Contraceptives mandate fits administration's pattern of disregard for religious freedoms

You'd have to be living in a groundhog hole the past few days to have missed the controversy over the administration's decision to mandate contraception coverage nationwide virtually regardless of religious or ethical objections.
Clearly the issue goes well beyond the controversy over contraception coverage to more fundamental principles of American civil rights. That's why even normally supportive media are assailing the President's assault on the First Amendment. Left-leaning  Washington Post commentator E.J. Dionne wrote of "Obama's breach of faith;" the Chicago Tribune ran a critical editorial, "A matter of faith" and USA Today editors opined that the "Contraception mandate violates religious freedom."
What's not getting quite as much coverage is the broader, extremely dangerous pattern of civil liberties violations into which the contraception coercion fits.
In the past three years, people of faith and conscience have witnessed:

1. the gutting of the only federal regulation protecting the exercise of conscience in health care; 
2. the denial of federal grant funds for aiding human trafficking victims because a faith-based organization refused to participate in abortion; 
3. the administration's lobbying of the Supreme Court to restrict faith-basedorganizations' hiring rights; and 
4. a coercive contraceptive mandate that imposes the government's ideology on the faith-based and pro-life communities.

History shows that wholesale abridgement of civil liberties happens gradually rather than overnight. History also shows that taking away the rights of one group of citizens leads to the loss of rights for any group of citizens.
If you recognize this dangerous trend and want the U.S. to avoid repeating the mistakes of history, contact your legislators today and tell them to support pending legislation to protect conscience rights and civil liberties, such as the Respect for Rights of Conscience Act.