The University of Notre Dame filed a fresh lawsuit against the federal government over contraception requirements in the health-care law, arguing that the compromise offered by the Obama administration to resolve a standoff with the Catholic Church fails to address its objections.
The University of Notre Dame said it filed a fresh lawsuit against the federal government over contraception requirements in the health-care law. Louise Radnofsky reports on the News Hub. Photo: Getty Images.
The compromise allows religiously affiliated institutions with moral concerns about birth control, such as Notre Dame, to omit this coverage in the health-insurance plans they provide employees. Instead, insurers would be responsible for informing workers in those plans that they were eligible for separate contraception coverage with no additional premium or co-payments.
Notre Dame says in its complaint, filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Indiana, that the compromise offered by the administration still leaves the school complicit in something it considers immoral. The university says the health-care law has created a situation in which its sponsorship of an insurance plan is tantamount to condoning birth control and its acquisition. Notre Dame cited a recent advertising campaign aimed at young people that described contraception access as one of the key benefits to getting coverage.
The departments of Justice and of Health and Human Services declined to comment on pending litigation on Tuesday.
The Rev. John Jenkins, president of Notre Dame, was among the heads of several dozen prominent Catholic organizations who filed lawsuits last year against the administration in search of a broader exemption from the requirement, such as the one now offered to houses of worship and a few other religious institutions that primarily employ and serve only members of their own faith.
Father Jenkins, who hosted President Barack Obama as the school's commencement speaker in May 2009 despite criticism over Mr. Obama's support of abortion rights, said in an interview Monday night that the university was renewing its litigation after determining the compromise to be unsatisfactory. "We're dealing with the freedom of an institution that is avowedly religious," he said. "We feel this really goes to the heart of religious institutions of all kinds and their freedom under the law to live out their mission," he said.
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Rev. John Jenkins, president of Notre Dame University, speaking at the Washington Ideas Forum at the Newseum in Washington in November. Reuters
Owners of for-profit companies, including Catholics, Mennonites and evangelical Christians, have also filed suits arguing that the requirement to provide birth-control coverage breaches their religious freedom.

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Two of those cases are set to be heard by the Supreme Court in the spring of 2014. In those cases, the government says the requirement as applied to for-profit employers is "lawful and essential to women's health" and that their owners shouldn't be allowed to cite religious beliefs as a reason for exemption. But unless the court voids the entire provision, the religiously affiliated institutions would be unlikely to be affected.
The contraception fight isn't the only legal challenge to the health-care law still in the courts. Some employers opposed to the law are arguing that it doesn't authorize people to receive federal tax credits in the states where Washington is running the exchanges. Small businesses that filed suit in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia will have their case heard Tuesday afternoon. The Republican-controlled House Judiciary Committee also held a hearing examining that claim on Tuesday morning.
Exhibit A in the case is a controversial advertising campaign running in Colorado that which highlights contraception coverage as one of the main reasons for young people to get health insurance. One of the ads, according to the complaint, depicts a "female youth next to male youth and stating 'OMG he's hot! Let's hope he's as easy to get as this birth control. My health insurance covers the pill, which means all I have to worry about is getting him between the covers.' "
Father Jenkins said he had met several times with high-ranking administration officials to try to find a more acceptable compromise, as well as talking on the telephone with them. "The administration has been good to us. We got a hearing, we presented our views, and they weren't able to accommodate us," he said.
The Obama administration has declined to comment on previous lawsuits. Officials including President Barack Obama and Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius have said before that they believe the accommodation they are offering is designed to respect religious concerns while also ensuring that all women have access to contraception.
"Today's announcement reinforces our commitment to respect the concerns of houses of worship and other nonprofit religious organizations that object to contraceptive coverage, while helping to ensure that women get the care they need, regardless of where they work," Mrs. Sebelius said in June, when the final rules setting the compromise were released.
Write to Louise Radnofsky at louise.radnofsky@wsj.com