Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 2012 was introduced by Senator Marco Rubio for the purpose of repealing the recent mandate that infringes religious freedom and conscience rights of religious organizations by the recent mandate within President Obama's healthcare law. The bill was developed in order to revoke the provisions in the new health care law that compels religious of faith-based institutions to provide employees with insurance coverage for contraception without any charge. The bill seeks to amend Title XXVII of the Public Health Service Act in order to promote religious conscience protections for individuals and organizations. Senator Marco Rubio introduced this bill following recent initiatives by the Department of Health and Human Services to establish a new mandate that will require many church-affiliated institutions to provide their employees with private insurance coverage for birth control at no costs.

Component of Health Care Addressed by the Religious Freedom Restoration Act:

The delivery of health care services and the overall health care system is based on four major components i.e. coverage, timeliness, workforce, and services. Since access to comprehensive health care and the quality of these services is crucial, the four components are the foundations for access to health care services.

The Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 2012 deals with health care coverage since it seeks to address the mandate for faith-based institutions to provide coverage to their workers free-of-charge. As an important component health care, health insurance coverage enables patients to get access into the health care system as uninsured people have difficulties in accessing medical services easily, are more likely to die early, and have poor health status. As the new regulations in President Obama's health care law deal with provision of coverage about birth...

Prior, to the introduction of the bill, the Department of Health and Human Services had finalized the development of regulations that will require many church-affiliated institutions to abide by the legislations in the new health care law. These developments were established despite of numerous efforts by several religious-based institutions to be permitted an exemption on religious grounds.
The main provision in the Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 2012 is that it seeks for conscience protections of individuals and faith-based institutions. This is through amendments to the Public Health Service Act with which no regulations shall require any individual or organization to provide or buy coverage for contraceptive or sterilization service ("Religious Freedom Restoration Act," 2012). In this case, the individual or organization should not be forced to provide or buy coverage or related education and counseling to contraceptives and sterilization with which the person or entity is opposed to for religious reasons.

Secondly, the Religious Freedom Restoration Act seeks to make amendments that would enable individuals and religious-based organizations to be excluded from engagement in any government-mandated speech regarding contraceptives or sterilization service. This will be followed by the elimination of any imposed fines, penalties, and additional sanctions that would be disadvantageous to an individual or religious-based entity.

The main issue that the Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 2012 bill addresses is the principle of religious freedom. The basis for addressing the issue of religious freedom is the legislation in the First Amendment that prohibits the Congress from enacting laws that respect the establishment of religion or forbids the free exercise of religious practices by individuals. Through this provision in the First Amendment, the country's founders sought a protective balance that provided wide berth to religious beliefs and practices while differentiating government involvement with…