Remember the Missouri state representative who is
suing the Obama administration because he doesn't want his one minor and two adult daughters to have access to prescription birth control on his health insurance? His case was tossed out by federal trial court, but has been
resurrected by a three-judge panel on the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
In his challenge, state Rep. Paul Joseph Wieland asserts that his daughters would be able to get prescription birth control under his insurance plan, provided by the state of Missouri, and that violates his religious beliefs, just like Hobby Lobby's beliefs were supposedly violated if the insurance plans they provided to employees covered certain kinds of birth control. Never mind that Wieland's daughters might not want to get birth control, the very fact that they could was akin to "an edict that said that parents must provide a stocked, unlocked liquor cabinet in their house whenever they're away for their minor and adult daughters to use." Yep. Exactly the same. If you're a nutjob Republican looking to make your political name by challenging Obamacare, that is.
How likely is it the Supreme Court would extend its Hobby Lobby decision to an individual? If you look at the decision, not very likely because that decision had a balancing test—the government could make sure that that employees of a place like Hobby Lobby could still have access contraceptive coverage while making sure that the company didn't have to pay directly for it. The government came up with that accommodation and, so far, Hobby Lobby has accepted it. But this is very different, because Weiland isn't the employer in this case, he's the employee, the customer and he can't argue he's just like Hobby Lobby. Here, as Ian Milhiser points out, is where it gets sticky.
For one thing, it is a relatively simple administrative task for an insurance company to note that the plan that covers Hobby Lobby’s employees does not include birth control and to adjust premiums accordingly. It is much more difficult for insurers to keep track of the particular religious beliefs of every individual in their network of customers and adjust each plan according to those religious beliefs. And, despite the fact that Missouri used to offer a contraceptive-free plan, the legal rule that the Wielands seek could require insurers to track a large number of different religious objections.
He goes on to point out that if Weiland's objections were recognized by the courts, what's to stop "a plaintiff who doesn't just object to their daughters having birth control—they object to anyone having birth control." A zealous employee could object to coworkers having the access—anyone in any pool of insured people could object to it being available to everyone. That's what the religious right has been working toward for some time now, but it's probably not what the Supreme Court had in mind. Or at least all but three of them.