Religious freedom and the Common Good

The key issue is not just whether corporations have a right to religious freedom that allows them to escape government regulations that have a secular purpose. It is also, and more importantly, whether anyone has a religious right to escape from such regulations. Except with regard to regulations that impinge on religious ritual practices, I think the answer is no. If you look back at the text that gave one of the first and still most powerful arguments for religious freedom, Locke’s Essay on Toleration, you will see that religious freedom is not the freedom to have one’s own religious beliefs trump laws that have a legitimate purpose in serving the common good or protecting the rights of other.