Tagged Hobby Lobby

Judaism is the star at a Bible museum built by Hobby Lobby

Kids can be Samson bringing down the walls at Courageous Pages, the play area at the new Museum of the Bible in Washington, D.C. (Ron Kampeas)
November 21, 2017 / Ron Kampeas, JTA

WASHINGTON (JTA) — As the Burning Bush crackles, God is heard. “Mow-zes,” God says in the mysterious mid-Atlantic accent that Hollywood once trained its actors to use — the one Anne Baxter as Nefertiti used to summon Charlton Heston’s Moses in the 1956 blockbuster “The Ten Commandments.” “Mow-zes, Mow-zes.”… Read more »

In reviewing ‘Hobby Lobby’ opinion, Jews see reasons to diverge over Neil Gorsuch

Supreme Court nominee Neil Gorsuch at a news conference on Capitol Hill, Feb, 1, 2017. (Drew Angerer/Getty Images)
February 15, 2017 / Ron Kampeas, JTA

  WASHINGTON (JTA) – On June 27, 2013, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 1oth Circuit, based in Denver, handed down a decision that would make history a year later when it was upheld by the Supreme Court: Closely held corporations have the same religious freedom rights as… Read more »

Jewish groups stand by religious freedom law, but Supremes’ take in Hobby Lobby ruling divides them
July 1, 2014 / Ron Kampeas, JTA
Demonstrators in Washington celebrate the U.S. Supreme Court decision in the Hobby Lobby case, June 30, 2014. (Mark Wilson/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON (JTA) — Two decades ago the Jewish community united in support of landmark religious freedom legislation. Now the Supreme Court’s application of that law has Jewish groups divided. Leading Jewish advocacy groups denounced the court’s 5-4 decision Monday in theHobby Lobby case granting religious freedoms protections to companies, while Orthodox groups… Read more »

In Hobby Lobby contraceptive case, arguing about kosher butchers
April 1, 2014 / Ron Kampeas, JTA
Demonstrators rally ouside of the U.S. Supreme Court during oral arguments in Sebelius v. Hobby Lobby March 25, 2014. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

WASHINGTON (JTA) — For 20 or so minutes last week, the issue of religious freedom was cast as a struggle between working women and Muslim and Jewish butchers. The pointed questions posed March 25 to the Obama administration’s chief lawyer by three U.S. Supreme Court justices got to the… Read more »

Whither the Jewish macher? Upstarts increasingly setting Jewish agenda
November 5, 2013 / Ron Kampeas, JTA
Nathan Lewin, left, and his daughter Alyza created headaches for major Jewish groups by persevering with a so-far unsuccessful lawsuit to get the State Department to recognize Jerusalem-born Americans as born in Israel. (Washington Week)

WASHINGTON (JTA) — On Sept. 27, the conservative political blogger Ken Berwitz was enraged — not by Democratic malfeasance, his favored bugbear, but by the policies of an Oklahoma-based chain of craft stores. Berwitz was bothered not only that Hobby Lobby was keeping Hanukkah tchotchkes off its shelves, but that… Read more »