This article is 8 years old, but the article about a Catholic healthcare provider denying MAID services reminded me of it. i learned about it from a friend who is a researcher of medical/healthcare policy in the US.
Basically, when Catholic hospitals merge or are even bought out by secular providers in the states, the Catholic church inserts language into the contract (the property becomes “encumbered” I think is the term) to require facilities to follow / adopt Catholic restrictions in perpetuity. These restrictions can never be unwound and are generally hidden from public knowledge during the deal.
Since 2001, the number of acute care hospitals operating under Catholic doctrine has shot up 22 percent.
As Mindy Swank discovered, it’s often impossible to know when a secular hospital is operating under Catholic restrictions. Genesis became a zombie religious hospital in 1994, during a merger with Catholic Mercy Hospital in Davenport, Iowa. The trend has accelerated in recent years, as secular hospitals have joined forces with Catholic facilities in an effort to hold their own against insurance companies and to comply with requirements for greater collaboration under the Affordable Care Act. In five states—Alaska, Iowa, South Dakota, Washington, and Wisconsin—more than 40 percent of acute care hospital beds now fall under Catholic doctrine.
I wonder if anyone has challenged these restrictions in court. Most states follow a rule against perpetuities that would void any perpetual encumberance on a property (I think South Dakota is the exception).
im sure it is structured in a way to elide any existing rules by the structure of the merger/transfer of management, but still exists for all practical purposes in perpetuity. the church is the oldest known organization on the planet, with the bank of england in a distant second.
not to mention, how does one prove “standing” in the case or find a court that isn’t ruled over by some tradcath maniac who will overturn every precedent to say the rights of an ancient church in italy supersede any american women’s right to bodily autonomy, because Jeppu Crimbo said so in 33 AD.
it occurs to me that the courts are not the mechanism for protecting the rights of the working class. they are the least democratic branch and they are ruled over by an elite professional class in a strict hierarchy of prestige and power. they are coinflippers at best. more commonly, they put their fingers on the scale behind closed doors and can detain people who argue with them on a whim.
my point being, if we’re waiting for the courts on an issue, we’ve already lost.