COOPERATION WITH EVIL, THE THEORY OF ACTION AND THE CONTRACEPTION MANDATE

Abstract

Abstract The debate concerning the so-called U.S.Health and Human Services (HHS) Contraception Mandatehas been adequately framed, in the academic field, within the traditional ethical doctrine oncooperation with evil. This principle will allow us to conclude whether employers may ethically comply with the onerous existing law or not. The discussion has been quite heated, because the practical conclusions authors have reached vary widely, depending on which interpretation of the theory they rely on. In this paper, some of these explanations are addressed and analyzed from the standpoint of the Thomistic theory of action, which is now the most common point of view. This work concludes that, although theContraception Mandatewill most likely be repealed by the current U.S. administration, as things once stood, compliance with it may have been ethically licit in some cases.