Daniel Mach is director of the American Civil Liberties Union’s program on freedom of religion and belief.

The Guttmacher Institute offers this Feb. 1, 2014, summary of state policies on emergency contraception, including a chart that shows which states allow pharmacists to refuse to dispense it. See also the institute’s February 2014 explanation of state policies on insurance coverage of contraceptives.

Eleven percent of sexually experienced American women ages 15-44 have used emergency contraception at least once, according to the 2006–2010 National Survey of Family Growth. That’s a jump from 1 percent of such women in 1995, the study says.

According to a June 13, 2012, fact sheet by the Public Religion Research Institute, Americans are split pretty evenly on the question of whether religious liberty is under attack in America. Interesting dichotomies were reported for Catholics, though, with just 44 percent telling PRRI that religious freedoms are being threatened — but 53 percent of […]

This Nov. 1, 2013, fact sheet by the Public Religion Research Institute provides data from its research on Americans’ views on gay and lesbian issues, including whether such matters should be decided at the state or federal level.

Joseph La Rue serves as legal counsel for the Alliance Defending Freedom, which describes itself as “an alliance-building legal ministry that advocates for the right of people to freely live out their faith.” He is based in the organization’s Scottsdale, Ariz., headquarters. The alliance supported the measure approved in February 2014 by the Arizona Legislature to […]

Read a Feb. 21, 2014, New York Times story about Arizona legislation that would let business owners use religious objections as justification for refusing service to gay couples.

Lisa Williams overcame years of childhood sexual abuse and other trauma and is now executive director of Living Water for Girls, a residential haven she founded in 2007 that provides education and therapeutic assistance to girls escaping prostitution and the street life. She lives in Georgia.  

Kate Mogulescu is the founder and supervising attorney of the Trafficking Victims Advocacy Project at the Legal Aid Society in New York City. The project has won praise from the American Bar Association, and Mogulescu has trained public defenders and prosecutors throughout the nation, as well as locally, on how to identify victims of sex trafficking […]