The employer rules: Job policy trumps personal conviction
By Mark Davis
Dallas Morning News
11/30/04 Imagine a gun dealer refusing to sell a rifle to a hunter because animals should not be shot. Or a baby furniture dealer refusing to sell a crib to an expectant couple with five kids because their family is already too large. Preposterous? Of course, but it's the kind of thing that has actually happened at some Texas pharmacies – and would continue under the protection of law if a curious wave of zeal is not squashed in Austin. A bill authored by state Rep. Frank Corte, R-San Antonio, would protect pharmacists from professional repercussions if they refuse to fill prescriptions for "emergency contraceptives." You might know them as "morning-after" pills, designed to prevent pregnancy if taken within 72 hours of sex. That creates an understandable objection among those who believe human procreation is not to be interfered with. So what happens when the occasional objecting pharmacist is looking at a customer clutching a prescription for morning-after pills? Some have refused to fill them, and that's where the battle lines are drawn. But this one has an easy answer: Pharmacists are entitled to the moral conscience of their choosing, but they are not entitled to expect their employers to contort themselves to accommodate it. If a pharmacy chooses to not stock such prescriptions as a matter of policy, that's fine. But if it does, anyone working there must serve customers without a moment's delay, moral concerns or no. That means no handing the matter off to another employee and certainly no lectures, as happened at a North Richland Hills pharmacy in March. Two months earlier, pharmacists in Denton refused a morning-after pill prescription to a rape victim. They were properly fired. Where did the notion arise that employees get to interrupt the transaction of business because they are offended by something? Working at a gun store means selling guns. Working at the New Fine Arts means selling porn. Working at a pharmacy, with almost no exceptions, means selling birth control of various types. In each example, employee conscience crises are resolved not by employer capitulation, but by the employee hitting the road. This is in no way a religious freedom issue. Pharmacists may hold any beliefs they wish – and if they open their own shop, they may reflect those beliefs in their policies. But once in the employ of someone else, their personal morality becomes irrelevant to the duty of serving the customer. What's next, vegan carhops at Sonic refusing to bring out my burger? This debate has been sidetracked by an examination of the worthiness of the pharmacists' objections. I may well admire their morals, but that has nothing to do with the duty they accept the moment they choose to work for a business that may dispense a pill that conflicts with their beliefs. Does the drugstore clerk at the front counter get the same leeway? Imagine the public-address system springing to life: "Larry, we need help at the front. Customer has a three-pack of Trojans. I'm conflicted." Doctors prescribe what they wish because most are their own bosses. Pharmacists may stock or not stock anything they wish when they own the business. But anyone working at a pharmacy is obligated to efficiently fill any and all in-stock prescriptions that come across the counter. They may raise red flags in the event of a prescription error or an unforeseen drug interaction or some other valid pharmaceutical obstacle. But their personal feelings must never throw a wrench into the already frustrating world of customer service. Legislators suggesting statutory protection for this nonsense are engaged in a confused pander to values voters. The job of those who might be sympathetic to the pharmacists is to realize that if a business practice creates a rare employee moral quandary, it is not the business that needs to bend. The Mark Davis Show airs from 9 a.m. to noon weekdays on WBAP News/Talk 820. His column appears Wednesdays in Viewpoints, and his e-mail address is mdavis@wbap.com.
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