The (Further) Eroding Moral Marketplace

My opposition to a pharmacist's right of conscience is grounded, in significant part, on my desire to maintain a vibrant "moral marketplace" in which pharmacies can serve as limited mediating structures, carving out their own identities on contested moral issues, e.g. whether or not to offer Plan B and whether or not to honor a pharmacist's own claim of conscience absent a legal mandate.  The reality of a moral marketplace presumes, of course, that the government will allow it to exist.  That appears increasingly in doubt, as evidenced by Wal-Mart's announcement yesterday that it would, under pressure from various state governments, reverse its corporate policy and begin selling Plan B at all of its pharmacies nationwide.  Wal-Mart indicated that it would allow individual pharmacists to refuse to dispense Plan B, subject to their willingness to refer the customer elsewhere.  NARAL immediately objected even to this loophole, contending that this limited pharmacist opt-out "really does leave the door open for women to lose access."

Rob