Compromise involves two or more people occupying the middle ground between them instead of one person convincing or coercing the others into adopting his or her position. President Barack Obama’s “compromise” to ensure that all women have contraceptives included in their employer-offered health insurance is no such thing.

Last week, Obama bowed to public criticism of his requirement that organizations with religious, specifically Catholic, affiliations ensure that the women they employ can receive birth control as part of their health insurance. He “compromised” by requiring insurance companies to offer that coverage free of charge if employers refused to do so.

The absence of actual compromise on this issue is demonstrated by the fact that his “compromise” does not meet Catholic objections in the middle: His solution to religious objections against insuring birth control was merely to require insurance companies to offer that coverage if religious-affiliated employers refuse to do so. Instead of co-opting Catholics and everyone opposed to such government intrusion into private life, Obama found a way to get what he wanted without having to craft an actual compromise.

If ensuring that all women have access to contraceptives is truly a problem of national or even public importance, as Obama and others, such as Iowa’s former Lt. Gov. Sally Pederson, assert, then there should be a public solution, characterized by congressional debate and compromise, to the problem.

Compelling private organizations (in the case of health insurance companies, profit-seeking private organizations) to redress the ‘wrongs’ of other private organizations (in this case, hospitals and universities affiliated with the Catholic Church) is not the answer.

Not only is American independence founded on the idea that everyone has the right to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness,” but our Declaration of Independence states, “To secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men.” Private entities should not have to actively protect rights that governments are responsible for protecting.

The American Revolution occurred after “a long train of abuses and usurpations” by the British government became unbearable. Instead of allowing the colonial assemblies to make their own laws and contribute to the British imperial system, Parliament excluded the colonists from political decision-making. There is a tradition in America of making laws to solve our problems; when the issue is public and important enough, we can act on it.

Health, including that of women, is important. But it is an issue for a private families, not the public eye. Providing birth control to every woman may be important to those women or those families in their individual capacities, but unless there is a tangible benefit to the way people interact with one another — to public life — it is not a matter for government attention.

In other words, the objects of political attention in a republic should be matters that affect our public lives, not our private ones. Do we really want the government to have a stake in the most intimate kind of health of over 155 million Americans? If we are to believe case law such as Griswold v. Connecticut, which held that government intrusion into the bedroom is unconstitutional, and pro-choice advocates who say that the internal workings of a woman’s body politically are untouchable, should the government be given any role in determining what services a woman receives from a private organization?

Obama has said that women should have access to insured birth control regardless of who their employer is. But American law has a long history of shielding religious agencies from having to comply with laws that violate their conscience. While covering contraceptives in insurance policies does not mean necessarily that women will use the available services, churches should not be forced to act as accomplices or enablers to practices they condemn for reasons of conscience.

It is inconsistent policy making to exempt some religious groups but not others from legal controls. Other religions receive protection from federal laws that impact the rest of us. Native American groups are used to using peyote cactus in their religious ceremonies. Their use of it has been protected since 1965. Conscientious objectors to serving in the military do not even have to have a religious reason for doing so; their sincere opposition to war is enough.

Requiring anyone to do something, rather than refraining to do something, is always dangerous. Requiring someone to act contrary to their sacred beliefs is even more dangerous.