In response to a phony crisis over “religious liberty” engendered by the right, President Obama seems to have stood his ground on an essential principle — free access to birth control for any woman. That access, along with the ability to receive family planning and preventive health services, was at the foundation of health care reform.

Mr. Obama’s new rule on birth control coverage lets institutions affiliated with a religion shift the cost of coverage to their insurance companies, but Mr. Obama assured Americans it would not result in other women, or the rest of the country, subsidizing that shift. By refusing to back down on Friday, Mr. Obama took an action that will help reduce the number of unwanted pregnancies, abortions and medical complications from pregnancy.

Nonetheless, it was dismaying to see the president lend any credence to the misbegotten notion that providing access to contraceptives violated the freedom of any religious institution. Churches are given complete freedom by the Constitution to preach that birth control is immoral, but they have not been given the right to laws that would deprive their followers or employees of the right to disagree with that teaching.

If a religious body does not like a public policy that affects its members, it is free to try to change it, but it cannot simply opt out of society or claim a special exemption from the law. Besides, contraceptive access is already in place in 28 states, and has been the law in New York for a decade, without inflicting the slightest blow to the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church, which has complied.