Obamacare and the Supreme Court

[Moliere]

Sarah Palin @SarahPalinUSA
Obama lied to the American people. Again. He said it wasn't a tax. Obama lies; freedom dies.

God bless you Sarah!!

[Moliere]

Lachlan Markay @LachlanMarkay
I'm so old I remember when Roberts was a right wing nutjob.

[All-American]

On the mandate "tax":

According to the Government, even if Congress lacks the power to direct individuals to buy insurance, the only effect of the individual mandate is to raise taxes on those who do not do so, and thus the law may be upheld as a tax.

[All-American]

The silver lining: Congress does not have the power to compel the purchase of broccoli.

The individual mandate, however, does not regulate existing commercial activity. It instead compels individuals to become active in commerce by purchasing a product, on the ground that their failure to do so affects interstate commerce. Construing the Commerce Clause to permit Congress to regulate individuals precisely because they are doing nothing would open a new and potentially vast domain to congressional authority. Every day individuals do not do an infinite number of things. In some cases they decide not to do something; in others they simply fail to do it. Allowing Congress to justify federal regulation by pointing to the effect of inaction on commerce would bring countless decisions an individual could potentially make within the scope of federal regulation, and—under the Government’s theory—empower Congress to make those decisions for him.

Indeed, the Government’s logic would justify a mandatory purchase to solve almost any problem. See Seven-Sky,
661 F. 3d, at 14–15 (noting the Government’s inability to “identify any mandate to purchase a product or service in interstate commerce that would be unconstitutional” under its theory of the commerce power). To consider a different example in the health care market, many Americans do not eat a balanced diet. That group makes up a larger percentage of the total population than those without health insurance. See, e.g., Dept. of Agriculture and Dept. of Health and Human Services, Dietary Guidelines for Americans 1 (2010). The failure of that group to have a healthy diet increases health care costs, to a greater extent than the failure of the uninsured to purchase insurance. See, e.g., Finkelstein, Trogdon, Cohen, & Dietz, Annual Medical Spending Attributable to Obesity: Payer- and Service-Specific Estimates, 28 Health Affairs w822 (2009) (detailing the “undeniable link between rising rates of obesity and rising medical spending,” and estimating that “the annual medical burden of obesity has
risen to almost 10 percent of all medical spending and could amount to $147 billion per year in 2008”). Those increased costs are borne in part by other Americans who must pay more, just as the uninsured shift costs to the insured. See Center for Applied Ethics, Voluntary Health Risks: Who Should Pay?, 6 Issues in Ethics 6 (1993) (noting “overwhelming evidence that individuals with unhealthy habits pay only a fraction of the costs associated with their behaviors; most of the expense is borne by the
rest of society in the form of higher insurance premiums, government expenditures for health care, and disability benefits”). Congress addressed the insurance problem by ordering everyone to buy insurance. Under the Government’s theory, Congress could address the diet problem by ordering everyone to buy vegetables. See Dietary Guidelines, supra, at 19 (“Improved nutrition, appropriate eating behaviors, and increased physical activity have tremendous potential to . . . reduce health care costs”).
People, for reasons of their own, often fail to do things that would be good for them or good for society. Those failures—joined with the similar failures of others—can readily have a substantial effect on interstate commerce. Under the Government’s logic, that authorizes Congress to use its commerce power to compel citizens to act as the Government would have them act.
That is not the country the Framers of our Constitution envisioned.

[Tex]

The silver lining:

@philipaklein: Upholding mandate on taxing power grounds grants Congress even more expansive power than if it were upheld on CC grounds.

[UtahDan]

Quoth Roberts: we reserve our opinion on the wisdom of the policy.

Hopefully his vote will help to counter the cynicism that has existed on the left since Bush v. Gore about justices simply voting their politics.

[All-American]

Justification for reading the mandate as a tax:

The question is not whether that is the most natural interpretation of the mandate, but only whether it is a “fairly possible” one. Crowell v. Benson, 285 U. S. 22, 62 (1932). As we have explained, “every reasonable construction must be resorted to, in order to save a statute from unconstitutionality.” Hooper v. California, 155 U. S. 648, 657 (1895). The Government asks us to interpret the mandate as imposing a tax, if it would otherwise violate the Constitution. Granting the Act the full measure of deference owed to federal statutes, it can be so read, for the reasons set forth below.

[All-American]

Defending against the dissenters:

The joint dissenters argue that we cannot uphold §5000A as a tax because Congress did not “frame” it as such. Post, at 17. In effect, they contend that even if the Constitution permits Congress to do exactly what we interpret this statute to do, the law must be struck down because Congress used the wrong labels. An example may help illustrate why labels should not control here. Suppose Congress enacted a statute providing that every taxpayer who owns a house without energy efficient windows must pay $50 to the IRS. The amount due is adjusted based on factors such as taxable income and joint filing status, and is paid along with the taxpayer’s income tax return. Those whose income is below the filing threshold need not pay. The required payment is not called a “tax,” a “penalty,” or anything else. No one would doubt that this law imposed a tax, and was within Congress’s power to tax. That conclusion should not change simply because Congress used the word “penalty” to describe the payment. Interpreting such a law to be a tax would hardly “[i]mpos[e] a tax through judicial legislation.” Post, at 25. Rather, it would give practical effect to the Legislature’s enactment.

[All-American]

@philipaklein: Upholding mandate on taxing power grounds grants Congress even more expansive power than if it were upheld on CC grounds.

I respectfully disagree.

[venkman]

Just another nail in the coffin. Limited federal power? 9th Amendment? 10th Amendment? LOL.

[Moliere]

Andy Borowitz @BorowitzReport
#SCOTUS UPDATE: Romney Blasts Supreme Court, Calling Affordable Care Act 'Worst Idea I Ever Had'

[venkman]

Hopefully his vote will help to counter the cynicism that has existed on the left since Bush v. Gore about justices simply voting their politics.

Or maybe this is his politics? Kennedy and I think Souter were nominated by Republican presidents.

I think they all vote their politics or at least political philosophy. One political philosophy is to try to interpret the constitution in it's original intent. Another is that the constitution can mean whatever the hell you want it to mean.

[All-American]

Roberts teeing up the election season:

The Framers created a Federal Government of limited powers, and assigned to this Court the duty of enforcing those limits. The Court does so today. But the Court does not express any opinion on the wisdom of the Affordable Care Act. Under the Constitution, that judgment is reserved to the people.

[LA Ute]

Or maybe this is his politics? Kennedy and I think Souter were nominated by Republican presidents.

A fair question, but I think Roberts is a conservative and just has integrity.

[LA Ute]

You spend every morning with yourself. I think you'll be fine

I would love to, but those &%!@!?! kids are always on my lawn. I can't be alone even if I want to.