11th Circuit Rules Individual Health Insurance Mandate Unconstitutional

In a good news-bad news scenario for lawyers challenging the individual mandate provision of Obamacare, the 11th circuit court in Atlanta ruled the provision unconstitutional by a 2-1 margain, while the 9th circuit court in San Francisco dismissed the case for lack of standing, even though it agreed to hear the case.

In the 11th, the judges ruled that the individual mandate was unconstitutional because it represented a broad interpretation of the Commerce Clause of the Constitution, which is the clause that gives Congress the power to keep commerce regular. The individual mandate, though, is an "unbounded assertion of congressional authority" inconsistent with that clause, which would require individuals to purchase health insurance for fear of penalty. The two judges that ruled in the majority were Judge Joel Dubina, a George H.W. Bush appointee, and Judge Frank Hull, a Bill Clinton appointee.

The 9th circuit, however, was a different matter entirely. The case was dismissed due to "lack of standing" on the part of the prosecutors, with Judge Dana Sabraw handing down the decision. This came after the case was turned down by the Supreme Court for expediated judgement. This ruling was not a shock to many people due to the left-leaning nature of this branch, which has often been called the "Nutty Ninth" for those reasons.

So far, three branches of the US Court of Appeals have ruled on the individual mandate, and only the 11th ruled it unconstitutional thus far. The third branch, the 6th up in Ohio, upheld it by a 2-1 vote, which would all but ensure that the fate of the individual mandate will not be decided until it reaches the Supreme Court once it is done working its way through the lower courts.

Originally published at www.silverunderground.com.

Distortions or Lies?

Recently, we’ve blogged about YAL chapters in Ohio helping out with The Ohio Project, which is a grassroots ballot initiative to nullify the federal healthcare mandate in Ohio. 385,000 signatures had to be gathered for the initiative to appear on the ballot this fall. On Thursday, about 550,000 signatures were turned in to the secretary of state (440,000 by the Ohio Project, and another 110,000 by a paid effort, Ohioans for Healthcare Freedom). 

Now, this might seem like the end of the story. However, following this event, the Ohio Democrat Party sent out a press release addressing the initiative. Usually, I ignore messages sent out by the two parties, but this one was so hideous that I felt it had to be addressed. 

The message from Seth Bringman, the ODP’s communication director, is below.

After over a year of paying petition circulators and collecting a modest amount of signatures, the Tea Party is patting itself on the back today. What the Tea Party won't tell you is that they are fighting against something that was a Republican invention championed by that Party's presidential frontrunner Mitt Romney. Their initiative is a waste of time and taxpayer money, and it doesn't come close to passing constitutional muster.

If you don't like the individual health care mandate, the government suggests you earn less money.

Yes, really:

President Obama's solicitor general, defending the national health care law on Wednesday, told a federal appeals court that Americans who didn't like the individual mandate could always avoid it by choosing to earn less money.

 

Neal Kumar Katyal, the acting solicitor general, made the argument under questioning before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit in Cincinnati, which was considering an appeal by the Thomas More Law Center. (Listen to oral arguments here.)....

 

During the Sixth Circuit arguments, Judge Jeffrey Sutton, who was nominated by President George W. Bush, asked Kaytal if he could name one Supreme Court case which considered the same question as the one posed by the mandate, in which Congress used the Commerce Clause of the U.S. Constitution as a tool to compel action.

 

Kaytal conceded that the Supreme Court had “never been confronted directly” with the question, but cited the Heart of Atlanta Motel case as a relevant example. In that landmark 1964 civil rights case, the Court ruled that Congress could use its Commerce Clause power to bar discrimination by private businesses such as hotels and restaurants.

 

“They’re in the business,” Sutton pushed back. “They’re told if you’re going to be in the business, this is what you have to do. In response to that law, they could have said, ‘We now exit the business.’ Individuals don’t have that option....That wasn’t in a single speech given in Congress about this...the idea that the solution if you don’t like it is make a little less money.”

Read more here.

What Obamacare Has Done For You:

After  attending a Young Democrats meeting last week, their chapter president directed me to healthcare.democrats.org , a website set up by the Democratic National Committee to assist in spreading the gospel of the "benefits" of Obamacare.

So, as he requested, I visited the site, entered my information, and received my report outlining exactly how Obamacare has "benefited" me. Being a healthy college student, the list was relatively short, but it was sufficient enough to ignite the same sense of indignation I felt over a year ago when this legal "monster of Frankenstein" was pushed through Congress.

The effects on me (or at least the effects chosen by the DNC to display to the public rather than hide from it) were as follows:

1.  Insurance companies must allow me to stay on my parents' plan until I am 26.

2.  My insurance company must now spend at least spend 80% of my premium dollars on health care -- not CEO salaries or profits.

3. I may no longer have to pay for preventive services such as vaccines or new-baby care.

All through this process, questions kept screaming in my mind:  At whose expense? By what right? At what cost?