Portion of healthcare reform found unconstitutional
Posted: Mon Dec 13, 2010 1:29 pm
http://nation.foxnews.com/health-care/2 ... care-today
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/co ... 02420.html
Fun fact: the judge was a Bush appointee.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/co ... 02420.html
This is a declarative ruling and not an injunctive one, so if I understand it properly that means the law will stand as written until it is reviewed by an appellate court, which I certainly hope it will be. Otherwise, the healthcare industry will soon collapse under its own corpulent weight, and there's no way public opinion would support a single-payer system, even in that eventuality.article wrote:U.S. District Court Judge Henry E. Hudson found that Congress could not order individuals to buy health insurance.
In a 42-page opinion, Hudson said the provision of the law that requires most individuals to get insurance or pay a fine by 2014 is an unprecedented expansion of federal power that cannot be supported by Congress's power to regulate interstate trade.
"Neither the Supreme Court nor any federal circuit court of appeals has extended Commerce Clause powers to compel an individual to involuntarily enter the stream of commerce by purchasing a commodity in the private market," he wrote. "In doing so, enactment of the [individual mandate] exceeds the Commerce Clause powers vested in Congress under Article I [of the Constitution.]
Fun fact: the judge was a Bush appointee.