Yesterday afternoon, Judge Rodger Vinson, who has presided over the 26-state lawsuit against the Affordable Care Act, issued his ruling.
In a decision that constitutes radical judicial activism run amok, Judge Vinson declared the "individual mandate" portion of the Affordable Care Act unconstitutional.
He then took the opportunity to insert his political philosophy into public policy, striking down the entire law! This decision flies in the face of fourteen other decisions, contradicts decades of legal precedent, and could jeopardize families' health care security. And to make matters worse, this is the very kind of judicial activism that most conservative justices and politicians have argued against for years.
In the recent Virginia ruling, Judge Henry E. Hudson adhered to precedent, narrowly tailoring his opinion by only striking down the individual mandate in December. Judge Vinson, however, took his ruling about ten steps further. He declared that, "Because the individual mandate is unconstitutional and not severable, the entire Act must be declared void."
Then, in comparing the Affordable Care Act to a watch, Judge Vinson said, "The Act, like a defectively designed watch, needs to be redesigned and reconstructed by the watchmaker."
With all due respect, Judge Vinson, if anything, the health care system before passage of the Affordable Care Act was a broken watch that forced hardworking Americans to spin their wheels while insurance companies had the right to discriminate against those who are -- or have been -- sick and to take away coverage if they get sick.
If this decision were allowed to stand, it would have devastating consequences for America's families.
Children with pre-existing conditions would once again be denied access to health care; insurers could take away health coverage and reinstate lifetime limits on coverage; small businesses would once again be priced out of the market; and seniors would lose their access to no-cost preventive services and help with the cost of prescription drugs.
If that's not enough, consider this: Insurance companies could continue to arbitrarily jack up premiums without meaningful oversight, all the while using more and more of your money to line CEOs pockets instead of spending it on actual health care.
While we are extremely disappointed with this activist ruling, we're not all that surprised.
Instead of filing the lawsuit in Tallahassee, the capital of Florida, then-Attorney General Bill McCollum chose to file the suit in Pensacola, where three out of three sitting federal judges were appointed by Republican Presidents. By going forum shopping, Attorney General Bill McCollum all but guaranteed this outcome.
We are confident, as this and other cases are decided on appeal, that the Affordable Care Act will be upheld in its entirety. We further expect that implementation of the law will continue uninterrupted, and, as a result, our nation will move much closer to the achievement of high-quality, affordable health coverage and care for all Americans.
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| Obama | Romney | |
|---|---|---|
| Electoral Votes (270 to win) |
332 | 206 |
| Obama | Romney | |
|---|---|---|
| Total | 65,899,660 | 60,932,152 |
| Percent | 51.1% | 47.2% |
| Democrats* | Republicans | |
|---|---|---|
| Current Senate | 53 | 47 |
| Seats gained or lost | +2 | -2 |
| New Total | 55 | 45 |
| Democrats | Republicans | |
|---|---|---|
| Seats won | 201 | 234 |
I don't understand why so many people wish for the government to have so much power over their lives. Where are the classical liberals that would never stand for this sort of thing?
To argue otherwise, is folly.
No amount of nitpicking over Vinson's possible motivations and agenda, the possible fallout of repeal or otherwise, or conjuring up of connotations and denotations is worth anything at this point!
None of that holds water in a court of LAW.
What we NEED now are clear, objective, legally sound proof, jurisprudence and arguments that can REFUTE Judge Vinson's ruling, especially in the area of what constitutes "inactivity" as far as Commerce Law is concerned.
How "inactivity" is to be construed is the crux of Vinson's ruling. Arguing about severability is useless and really moot if the 'inactivity' argument cannot be won.
But yeah, let's not kid ourselves either: the individual mandate CANNOT be separated from the rest of the ACA bill. The entire law WILL fail and even backfire and make things worse if the individual mandate were struck down.
Obama should've stuck to his guns and fought for the Public Option. WHY the PO was "not viable" is still simply beyond me.
I followed the whip counts for the Public Option, it had the votes to pass, while I support Obama, he did make a conscious decision to scrap it to appease the insurance industry.
Ya know, that's the thing about the Democrats. They often don't have the courage in their own convictions. All too willing to play the game that they accuse the Republicans of. Both parties really screwed this one up, and because they controlled both Houses in addition to the White House, the bulk of the blame for this big stinking mess has to go to the Dems. Way to go and choke on your big moment, guys!
Some additional information would be nice
"This decision flies in the face of fourteen other decisions"
Does that include the 12 decisions that were not based on the merits?
"Contradicts decades of legal precedent"
Some case names might be helpful to illustrate this point.
"And could jeopardize families' health care security."
It is possible, but since the law has been passed insurance premiums and copays have continued to go up (and this law has been attributed to a number of those increases) jeopardizing the healthcare security of those previously covered.
The aforementioned Supreme Wing is a cliche. If you want to know how bad it really is, I recommend Erwin Chemerinsky’s excellent The conservative assault on the Constitution, and a good look at the appalling and literally seditious District of Columbia v. Heller decision ( http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/07-290.ZS.html ).
Well, he kinda didn't have a choice. You see, the government stated SPECIFCALLY and clearly in it's arguments before the court that the act COULD NOT STAND without the mandate to fund it. Basically, the government said it's all or nothing.
The judge simply took them at their word.
I wonder why liberals don't care about that? Do they honestly thing we'll never have another Rebulican controlled Congress and White House?
The 5 to 4 decision was how to remedy the clear violation of the 14th Amendment. Since there was no way to remedy the violation without the U.S. Supreme Court (or the Florida Supreme Court) rewriting the laws of Florida regarding 'hanging chads' etc., it simply allowed the Secretary's decision to certify the result under Florida law to stand. Courts do not have the right to rewrite laws and there were no laws on the books that could be interpreted to achieve a different result.
One cannot fault the Supreme Court for refusing to do what the Florida legislation should have done for its citizens, write a law similar to Texas and other States that covered 'hanging chads' and similar issues which would have permitted a recount using 'commissioners' in different counties etc.
The 5 to 4 decision was judicial restraint, not activism as many like to argue.
The problem with the GOP is they don't either as you just demonstrated.
Does anyone have a link to the actual ruling? Because if he made that statement, I'm going to hammer him on that statement over and over again.
Tea Party Judge Roger Vinson ‘Borrows Heavily’ From Family Research Council To Invalidate Health Law
But a closer read of his analysis reveals something peculiar. In fact, as Vinson himself admits in Footnote 27 (on pg. 65), he arrived at this conclusion by “borrow[ing] heavily from one of the amicus briefs filed in the case for it quite cogently and effectively sets forth the applicable standard and governing analysis of severability (doc. 123).” That brief was filed by the Family Research Council, which has been branded as a hate group by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC).
. . .
Vinson’s conclusion is peculiar because the courts usually defer to Congress on questions of severability. In fact, even Judge Henry Hudson — the Virginia Judge who also found the individual mandate to be unconstitutional — left the whole of the law intact noting, “It would be virtually impossible within the present record to determine whether Congress would have passed this bill, encompassing a wide variety of topics related and unrelated to health care, without Section 1501…Therefore, this Court will hew closely to the time-honored rule to sever with circumspection, severing any ‘problematic portions while leaving the remainder intact.‘“
http://thinkprogress.org/2011/01/31/vinson-frc/”