Title: Is the Affordable Care Act unconstitutional? - Washington Times
Headings: 'Is the Affordable Care Act unconstitutional?'
'Is the Affordable Care Act unconstitutional?'
ANALYSIS/OPINION:
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Content: And fourth, that the federal government would micromanage the delivery of health care and, along with the states, orchestrate and subsidize health care for those who did not receive it from an employer. TOP STORIES
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When the legal challenge to the ACA was before the U.S. Supreme Court in June 2012, the core issue was does the Commerce Clause of the U.S. Constitution — which delegates to Congress the power to regulate interstate commerce — empower Congress to compel people to engage in it by purchasing a health insurance policy. As the late President George H.W. Bush liked to ask: Can Congress force me to eat broccoli? When the Supreme Court took a preliminary vote after oral arguments on the constitutionality of the individual mandate, the tally was 5-4 to invalidate it. Then Chief Justice John Roberts had second thoughts. He saw the polls, which showed Mitt Romney safely ahead of President Barack Obama in the then-upcoming presidential race, and Republicans looking good to capture Congress. He reasoned to his colleagues that it would be better for history and the court’s legacy if the political branches invalidated legislation as controversial as the ACA, rather than the court.