The majority opinion was written by Chief Justice John Roberts, who held that the law was a valid exercise of Congress’s power to tax.
Huge ruling in favor of Obama. Watch the GOP spin this in their favor.
Very disappointing day for many, maybe the majority if people in the US.
Wonder if we’ll hear about the terrible Conservative SCOTUS making another 5-4 decision based on politics.
File this under “we lost, you won” and remember that when you lose the next one. You win some and you lose some, stop blaming politics.
Please share widely!
I was hoping it would be struck down so we could then move toward single payer.
It would have been back to the drawing board, and a President Romney and Speaker Boehner and Majority Leader McConnell would not have touched this issue for four years, then after 4-8 years of Romney Democrats might then have another shot to reopen this debate, a debate many of them bungled and were afraid to fight. No thank you, I’d rather get all the benefits of the law now and add a strong public option 10-15 years down the road to contain costs. The Medicare extension to cover everyone 130% over the poverty line will be more than enough to cover the uninsured, the working poor, and the lower middle class.
While single payer or a public option would be preferable, in all likelihood they would save middle class workers very little. An opt-in public option would serve the same people already served by the Medicare extension. We won the battle, now lets focus on winning the war and playing the long game. As the President pointed out, blowing up the existing system was just too hard and difficult to do, but I will take ACA over the alternative, and no future Republican or Democratic administration would take up this issue had this failed today.
I think better of the American people than you do. This was a huge ruling in favor of the American Constitution, which does not allow for nine persons in robes to legislate for the bench. This conservative policy was enacted despite the high bar of writing a new law that exists in our democratic system.
Seems John Roberts does care about his legacy.
It’s a tax. A big tax. 2.5% on your income (ramping up from 1% in 2014.) Now, it ALWAYS was a tax increase but now the SCOTUS concurs. If you want to call this “spin,” feel free. I call it “framing the issue.” Sorry.
I haven’t read the opinion, but how was the mandate treated?
As I’ve stated before, the solution to this problem is and should be legislative, not judicial.
If you like what you say it’s “framing” if you don’t it’s “spin”. Both are designed to mislead. I think the solution to this problem is not funneling money to Blue Cross et al, but conservatives in both parties love the idea.
And I’m sick of people misusing the word tax. I won’t vote to obliterate the income tax? That’s a “tax hike”. You have to pay a fee for something to be done, it’s “a tax”. I know it’s great spin/framing, but it’s dishonest.
The framing/spin decision is similar to the bold and courageous/arrogant judicial overreach distinction, which depends on whether one agreed.
I also think that when governments raise fees in order to achieve “revenue enhancement” these words are chosen for no reason other than spin, so it doesn’t seem to me to be a party foul to spin it differently.
In both instances, the government does things that cause you to make a transfer of your money to the government. You can call it a tax, a fee, or a fiddlefaddle, but the effect is the same.
It was, at the time it was passed, and remains, an unpopular bill. If that is merely because it wasn’t sold well, then whose fault is that?
I think the hope in 2010 was that by 2012, everyone would love all the new benefits. Hasn’t happened yet. Maybe by 2014.
I actually got choked up when the decision came down. Just printed it out (193 pp!) and look forward to parsing the decision and dissent, but for now, wins are so few and far between that I’m simply celebrating. my FB page and e-mail inbox has been lighting up since 10:30 in a way I haven’t see in a while.
The fact that nearly the whole thing was upheld is a huge game-changer for November. The President now runs from a position of strength. I’ll go so far as to suggest that John Roberts may have just won him a second term. Strange world.
I listened to coverage On Point (WBUR) as the decision was announced.
Several of the legal scholars made two points that make me gravely concerned:
1. The decision seems to severely restrict Congress’s ability to withhold federal funding (such as in the medicare/medicaid section) as punishment. This has implications that are far far broader than ACA.
2. While upholding the ACA by treating it as a tax measure, the Court also accepted the constitutional arguments offered by ACA opponents. This, too, has very far-reaching implications.
This decision smells of a political horse-trade to me. I continue to be uncomfortable with the highly-politicized split of the Court. I am even more uncomfortable by the power this gives John Roberts.
I hate sports metaphors, but I’ll use one anyway. This decision, coming in the midst of a Presidential campaign, looks to me like a high inside heater thrown at Barack Obama from the political right wing of the GOP. It puts the ACA squarely on the front burner as a campaign issue, and we can now expect that the billions of dollars worth of right-wing PAC money unleashed by Citizens United will be spent distorting the ACA. Unlike the Supreme Court, the media and GOP is not required to be even remotely truthful. With any luck, President Obama will knock this pitch out of the park. The risk is that he’ll step back out of the box — or worse, will be beaned and taken out of the game.
1. Re withholding funding. It is a restriction, but I am not sure if it is a severe restriction. The restriction is that you can’t withhold funding on program A to force compliance with program B. The controversial point is whether this statute is expanding or re-purposing Medicaid. It is now difficult to simply pile programs atop one another like pancakes in a stack; Congress however could repeal and replace the existing scheme.
2. The commerce clause justification was, by far, the most unsettling aspect of the law, at least for me, because there really was no limit on the proposed power given the government. Even david’s limiting princiles relied more on “well, this case is special” than by supplying a principle. In the event, as david noted months ago, it was called a mandate, but was not structured as am actual mandate. It was structured as a tax incentive. It seems clear that all of the fuss about the commerce power was political cover; calling it a tax would have killed it. I don’t see why the constitutional application of limits of government power should turn on the slipperiness of congressmen. This seems like the right call.
3. Did you ever think that this would be anything other than a major issue in November? Republicans regained the Congress because this was a political issue in 2010; of course they will try the same play in November.
Had it been completely upheld, on all theories, it would be a campaign issue, because it is not a popular bill. At least not yet. Had it been completely overturned, it would be a campaign issue, because a gravely wounded Obama would campaign against a dictorial court. Democrats forced a not-particularly popular law through, with no particular effort at really selling it, on a party line vote, in hopes that the bill would become more popular in time. Hasn’t happened yet. Eventually, they will have to sell it. Maybe now would be a good time.
This withholding of funding is usually used as a backdoor violation of American federalism, rather than an enforcement of federal law. I like that part.
…the President did a good job laying out what is at stake. Granted it sounded like he dusted off the 2009 talking points, but this is the kind of thing about which we need constant reminders about how it works and why it’s good. I do think the tax argument is stronger than the commerce clause argument, especially since the tax provision is unenforceable anyway. One question I have is why the warning about Medicaid. If I understand the Court correctly they are saying Medicaid funds cannot be withdrawn for failure to comply. Is that a message to the regulators that that is what the law says? Seems like Congress would have every right in the world to write a law attaching strings to federal funding along with criteria for withdrawal of same.
Medicaid. A program enacted to cover certain individuals and/or families. Call it Group A.
Addordable Care Act, Medicaid expansion. Leaves Group A, adds a new batch of individuals. Call these new folks Group B. This didn’t change Group A, it just added Group B.
The Court said: you can’t require states to cover Group B by witholding funding for the long-standing program covering Group A. You can withold funding for Group B from states that don’t cover Group B. So the spending power cannot be used to make the states an offer they can’t refuse, so to speak.
Of course, it sure seems to me that Congress could simply repeal Medicaid and replace it such that Group A no longer exists, Group B is never identified, but instead covers Group C. And Group C just happens to be A+B. That’s why these seems like a restriction, but not a severe one.
I think this decision will recharge the hugely popular movement and we may see headwinds which caused a huge GOP victory in 2010.
I also think this decision will give Gov Romney a lot of ammo to hammer Obama on. Hopefully the GOP will churn this decision in tot he already majority of Americans who didn’t like ObamaCare and make some hay in the battleground states. In many states, it won’t take a huge swing to bring them over.
Cross your fingers like-minded friends.
the unions (AKA root of all evil).
But in all honestly, the conservative court ACA was upheld. With all due respect to your post 5 -4 on this is pretty nutty, how do they explain the 4 votes.
we are making progress all over the country with CA being the latest state making huge cuts to union benefits both at local (San Diego…) and statewide contract levels.
How do I explain 4 votes? How would you explain any vote going 5-4?
Governor Romney passed ObamaCare at the state level, I really do not see how he can really hammer at this issue in the general election without getting the MSM and the Obama campaign to constantly bring it up over and over again. Lastly, the anti-Obamacare crowd is in his camp anyway.
JohnD, meet Red Mass Group!
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Despite his vehement rhetoric against the Affordable Care Act now, I think it is unlikely Romney would support the outright repeal if elected. Certainly we all know what he says at any given moment cannot be trusted.