{"id":4154,"date":"2011-08-12T16:07:42","date_gmt":"2011-08-12T20:07:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/?p=4154"},"modified":"2011-08-12T17:29:54","modified_gmt":"2011-08-12T21:29:54","slug":"unconstitutional-11th-circuit-strikes-down-obamacare-mandate","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.jasetaro.com\/blog\/2011\/08\/12\/unconstitutional-11th-circuit-strikes-down-obamacare-mandate\/","title":{"rendered":"Unconstitutional: 11th Circuit strikes down Obamacare mandate"},"content":{"rendered":"

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit, based in Atlanta, ruled today that Congress exceeded its Constitutional authority by requiring Americans to buy health insurance coverage<\/a>. The 2-1 ruling also found that the rest of the law could stand.<\/p>\n

I’m still reviewing the 200 plus page majority opinion from Judges Joel Dubina and Frank Hull, but here’s the conclusion summarizing the court’s findings:<\/p>\n

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We first conclude that the Act\u2019s Medicaid expansion is constitutional. Existing Supreme Court precedent does not establish that Congress\u2019s inducements are unconstitutionally coercive, especially when the federal government will bear nearly all the costs of the program\u2019s amplified enrollments.<\/p>\n

Next, the individual mandate was enacted as a regulatory penalty, not a revenue-raising tax, and cannot be sustained as an exercise of Congress\u2019s power under the Taxing and Spending Clause. The mandate is denominated as a penalty in the Act itself, and the legislative history and relevant case law confirm this reading of its function.<\/p>\n

Further, the individual mandate exceeds Congress\u2019s enumerated commerce power and is unconstitutional. This economic mandate represents a wholly novel and potentially unbounded assertion of congressional authority: the ability to compel Americans to purchase an expensive health insurance product they have elected not to buy, and to make them re-purchase that insurance product every month for their entire lives. We have not found any generally applicable, judicially enforceable limiting principle that would permit us to uphold the mandate without obliterating the boundaries inherent in the system of enumerated congressional powers. \u201cUniqueness\u201d is not a constitutional principle in any antecedent Supreme Court decision. The individual mandate also finds no refuge in the aggregation doctrine, for decisions to abstain from the purchase of a product or service, whatever their cumulative effect, lack a sufficient nexus to commerce. [fn omitted]<\/p>\n

The individual mandate, however, can be severed from the remainder of the Act\u2019s myriad reforms. The presumption of severability is rooted in notions of judicial restraint and respect for the separation of powers in our constitutional system. The Act\u2019s other provisions remain legally operaive after the mandate\u2019s excision, and the high burden needed under Supreme Court precedent to rebut the presumption of severability has not been met.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

While this is welcome news I wouldn’t celebrate just yet, we’ve still got a long way to go. If nothing else this ruling makes it more likely that this case is headed to the Supreme Court.<\/p>\n

Random thoughts:<\/p>\n