Congress Passes Socialized Medicine and Mandates Health Insurance -In 1798

The ink was barely dry on the PPACA when the first of many lawsuits to block the mandated health insurance provisions of the law was filed in a Florida District Court.

The Constitution nowhere authorizes the United States to mandate, either directly or under threat of penalty, that all citizens and legal residents have qualifying health care coverage.

Unger is well refuted by an early commenter (whom he immediately censors LOL!).

The first introduction of the bill in congress:
Journal of the House of Representatives of the United States, 1789-1793
MONDAY, JULY 20, 1789
“...Ordered, That a committee be appointed to bring in a bill, or bills, providing for the establishment of hospitals for sick and disabled seamen, and for the regulation of harbors; and that Mr. Smith, of South Carolina, Mr. Clymer, and Mr. Carroll, do prepare and bring in the same.”

A later mention:
Journal of the House of Representatives of the United States, 1789-1793
FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 8, 1793
“A memorial of the merchants and inhabitants of the towns of Norfolk and Portsmouth, in the State of Virginia, was presented to the House and read, stating the inconveniences under which they labor from the number of sick and disabled seamen that daily frequent that port, and praying that a tax may be imposed on all vessels or seamen, for the purpose of establishing, in or near the seaport towns of the United States, marine hospitals, for the reception and support of sick and disabled seamen; or that such other regulations may be adopted, as to the wisdom of Congress shall seem meet.”

The legislative history totally denies the comparison to Obamacare.

The mandates of what health insurance Americans must have in Obamacare touch more than a tithe of the economy. At some point, as the Russians say, "quantity has a quality of its own. One thing to regulate foreign and interstate commerce by requiring a 1% tax to support a government health benefit directly related to other-than-intrastate commerce - and another to levy taxes sufficient to control the whole health care industry nationwide, with flimsy rationales rather than reasons.
We need a constitutional amendment which requires a supermajority and/or repetition of a vote before and after an election in order to commit resources on half that scale. And, incidentally, to prevent lame-duck sessions of Congress from taking up substantive legislation absent a legitimate emergency. We also need term limits to prevent the dominance of grandiose ideas such as Obamacare in Congress.

Regrettably it seems that Forbes has also become a left-wing publication, like Time, Newsweek, and U.S. News. Is this some sort of virus that infects large publications until they sicken and die?

O’Sullivan’s First Law:

All organizations that are not actually right-wing will over time become left-wing.
O'Sullivan was right, but his article announcing his law lamely cited a few examples and just left it. The reason his law is true lies in the Newspeak definitions of ideological labels:

objective: reliably promoting the interests of Big Journalism. (usage: always applied to journalists who are members in good standing; never applied to anyone but a journalist)

liberal: see "objective," except that the usage is reversed: (usage: never applied to journalists; always applied to anyone but a journalist)

progressive: see "liberal." (usage: same as for "liberal."

moderate: see "liberal." (usage: same as for "liberal."

centrist: see "liberal." (usage: same as for "liberal."

conservative: rejecting the idea that journalism is a higher calling than providing food, shelter, clothing, fuel, and security; adhering to the dictum of Theodore Roosevelt that:
"It is not the critic who counts . . . the credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena
(usage: applies to people who - unlike those labeled liberal/progressive/moderate/centrist, cannot become "objective" by getting a job as a journalist, and probably cannot even get a job as a journalist.)(antonym:"objective")

"right-wing": see, "conservative."

Notice that "objective," "moderate," and "centrist" are classical virtues and are positive labels; likewise "liberal" and "progressive" are American virtues and are positive labels - at least to the extent that their Newspeak definitions have not been realized by the public. OTOH "conservatism" is not an American virtue - drilling for oil or developing genetically modified corn, IOW progress, is something American "conservatives" favor.

I just read some of this including your comment to people who are sitting around looking at TV. One of them said “Forbes is a right wing crackpot.” I don’t read it so I have no opinion.

At any rate, the article goes on to say:

“It turns out, the Founding Fathers would beg to disagree.

In July of 1798, Congress passed – and President John Adams signed - “An Act for the Relief of Sick and Disabled Seamen.” The law authorized the creation of a government operated marine hospital service and mandated that privately employed sailors be required to purchase health care insurance.

Keep in mind that the 5th Congress did not really need to struggle over the intentions of the drafters of the Constitutions in creating this Act as many of its members were the drafters of the Constitution.

And when the Bill came to the desk of President John Adams for signature, I think it’s safe to assume that the man in that chair had a pretty good grasp on what the framers had in mind.

Here’s how it happened.

During the early years of our union, the nation’s leaders realized that foreign trade would be essential to the young country’s ability to create a viable economy. To make it work, they relied on the nation’s private merchant ships – and the sailors that made them go – to be the instruments of this trade.

The problem was that a merchant mariner’s job was a difficult and dangerous undertaking in those days. Sailors were constantly hurting themselves, picking up weird tropical diseases, etc.

The troublesome reductions in manpower caused by back strains, twisted ankles and strange diseases often left a ship’s captain without enough sailors to get underway – a problem both bad for business and a strain on the nation’s economy.

But those were the days when members of Congress still used their collective heads to solve problems – not create them.

Realizing that a healthy maritime workforce was essential to the ability of our private merchant ships to engage in foreign trade, Congress and the President resolved to do something about it.

Enter “An Act for The Relief of Sick and Disabled Seamen”.

I encourage you to read the law as, in those days, legislation was short, to the point and fairly easy to understand.”

There are also at least 190 comments below the long article.

I read the article and would say this:

This was a tax, not insurance, levied on all ships docking in the USA which ship owners were allowed but not required to pass on to their sailors. It applied to sailors of all nationalities. It had an obvious constitutional justification, the federal government’s role in supervising foreign trade.

The Liberals are desperate and grasping at straws to justify their unconstitutional health care law.

It also seems that Forbes has morphed over the years into still another left-wing publication. Steve Forbes are you listening? Please look after your inheritance, before you find it is gone. Forbes may soon have to change it’s advertising slogan from “capitalist tool” to “socialist tool”.

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