Posted on 12/01/2009 1:55:20 PM PST by Windflier
The Truth About the Health Care Bills - Michael Connelly, Retired Constitutional Attorney
Well, I have done it! I have read the entire text of proposed House Bill 3200: The Affordable Health Care Choices Act of 2009. I studied it with particular emphasis from my area of expertise, constitutional law. I was frankly concerned that parts of the proposed law that were being discussed might be unconstitutional. What I found was far worse than what I had heard or expected.
To begin with, much of what has been said about the law and its implications is in fact true, despite what the Democrats and the media are saying. The law does provide for rationing of health care, particularly where senior citizens and other classes of citizens are involved, free health care for illegal immigrants, free abortion services, and probably forced participation in abortions by members of the medical profession.
The Bill will also eventually force private insurance companies out of business, and put everyone into a government run system. All decisions about personal health care will ultimately be made by federal bureaucrats, and most of them will not be health care professionals. Hospital admissions, payments to physicians, and allocations of necessary medical devices will be strictly controlled by the government.
However, as scary as all of that is, it just scratches the surface. In fact, I have concluded that this legislation really has no intention of providing affordable health care choices. Instead it is a convenient cover for the most massive transfer of power to the Executive Branch of government that has ever occurred, or even been contemplated. If this law or a similar one is adopted, major portions of the Constitution of the United States will effectively have been destroyed.
The first thing to go will be the masterfully crafted balance of power between the Executive, Legislative, and Judicial branches of the U.S. Government. The Congress will be transferring to the Obama Administration authority in a number of different areas over the lives of the American people, and the businesses they own.
The irony is that the Congress doesn't have any authority to legislate in most of those areas to begin with! I defy anyone to read the text of the U.S. Constitution and find any authority granted to the members of Congress to regulate health care.
This legislation also provides for access, by the appointees of the Obama administration, of all of your personal health care information, your personal financial information, and the information of your employer, physician, and hospital, in direct violation of the specific provisions of the 4th Amendment to the Constitution. All of this is a protection against unreasonable searches and seizures. You can also forget about the right to privacy. That will have been legislated into oblivion regardless of what the 3rd and 4th Amendments may provide.
If you decide not to have health care insurance, or if you have private insurance that is not deemed acceptable to the Health Choices Administrator appointed by Obama, there will be a tax imposed on you. It is called a tax instead of a fine because of the intent to avoid application of the due process clause of the 5th Amendment. However, that doesn't work because since there is nothing in the law that allows you to contest or appeal the imposition of the tax, it is definitely depriving someone of property without the due process of law.
So, there are three of those pesky amendments that the far left hate so much, out the original ten in the Bill of Rights, that are effectively nullified by this law It doesn't stop there though.
The 9th Amendment that provides: The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people;
The 10th Amendment states: The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are preserved to the States respectively, or to the people. Under the provisions of this piece of Congressional handiwork neither the people nor the states are going to have any rights or powers at all in many areas that once were theirs to control.
I could write many more pages about this legislation, but I think you get the idea. This is not about health care; it is about seizing power and limiting rights.
Article 6 of the Constitution requires the members of both houses of Congress to "be bound by oath or affirmation to support the Constitution." If I were a member of Congress I would not be able to vote for this legislation or anything like it, without feeling I was violating that sacred oath or affirmation. If I voted for it anyway, I would hope the American people would hold me accountable.
For those who might doubt the nature of this threat, I suggest they consult the source, the US Constitution, and Bill of Rights. There you can see exactly what we are about to have taken from us.
Michael Connelly Retired attorney, Constitutional Law Instructor Carrollton, Texas
AFTER HAVING READ THIS, PLEASE FORWARD....
WE MUST HOLD CONGRESS ACCOUNTABLE BEFORE IT IS TOO LATE.
Richard Slemaker Publisher
MedicineT Magazine
3733-1 Westheimer Road, Suite 1020
Houston, Texas 77027-5226
WEB: www.medicinemagazine.us
I do hope that you as someone with insight into Constitutional law can envisage some way that we Americans can fight this in a way that can preserve our liberties if enacted.
The Supreme Court would agree if what you say is correct.
We dared call it "unconstitutional" way before the herd.
The radio talk show hosts, Mark Levin in particular, are academically vindicated. The fight is definitely ON!
Yes, we did. Freepers have also predicted a painful death by a thousand lawsuits if this thing passes the Senate.
Let's hope that it doesn't pass.
My understanding, please correct if wrong, is that if passed and then constitutionally tested, those things deemed unconstitutional are plucked out, leaving the remainder in place. Thus, the need to apply maximum force against at every stage of the legislative way.
The Supreme Court would agree if what you say is correct.
With all due respect, I didn't write the piece. I got it in email less than an hour ago, and thought that it was such a well crafted statement about this abomination, that I should post it to FR so that others can send it out to their email lists.
My sentiments mirror yours exactly.
the sooner it dies, the sooner free enterprise will find it safe to put its toe in the water.
‘...it is a convenient cover for the most massive transfer of power to the Executive Branch of government that has ever occurred, or even been contemplated.’
V. I. Lenin, please call your office.
The United States Congress, led by President Obama, and under the boot heel of the Democrat Party, seeks nothing less than a full scale socialist takeover of the nation.
Not bad for a Moslem who wasn’t even born here, and is/was ineligible to be president. One has to love the irony...
Amen to that. We can start by giving the 16th Amendment our middle finger.
Seriously, if Harry Reid gets this monstrosity through the Senate, it will be the spark that ignites the Second American Revolution.
It will have to be, because if this is passed, there truly is no more constitutional republic, and no further need to pretend that this is even a poor imitation of the nation devised by the Founders.
You probably saw Howard Dean's recent remarks, where he plainly admits that this is their goal.
At the rate Obama & Co. are trying to implement their fundamental overthrow of our system of government, I don't know if we'll even get to the 2010 elections before a revolution breaks out.
The entire left-liberal, Socialist agenda must die to bring prosperity back to the nation. They are a cancer upon the greater good.
‘At the rate Obama & Co. are trying to implement their fundamental overthrow of our system of government, I don’t know if we’ll even get to the 2010 elections before a revolution breaks out.’
Or the economy is ruined beyond the Point Of No Return.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.