Posted on 10/08/2010 2:31:57 PM PDT by jazusamo
A top Republican said Friday that he expects the U.S. Supreme Court to strike down key parts of the new healthcare reform law as unconstitutional.
Rep. Mike Pence (R-Ind.), the third-ranking House Republican, who serves as conference chairman, said he saw enough votes on the high court to strike a blow to President Obama's signature domestic initiative.
"It's going to the Supreme Court, and the Supreme Court's going to decide whether or not the Constitution of the United States permits the government to order the American people to purchase goods or services, whether they want them or need them or not," Pence said Friday on WLS radio in Indiana.
The Indiana lawmaker, and potential 2012 presidential candidate, has been among the crowd of Republicans to question whether a central part of Democrats' healthcare reform bill is constitutional. The crux of their argument is that the individual mandate — the section of the law requiring individuals to have health insurance of some sort — violates the Constitution.
A federal judge in Michigan dismissed a major case on Thursday challenging the healthcare law's constitutionality on that grounding, though other lawsuits are still being litigated in other federal districts. If courts in different areas of the country end up issuing different rulings, it could heighten the chances that the Supreme Court would take the case.
If it gets to that point, Pence said, he could envision five of the court's member voting to rule the bill unconstitutional.
"I rather like our chances when this thing gets to the U.S. Supreme Court," he said. "I think there could be a narrow majority on the court that recognizes that you cannot compel the American people to purchase health insurance just as a function of being an American citizen."
btt
Pence and the other Republicans all opposed this horrible bill. Mitch McConnel specifically challenged its constitutionality before the DemonRats passed it. All your statement does now is encourage Freepers to stay home and not vote for Republicans. Could you be a troll, like some of those fake "Tea Party" candidates the DemonRats are running to divert Republican votes????
It’s a bad idea to decide matters in the court.
They need to deal with this in the Congress on Day 1.
Just repeal the damn thing so we don’t have to find out.
Wishful thinking. The Supreme Court decided long ago that no severability clause is needed. Just watch, the Court will probably decide that something in the bill is unconstitutional, but I guarantee you that they won’t strike down the whole thing.
You put riders on every bill that makes sure that none of the funds in the bill can be used for anything related to a national healthcare act.
In other words, Mike, you find a set of balls and you use them.
Does the section of the law requiring individuals to have Social Security numbers violate the Constitution?
Got a refernce to back that up?
Apprently you went to bed too early a few weeks ago when Cuccinelli was on Greta discussing this very thing about the lack of severability language, and the fact that if any single aspect of the law is found unconstitutional by the USSC the whole thing goes down.
FReegards!
Trust SCOTUS? Big mistake.
In their haste to pass it, the Dems forgot to put in the usual severance clause that states that if any portion of the law is struck down, the rest will remain in force.
They use that on most bills but forgot it on this one...and they can't go back to fix it because they no longer have the votes. To top that off, a number of Dems are now saying they are against it.
If parts of the bill are unconstitutional then the whole bill is automatically unconstitutional because the dems forgot to put a severance clause in it.
For an explanation of the severance clause see:
http://www.examiner.com/conservative-in-phoenix/arizona-opting-out-of-obamacare
I know how it works with contracts, but not legislation...
It ceratainly DOES apply to legislation and the usual boiler plate clause to make it severable was not in the version that passed.
That has been discussed many times on this forum.
I’m not an attorney, but my understanding is that even if there were a severability clause (which I don’t think there is), the Supreme Court still has the discretion to strike the whole thing down. If the sections that are ruled unconstitutional are so important to the legislation as to make it unworkable without them, then I think they will strike whole thing. Since the individual mandate is a major funding vehicle of the legislation, ObamaCare would be unworkable without it.
"Apprently" I did, and apparently you missed Mark Levin talking about precedents where the courts have found portions of laws unconstitutional without overturning the entire law. Let's just watch and see what happens. Don't put your faith in the courts, we need to win this in Congress.
Correct. The Supreme Court decides whether a law is severable or not, not Congress. They consider a severability clause to be a suggestion.
Since the individual mandate is a major funding vehicle of the legislation, ObamaCare would be unworkable without it.
Don't count on that. Since the law is thousands of pages of disconnected measures, the Supreme Court will almost certainly decide that they can chop it up.
"We" won't be allowed to, the Supreme Court will. Supreme Court appointments are very important.
DOn’t you DARE count on that happening Mr. Pence. Don’t even give it a chance to get to court. You had sure as hell better kill the POS before it ever gets there.
Since you fail to mention it in your post, you don't appear to have any appreciation for the meaning of term, severability, and why it is significant.
"McCain-Feingold," had the severability clauses, so while some of it was thrown out by USSC other portions survived. Obamacare failed to make any provision for severability. Therein lies its fatal weakness
There's no reason to have faith per se in the courts, but given that there are thousands of pages in that bill, and that it was so clumsily put together one is is certain to find plenty of examples of un-costitutionality.
If Virginia alone wins its case, the law fails entirely.
It's past your bedtime....
Maybe a tie. Kagan advised Obie as Solicitor General. Her advocacy would taint her objectivity impelling her recusal.
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