Construing the Commerce Clause to permit Congress to regulate individuals precisely because they are doing nothing would open anew and potentially vast domain to congressional authority. Congress already possesses expansive power to regulate what people do.Upholding the Affordable Care Act under the Commerce Clause would give Congress the same license to regulate what people do not do. The Framers knew the difference between doing something and doing nothing. They gave Congress the power to regulate commerce,not to compel it. Ignoring that distinction would undermine the principle that the Federal Government is a government of limited andenumerated powers. The individual mandate thus cannot be sustained under Congress’s power to “regulate Commerce."
...Nor can the individual mandate be sustained under the Necessary and Proper Clause as an integral part of the Affordable Care Act’s other reforms. Each of this Court’s prior cases upholding lawsunder that Clause involved exercises of authority derivative of, and in service to, a granted power. The individual mandate, by contrast, vests Congress withthe extraordinary ability to create the necessary predicate to the exercise of an enumerated power and draw within its regulatory scopethose who would otherwise be outside of it. Even if the individualmandate is “necessary” to the Affordable Care Act’s other reforms,such an expansion of federal power is not a “proper” means for making those reforms effective.
The only thing Roberts demolished was America. He gets the finest health care in the world so WTF does he care? I hope all his close friends and family abandon him for abandoning America. He deserves it. Our Forefathers would’ve wished him worse.
Ideally Roberts would have sided with Scalia but the lame Obama personal mandate which has little power to do anything to anyone or force anyone (Republican hype misses this completely) is not that much different than the way congress uses the tax code to bribe us with our own money.
My expectations were very reserved on this decision and I am not getting bent out of shape on it.
Republicans got so hung up on the powerless personal mandate that they ignore that a more serious part of the bill was thrown out, the medicaid mandates on the states.
Hopefully the whine-fest will die out in a day or two.
Sorry, you are trying to put lipstick on a pig. This ruling was a disaster for us. There is no getting around what Roberts just did to this country. I chose not to go to the health club today. Roberts just ruled that I can be taxed for that. He is one SOB.
It’s doubtful Robert’s saved Obama’s reelection, but it isn’t for lack of trying.
How stupid. When Nancy Pelosi is smiling, America has just taken one in the ass. I can’t stand these Beltway “conservatives” who are either lying to us, or are simply imbeciles. Bob
How could he in one paragraph say, "They gave Congress the power to regulate commerce,not to compel it.", but STILL essentially allow Congress to compel citizens by penalizing them with a tax? It just makes NO sense.
And the South won!
That cowardly scumbag Roberts demolished the Constitution. Period.
The spin is making me sick.
The conventional wisdom on this is that Roberts sided with the liberals primarily because he was afraid of the criticism that would come down on the court if he didn’t. If true, that makes him one of the most spineless pussbags ever to wear a robe.
BFD. Any moronic rationale, particularly the Ginsberg “extortion” BS, is utterly retarded and nothing but a cover for cowardice. Instead of doing the right thing, another asshole compromised and sold out Americans, period. To believe that Romney will win because of this is delusional at best. Romney loses and Ginsberg still retires and where are we then?
In any case, Roberts is a traitor to Americans, a traitor to the Constitution, and an unbelievable coward, and nothing anyone says will make those facts simply disappear, nor anything anyone says will “soften” the absolute betrayal by this son of a bitch.
What utter BS> This is no more than the losing side trying to save face. I am so damned sick of spin. You can’t get anything done when you ignore the truth. We got our asses handed to us by Roberts. Now THAT is the truth.
The socialist Dems are all laughing AT him (expect some published gratuitous gushing from Time, Newsweek, NYT, but they are all LOLing at the water cooler); and I suspect that some self-respecting conservative will no longer want to be seen with him.
I can't see where there is any living this down for the once, and formerly honorable, Chief Justice, even if he makes perfect decisions from this point forward.
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It sure would have meant more if he had made these statement but voted against Obamacare.
Folks are idiots to attempt to spin the actions of Roberts as somehow beneficial. They are not. All he has done is said hey the fed. govt. has unlimited power to tax any American citizen they choose to for any reason they want to.
The IRS can be an instrument to police the behavior of individual citizens. There is no need for objectivity or fairness in their power to tax. Some people can be forced into slavery using this power and that is okay.
Roberts is insane and wrong. He was not genius or clever.
The meaning of all this is (AZ + ObamaCare) simple:
We can’t rely on the Supreme Court anymore... for anything.
EVERYTHING must be done by the elected branches of government. Everything.
That means we have to win big in November.
We either win big, or we lose big.
There’s no middle ground.
Bump to read later. Looks like there are some interesting comments.
The most infuriating thing in this whole decision is that the 5 idiots who upheld this monstrosity did so on utterly fallacious reasoning!
If the gubmint says, “You will buy healthcare or you will be taxed!” The tax is a consequence that follows from refusing to buy the healthcare! The question the court addressed is “can congress impose a tax?” when the real question is “can congress compell people to buy healthcare?”
So if the answer to the question as to whether congress can compell citizens to buy healthcare is “no” according to Robert’s own reading of the commerce clause, then on what basis does the tax from an unconstitutional mandate follow???
If the cause is unconstitutional, how is the consequence then constitutional?
This is an absolutely ridiculous ruling and no one should obey this law. No one!
Let’s see them try to put more than half of the people in this country in prison!