Obamacare Goes To Court

I apologize to those who are sick and tired of hearing about healthcare.  Ok, not really.  The discussion on healthcare isn't over yet.  It was March 2010 when President Obama signed into law, The 'Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act', commonly known as Obamacare, and it is still being vehemently debated across the country.  Now it's time for the Supreme Court to way in.  For those who don't know a lot about U.S. government, our government is set up with three branches so that no one branch can make stupid laws.  If any of the three branches disagrees with a law, they have the means to stop it.  The Obamacare issue is a perfect example of this 'checks and balances system' in action.  Both houses of congress passed the bill.  The President signed it in to law, and now the Supreme Court must determine whether the law is constitutional or not.

We must keep in mind though, that this time the issue is not about healthcare at all.  It it is about the reach of the government's authority.  Specifically, the Supreme Court is to decide whether or not the federal government has the constitutional authority to force citizens to buy healthcare.  This is one of the requirements found in the bill.  This particular requirement is commonly known as The Personal Mandate.

US District Court Judge Roger Vinson has already heard the case in Florida and ruled that the individual mandate was both unconstitutional and that it could not be severed from the law.  He had the following to say about the issue, and I hope that the Supreme Court will keep this in mind when making their decision,

"I emphasized once before, but it bears repeating again: this case is not about whether the Act is wise or unwise legislation, or whether it will solve or exacerbate the myriad problems in our health care system. In fact, it is not really about our health care system at all. It is principally about our federalist system, and it raises very important issues regarding the Constitutional role of the federal government."

Note: A final ruling is not expected until June of this year.