Individual Mandate

Healthcare is different. That, according to defenders of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act -- "Obamacare" -- is the justification for the law's individual mandate. FOR THE RECORD: This piece has been updated to reflect editing changes that appeared in the print version of the Op-Ed but not in the original Web version. The Web version originally said that catastrophic insurance is prohibited and outlawed by the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, and in the author's opinion, the act shifts costs unfairly to all those covered.

The Supreme Court is about to toss a judicial bomb into the middle of the presidential campaign, and nobody knows what impact it will have. The bomb, of course, is the court's ruling on President Obama's healthcare law, which is expected next month. At first glance, the political implications might look simple. If the court upholds the law, Obama's biggest legislative achievement, the president wins; if the court declares the law unconstitutional, he loses. COMMENTARY AND ANALYSIS: Presidential Election 2012 But as with many things in politics, it may not be that simple at all. If the court upholds the law, Obama will hail the decision as proof that he was right all along.

What part of the insurance business do opponents of healthcare reform not understand? That's a question I frequently ask myself when I hear people complaining about a requirement that almost everyone buy coverage in return for insurers not being able to turn anyone away, regardless of medical condition. This week, a federal district judge in Virginia ruled that the so-called individual mandate is unconstitutional because Congress overstepped its bounds in approving the requirement.

Down on Deasy Re "On a mission to change school district's culture," April 8 In the 1980s I was a teacher in the L.A. Unified School District's Incentive Substitute Teacher Program, which was meant to ensure good instruction and classroom oversight in hard-to-staff schools. I can assure readers that "subbing" is one of the least-empowered positions in the district. That L.A. Unified Supt. John Deasy would walk into a classroom unannounced and criticize "well-regarded" substitute teacher Patrena Shankling as she "carried out the assignment left by the regular teacher," and then the next day send her a letter of termination, is nothing more than bullying.

The legal battle over the federal healthcare reform law boils down to an argument over how to balance two opposing principles within the Constitution: the broad power granted to Congress to regulate interstate commerce, and the liberties reserved to individual citizens. In a series of decisions over the past century, the Supreme Court has relaxed the limits on Washington's power over commerce, leading some conservatives and libertarians to fear that Congress could interfere in just about any decision made by businesses and their customers.

The Supreme Court is about to toss a judicial bomb into the middle of the presidential campaign, and nobody knows what impact it will have. The bomb, of course, is the court's ruling on President Obama's healthcare law, which is expected next month. At first glance, the political implications might look simple. If the court upholds the law, Obama's biggest legislative achievement, the president wins; if the court declares the law unconstitutional, he loses. COMMENTARY AND ANALYSIS: Presidential Election 2012 But as with many things in politics, it may not be that simple at all. If the court upholds the law, Obama will hail the decision as proof that he was right all along.

Should the government force everyone to purchase health insurance? Few topics in the healthcare debate are more controversial than the so-called individual mandate, which would fine citizens without insurance and lies at the heart of the now-stalled healthcare bills in Congress. President Barack Obama has said that a major goal of healthcare reform is to reduce the number of legal residents who are uninsured (currently estimated at 17% of adults). One strategy is for the government to require insurance to be sold at a fixed price regardless of preexisting conditions, but in that case, many people might wait until they get sick before they purchased insurance, which could bankrupt the system.

The Supreme Court will rule next year on the constitutionality of the healthcare reform passed in 2010. But constitutionality notwithstanding, Republican opposition to the new law has been vigorous and consistent. In recent GOP presidential debates the candidates have been unanimous in condemning it, in particular objecting to the requirement that almost all Americans obtain health insurance or pay a penalty. On the surface, Republican and conservative opposition to the new requirement seems perfectly logical.

Down on Deasy Re "On a mission to change school district's culture," April 8 In the 1980s I was a teacher in the L.A. Unified School District's Incentive Substitute Teacher Program, which was meant to ensure good instruction and classroom oversight in hard-to-staff schools. I can assure readers that "subbing" is one of the least-empowered positions in the district. That L.A. Unified Supt. John Deasy would walk into a classroom unannounced and criticize "well-regarded" substitute teacher Patrena Shankling as she "carried out the assignment left by the regular teacher," and then the next day send her a letter of termination, is nothing more than bullying.

The costliest piece of the healthcare reform law Congress passed this year is the subsidy it creates to help working-class Americans buy insurance. This new entitlement is not the law's most controversial piece, however. That dubious distinction belongs to the provision that makes the subsidies necessary: the mandate that all American adults buy health policies, starting in 2014. To critics, this "individual mandate" epitomizes the intrusiveness and regulatory overreach that have characterized the last two years of consolidated Democratic power in Washington.

Healthcare is different. That, according to defenders of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act -- "Obamacare" -- is the justification for the law's individual mandate. FOR THE RECORD: This piece has been updated to reflect editing changes that appeared in the print version of the Op-Ed but not in the original Web version. The Web version originally said that catastrophic insurance is prohibited and outlawed by the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, and in the author's opinion, the act shifts costs unfairly to all those covered.

The Affordable Care Act faced a possibly fatal challenge last week when the constitutionality of its individual mandate provision was argued in the Supreme Court. Much of the terrain was easy going. Neither the justices nor the lawyers doubted that the healthcare and healthcare insurance markets involve interstate commerce - insurance and healthcare providers are usually national or at least regional operations, folks who cross state lines get sick and must be cared for away from home regularly, and people are often unable to relocate to another state for fear of losing employer-based coverage.

President Obama is a lawyer by training and a former professor of constitutional law, and I am neither. Still, I can't help but think his remarks today about "judicial activism" and the Supreme Court's review of the 2010 healthcare reform law were hyperbolic. At a news conference held jointly with Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Mexican President Felipe Calderon, Obama was asked, "[H]ow would you still guarantee healthcare to the uninsured and those Americans who've become insured as a result of the law" if the measure's individual mandate were declared unconstitutional?

As doubts grow about the survival of the federal healthcare law, state officials are considering ways to keep key elements of the legislation alive in California. Skepticism of the Affordable Care Act by conservative Supreme Court justices during oral arguments last week has raised the possibility the court will strike the individual mandate to purchase health coverage or throw out the entire law as unconstitutional. Even if the whole law is scrapped nationally, many of its consumer protections, such as guaranteed coverage for children, are expected to survive in California.

After a three-day marathon of oral arguments, the nine members of the Supreme Court met in conference Friday to cast preliminary votes on the constitutionality of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, a.k.a. "Obamacare. " Some commentators regard the outcome as a foregone conclusion based on the skeptical questions posed to the government's lawyers by the two Republican-appointed justices considered most likely to uphold the law - Chief JusticeJohn G. Roberts Jr.and JusticeAnthony M. Kennedy - and on the supposedly lackluster advocacy of Solicitor General Donald B. Verrilli Jr. At the risk of being accused of wishful thinking, we believe reports of the death of the law may be greatly exaggerated.

WASHINGTON - Eight years ago, George W. Bush administration lawyers went before the Supreme Court arguing that the justices should defer to the president during wartime and allow the commander in chief to decide how to treat "enemy combatants" held at Guantanamo Bay. To their surprise, they lost. Justice Anthony M. Kennedy joined with the liberal bloc to rule that these prisoners had a right to a judicial hearing. This week, President Obama's lawyers went before the Supreme Court arguing that the justices should defer to Congress when it comes to regulating health insurance.

Any final healthcare bill is likely to require that virtually all Americans obtain insurance. This "individual mandate" has stirred some controversy and confusion. Here are some questions and answers. Why require everyone to buy insurance? All insurance is based on the idea that most of the time, most people are not filing claims. As it applies to healthcare, supporters say, most people are pretty healthy most of the time, but eventually almost everyone incurs major medical expenses.

One afternoon in 1934, Supreme Court Justice Harlan Fiske Stone decided to quietly help Labor Secretary Frances Perkins out of a jam. Her quandary was how to write a Social Security law that would survive scrutiny by the court's conservative bloc. Stone, a progressive, pulled her aside during a tea party at his home, glanced around to make sure he wasn't overheard, and whispered, "The taxing power of the federal government, my dear; the taxing power is sufficient for everything you want and need.

For wont of the right word, will "Obamacare" be lost? Some analysts are predicting the demise of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, saying the Supreme Court will declare unconstitutional the law's requirement to buy insurance, then find the measure unsustainable without it. This is purely speculation, of course; the justices aren't expected to release their decision until the end of the current term in June. Nevertheless, the back and forth in the courtroom this week -- and particularly the conservative justices' grilling of Solicitor General Donald Verrilli, the administration's principal attorney -- suggested that defenders of the law would have been on much more solid ground had they made two changes in the terms used to describe one of the core features of the act. At issue are two aspects of the individual mandate, the requirement that virtually all adult Americans maintain insurance coverage.

In 2009, President Obama was asked whether the individual mandate in his healthcare plan was really just a tax in disguise. "I absolutely reject that notion," he responded. But if the president had been brave enough back then to call a tax a tax, his healthcare law might not be in such a mess today. At the Supreme Court this week, both sides basically agreed that the Constitution allows the federal government to enact a national health insurance plan - even a government-run single-payer plan.