I have been listening (over and over) to the right crying foul from SCOTUS today. I must point out that the overwhelming comments from the Republicans has always been conservatives on the bench to rule on law, not OPINIONS about the law. Chief Roberts eloquently, albeit begrudgingly, commented on just that. He alluded to the fact that SCOTUS does not make law, the Congress does, and they are subject to the ire of the voter:
The essence of Roberts’s ruling was:
• “The Affordable Care Act is constitutional in part and unconstitutional in part,” Roberts wrote.
• “The individual mandate cannot be upheld as an exercise of Congress’s power under the Commerce Clause. That Clause authorizes Congress to regulate interstate commerce, not to order individuals to engage in it.”
• But “it is reasonable to construe what Congress has done as increasing taxes on those who have a certain amount of income, but (who) choose to go without health insurance. Such legislation is within Congress’s power to tax.”
Roberts made a point of noting that he and the other justices “possess neither the expertise nor the prerogative to make policy judgments. Those decisions are entrusted to our Nation’s elected leaders, who can be thrown out of office if the people disagree with them. It is not our job to protect the people from the consequences of their political choices.”
We knew how the other justices (except justice Kennedy) were going to align themselves…on the right and left. This is the problem with the court. Chief Justice Roberts said from the start that he wanted to stop that. He took a chance….a BIG chance…of putting the Court where it needs to be, and that’s using the tool of the Constitution.
Like I said, like it or not, Chief Justice John Roberts stepped onto ground that the Supreme Court hasn’t been on in a while – Impartiality. It may be bad public policy, but that isn’t the job of the court.
Now, it’s up to the side that you pick whether or not Obamacare lives beyond 2012. But Chief Justice Roberts move may have been a wise one. He just told you whose responsibility that it was to fix it.
You can at least now feel good that the leader of our SCOTUS is looking at the Constitution and using it to measure Congress. I think the founders would be happy right now. Not with Obamacare, but with an honest attempt at Judiciary…
babybttrfly
Steve Hilton
Mike
Jun 28, 2012 @ 13:44:12
The political genius of John Roberts
Posted by Ezra Klein in the Washington Post just a few minutes ago…
After Chief Justice Charles Evan Hughes deftly beat back Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s court-packing proposal, FDR said, with grudging admiration, that Hughes was the best politician in the country. “That was hardly the way Hughes would have chosen to be remembered,” writes James Simon in “FDR and Chief Justice Hughes,” “though there was much truth in the president’s remark.”
I doubt Roberts wants to be known for his political skills, either. But in today’s decision, he showed that, like Hughes before him, he’s got those skills in spades.
The decision today is being reported as 5-4, with Roberts voting with the liberals. Akhil Reid Amar, a constitutional scholar at Yale Law, sees it differently. “The decision was 4-1-4,” he said.
Here’s what Amar means: The 5-4 language suggests that Roberts agreed with the liberals. But for the most part, he didn’t. If you read the opinions, he sided with the conservative bloc on every major legal question before the court. He voted with the conservatives to say the Commerce Clause did not justify the individual mandate. He voted with the conservatives to say the Necessary and Proper Clause did not justify the mandate. He voted with the conservatives to limit the federal government’s power to force states to carry out the planned expansion of Medicaid. ”He was on-board with the basic challenge,” said Orin Kerr, a law professor at George Washington University and a former clerk to Justice Kennedy. “He was on the conservative side of the controversial issues.”
His break with the conservatives, and his only point of agreement with the liberals, was in finding that the mandate was a “tax” — a finding that, while extremely important for the future of the Affordable Care Act, is not a hugely consequential legal question.
“We won,” said Georgetown law professor Randy Barnett, who was perhaps the most influential legal opponent of the Affordable Care Act. “All the arguments that the law professors said were frivolous were affirmed by a majority of the court today. A majority of the court endorsed our constitutional argument about the Commerce Clause and the Necessary and Proper Clause. Yet we end up with the opposite outcome. It’s just weird.”
One interpretation is that Roberts was playing umpire today: He was simply calling balls and strikes, as he promised to do in his Senate confirmation hearings. But as Barnett’s comments suggest, the legal reasoning in his decision went far beyond the role of umpire. He made it a point to affirm the once-radical arguments that animated the conservative challenge to the legislation. But then he upheld it on a technicality.
It’s as if an umpire tweaked the rules to favor his team in the future, but obscured the changes by calling a particular contest for the other side. ”John Roberts is playing at a different game than the rest of us,” wrote Red State’s Erick Erickson. “We’re on poker. He’s on chess.”
By voting with the liberals to uphold the Affordable Care Act, Roberts has put himself above partisan reproach. No one can accuse Roberts of ruling as a movement conservative. He’s made himself bulletproof against insinuations that he’s animated by party allegiances.
But by voting with the conservatives on every major legal question before the court, he nevertheless furthered the major conservative projects before the court — namely, imposing limits on federal power. And by securing his own reputation for impartiality, he made his own advocacy in those areas much more effective. If, in the future, Roberts leads the court in cases that more radically constrain the federal government’s power to regulate interstate commerce, today’s decision will help insulate him from criticism. And he did it while rendering a decision that Democrats are applauding.
“For those of us who oppose the Affordable Care Act as a policy matter, this is a bad day,” Barnett said. “For those of us in this fight to preserve the limits of constitutional government, this is not a bad day.”
And for President Obama, who has labored without success to find a bipartisan foothold in his advocacy for the Affordable Care Act, Roberts’s coup in writing an opinion that has found support on both sides must inspire some grudging respect.
Jun 28, 2012 @ 21:31:31
from whitehouse12.com:
Chief Justice Roberts Is A Genius
Posted on June 28, 2012 by I.M. Citizen
Before you look to do harm to Chief Justice Roberts or his family, it’s important that you think carefully about the meaning – the true nature — of his ruling on Obama-care. The Left will shout that they won, that Obama-care was upheld and all the rest. Let them.
It will be a short-lived celebration.
Here’s what really occurred — payback. Yes, payback for Obama’s numerous, ill-advised and childish insults directed toward SCOTUS.
Chief Justice Roberts actually ruled the mandate, relative to the commerce clause, was unconstitutional. That’s how the Democrats got Obama-care going in the first place. This is critical. His ruling means Congress can’t compel American citizens to purchase anything. Ever. The notion is now officially and forever, unconstitutional. As it should be.
Next, he stated that, because Congress doesn’t have the ability to mandate, it must, to fund Obama-care, rely on its power to tax. Therefore, the mechanism that funds Obama-care is a tax. This is also critical. Recall back during the initial Obama-care battles, the Democrats called it a penalty, Republicans called it a tax. Democrats consistently soft sold it as a penalty. It went to vote as a penalty. Obama declared endlessly, that it was not a tax, it was a penalty. But when the Democrats argued in front of the Supreme Court, they said ‘hey, a penalty or a tax, either way’. So, Roberts gave them a tax. It is now the official law of the land — beyond word-play and silly shenanigans. Obama-care is funded by tax dollars. Democrats now must defend a tax increase to justify the Obama-care law.
Finally, he struck down as unconstitutional, the Obama-care idea that the federal government can bully states into complying by yanking their existing medicaid funding. Liberals, through Obama-care, basically said to the states — ‘comply with Obama-care or we will stop existing funding.’ Roberts ruled that is a no-no. If a state takes the money, fine, the Feds can tell the state how to run a program, but if the state refuses money, the federal government can’t penalize the state by yanking other funding. Therefore, a state can decline to participate in Obama-care without penalty. This is obviously a serious problem. Are we going to have 10, 12, 25 states not participating in “national” health-care? Suddenly, it’s not national, is it?
Ultimately, Roberts supported states rights by limiting the federal government’s coercive abilities. He ruled that the government can not force the people to purchase products or services under the commerce clause and he forced liberals to have to come clean and admit that Obama-care is funded by tax increases.
Although he didn’t guarantee Romney a win, he certainly did more than his part and should be applauded.
And he did this without creating a civil war or having bricks thrown through his windshield. Oh, and he’ll be home in time for dinner.
Brilliant.
Jun 28, 2012 @ 22:06:12
I know that is all true Steve, but now if we don’t get a Republican House, Senate and Presidency we can’t get it repealed. And that is also assuming Romney would repeal it if he’s elected. I think Obamacare takes full effect in 2014 or maybe it’s 2013 if it isn’t repealed.
Jun 29, 2012 @ 21:39:16
I just posted some more info Mike…read the breaking news on tax authority…also the federalist papers spell it out. The Senate is the one who levied this mandate…SCOTUS says it’s a tax, therefore, it’s immediately unconstitutional. All the House has to do is repeal it…(via the Federalist Papers…)
The power to levy taxes exists only in the House of Representatives. Since the imposition of taxes was forbidden to the older Articles of Confederation, Alexander Hamilton in essay Nos. 30 to 36 of the Federalist Papers and, importantly, No. 52, wrote that the power of taxation was essential to any functioning government. There was a great deal of controversy over both the Constitution in general and the ability for the central government to raise taxes in particular, and thus, the Federalists who wrote the constitution placed this power in the House.
Hamilton’s Justification
In essay Nos. 30 and 52 of the Federalist Papers, Hamilton lays out his case. The case is based on the fact that the House is meant to be the most “popular” branch of government. It was meant to be distinct from the Senate. The House was for the common people, the Senate for the American “aristocracy.” The Senate was not elected by popular vote until the early 20th century. The House was both elected by the population as a whole and at frequent intervals, every two years. This meant that the power of taxation was to be placed solely in that part of the legislature that was closest to the people.
Jul 01, 2012 @ 20:48:39
Steve, I just heard heard this before going to Church today.
Eric Cantor: Health care repeal vote coming July 11
Jul 02, 2012 @ 00:20:50
I like it….going to do a new post on Roberts…I think you’ll enjoy reading it.