After months of discourse on the constitutionality of President Obama’s health-care overhaul legislation, The U.S. Supreme court has announced its agreement to rule on the individual health care mandate that was pushed through Congress in 2010. The concern of the members of Congress who are supporting the lawsuit is that the law over-steps its threshold of power and authority in regards to making it a requirement for Americans to acquire insurance by 2014. Often times patients prefer to pay their own health expenses, especially when they take into consideration the trend in pricing transparency and price shopping for health care.
The court hearings will begin in March and will most likely commence in late June. The basis of the dispute lies in the government’s power to regulate interstate commerce. Since reimbursements, collections and insurance is all state-to-state based, it has been argued from the beginning that the health care legislation referred to as “ObamaCare,” is unconstitutional.
The American Center for Law and Justice is the legal group that has been lobbying against “ObamaCare” since the beginning and just a few weeks ago, they released an amicus brief to the Supreme Court requesting that the Justices take the case, representing the 105 members of Congress and the innumerable Americans that are in support of the lawsuit. This announcement serves as a ray of hope for all of those individuals in opposition to the mandate, but The New York Times Caucus Blog says that it could serve as a risk to some of the potential presidential candidates.