The Affordable Care Act goes on trial today before the Supreme Court
On March 23, 2010 the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) was signed into law by President Barack Obama, and today, March 26, 2012, the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is set to hear three arguments over three days from opponents and proponents of the new health care law.
The Supreme Court will be hearing arguments on three different items:
• Monday, the justices will hear 90 minutes of argument on an old 19th century law, the Anti-Injunction Act, which says that the Supreme Court cannot pass judgment on the law until its key provisions go into effect in 2014. Both the Whitehouse and the republicans want the case heard now and do not want to put it off until 2014.
• Tuesday, the Supreme Court will take up the question on whether the individual mandateis a tax. This is the portion of the Affordable Care Act that has some American citizens upset. The mandate requires everyone to have health insurance. For those that cannot afford health insurance the federal government will provide a subsidy, and those that can afford health insurance and refuse to buy coverage, they will be fined. The mandate will go into effect in the year 2014
• Wednesday, the court will hear arguments over whether the Affordable Care Act’s expansion of the Medicaid program violates the Constitution. The law requires states that accept federal matching funds for Medicaid to expand that program to cover everyone under 133 percent of the poverty line.
It should be noted that 23 States filed law suits against the new health care laws. Of those 23 States all but one are controlled by the Republican Party. Two of the current Republican candidates running for President, Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich were in favor of the individual mandate. Gingrich proposed an individual mandate in 1993 as a counter to President Bill Clinton who proposed a form of universal healthcare. And former Governor of Massachusetts Mitt Romney signed into law individual mandates for his State, which the Affordable Care Act is modeled on.
And this year republican controlled States have proposed and or passed into law mandates that force women to have unwanted and unnecessary medical procedures as well as placing obstacles in their way in order to receive health care.
The Republican Party has been crying and whining against health care mandates that were originally their idea, yet they are currently passing laws that create health care mandates. The irony and the hypocrisy from the Republican Party is so palpable you can cut it with a knife.
If the Supreme Court rules in favor of the Affordable Care Act, as many as 40 million more Americans will have access to health care, and in just about every country on this planet that would be seen as a great accomplishment for their citizens, but not here, not in the United States of America.
The Supreme Court said that they will announce their rulings sometime in June of this year.
The Story of the Affordable Care Act: From an Unmet Promise to the Law of the Land