Health Reform Not Constitutional

[BGutzman]

The problem is the "Commerce Clause" has been the excuse of generations of laws that it was never actually intended to allow. Im not claiming that all the laws passed under it are unconstitutional but I do believe that congressional overreach is rampant and this clause is the "excuse"

Further very limited governement can be a solution for many problems, bloated all encompassing government is something else entirely.

[BGutzman]

I truly think the overall problem is the Supreme court cannot or does not deal with deciding these issues in a timely manner. The whole process to challenge a law usually takes years and in the mean time your rights are tromped all over by some politician who often is planning to pass another similar law as soon as the challenge wins.

Im not advocating any sort of anything but I can say I can see why people are sick and tired of this same old business. We really must have more limitations to congressional and party powers and we really need to get back to being a nation of freedoms instead of a nation of laws bordering on madness in sheer volume and breath of items affected by law and not left to "the people"

Much of this madness will never go away unless the supreme court makes an effort to place injunctions against specific types of legislation or else we will continually chase our legal tail much like a dog. The only other option is to enumerate more constitutional rights so our reps can maybe understand there are real limits to what they can legislate and the constitution is something they simply cannot choose to continue to ignore.

[Musketeer]

I truly think the overall problem is the Supreme court cannot or does not deal with deciding these issues in a timely manner. The whole process to challenge a law usually takes years and in the mean time your rights are tromped all over by some politician who often is planning to pass another similar law as soon as the challenge wins.

I am betting you will see fast action here. The SCOTUS can act quickly when needed. They went back and forth with FDR pretty regularly and I see this issue being fastlaned.

[Buzzcook]

Two tiered system
Okay Buzzcook, heres what I'll do. Medicare for all, every person who works and/or files a Federal income tax return, will pay an additional FICA type tax for universal Medicare. Every citizen will then be able to access this care.

However, private, ultra high quality Medical care will still be available to those who can afford to pay for it outright, or purchase additional private insurance to cover it.

No whining about not being able to afford the deluxe care.

Medicare for all doesn't preclude private insurance. So I'm fine with that. Medicare also doesn't preclude high quality health care.

Medicare for all also avoids a constitutional confrontation.

btw in the socialist paradise Great Britain, people can still buy private personal health insurance.

[BGutzman]

Medicare for all also avoids a constitutional confrontation.

Actually it doesn't as depending on your take of Freedom one could make a arguement that there is no constitutional right to state sponsored socialized healthcare or any mandate for those who wish not to participate to pay for this monster.

Im not saying that is the way it is, right now as if you work, you pretty much have to pay but that doesn't make it right or within the constitution just something that hasn't been challenged.

I do not believe the state exist to care for every citizen from cradle to grave nor do I believe there is any mandate for any form of social program outside of infrastructure to ensure the reasonable exchange of goods resulting in commerce.

We are a nation that now believes that no one should ever have to have a boo boo or suffer a consequence of making bad choices in life. With just the right amount of therapy and social programs we can cure the ills of the world including ending freedom and personal choice. Nations have tried this and failed and yet here we are trying this guarnteed failure out for ourselves and allowing our reps to use the commerce clause to justify almost anything.

No where in the commerce clause does it imply the right to legislate your every action and as a historically truth, in the beginning of its existance the commerce clause was about infrastructure and trade between nations and keeping states dealing with each other fairly.

[brickeyee]

Actually it doesn't as depending on your take of Freedom one could make a arguement that there is no constitutional right to state sponsored socialized healthcare or any mandate for those who wish not to participate to pay for this monster.

And you will lose in court very quickly, as every case brought has.

The government can collect a taxes, essentially without limit.

It can then spend those taxes on the 'general welfare.'

As even the 'experts' before congress have repeated, if the government had taxed folks and then provided insurance the court cases would have been rather moot.

[carguychris]

Actually it doesn't as depending on your take of Freedom one could make a arguement that there is no constitutional right to state sponsored socialized healthcare or any mandate for those who wish not to participate to pay for this monster.

In a way, you're totally correct- there is no right to socialized healthcare... but that doesn't necessarily mean that the government can't spend money providing it.

And you will lose in court very quickly, as every case brought has... The government can collect a taxes, essentially without limit... It can then spend those taxes on the 'general welfare.'

+1. This relates to what Al and I were discussing earlier in this thread- is "general welfare" meant as a limitation on the taxing power, or does it enumerate an independent spending power?

Most courts since the FDR era have generally agreed that it enumerates an independent spending power that's not strictly constrained by the functions of the federal government as spelled out in the Constitution. This generalized spending goes well beyond prominent and expansive social programs; it also encompasses relatively small agencies such as the National Weather Service and the U.S. Geological Survey. As I recall, the Constitution doesn't say anything about the weather, rocks, or maps.

Many still disagree with this view, but as the old saying goes, the cat's already out of the bag.

[BGutzman]

Most courts since the FDR

I agree but just because it was changed during FDRs time does not change the historical truth prior to this time.

I get it time goes on and one judge or many judges decide to go with his or her own personal beliefs instead of the words written in black and white or the poor legal use of precedence.

Wrong is wrong and just because people are willing to accept something else as being the new whatever doesn't make it right. The longer this thread goes to more I can see the commerce clause needs to go away.

A simple look at the social programs at the time of the founding fathers shows that it was strictly limited to friends and familys and churches helping each other as they choose to and there existed no such thing within the government.

[jimjc]

The question is not if they die from lack of care but WHY they lack care.

No one in this nation is denied care.
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Most uninformed statement I`ve read of coarse I`ve not read everything........


Almost 50,000 dying yearly because of no health insurance... Millions with very limited insurance if any because companies have hired them as part time employment so they don`t have to pay for health care, more and more companies are doing this daily. Some Hospitals and doctors not accepting patients with only Medicare. People that once had a serious disease no longer can get health insurance and without health insurance hospitals will turn you away.

And you say "no one in this country is denied care" You have absolutely no idea whats happening or you are one of the misinformers the Internet is full of.

[Buzzcook]

Spending for the general welfare predates FDR and the new deal.

The various homestead acts were public welfare projects as were land grants to vets.
The USDA was founded well before the new deal.
http://www.propertyrightsresearch.org/usda.htm

In 1862, when President Abraham Lincoln founded the U.S. Department of Agriculture, he called it the "people's Department

Social programs go back to George Washington and far earlier.
http://www.ssa.gov/history/bortz.html

If your argument is that social programs in general are unconstitutional, then you have to argue against a few hundred years of history.

The constitutional question is how those programs are implemented.

Judge Vinson made this argument.

The Necessary and Proper Clause cannot be utilized to “pass laws for the accomplishment of objects” that are not within Congress’ enumerated powers.

Basically if a power is not listed in the constitution it is by definition unconstitutional.

But Alexander Hamilton made this argument.

E]very power vested in a government is in its nature sovereign, and includes, by force of the term, a right to employ all the means requisite and fairly applicable to the attainment of the ends of such power, and which are not precluded by restrictions and exceptions specified in the Constitution, or not immoral, or not contrary to the essential ends of political society.

Basically if something is not prohibited by the constitution or generally icky, then it's ok.

[Brian Pfleuger]

Originally Posted by jimjc

Most uninformed statement I`ve read of coarse I`ve not read everything........


Almost 50,000 dying yearly because of no health insurance... Millions with very limited insurance if any because companies have hired them as part time employment so they don`t have to pay for health care, more and more companies are doing this daily. Some Hospitals and doctors not accepting patients with only Medicare. People that once had a serious disease no longer can get health insurance and without health insurance hospitals will turn you away.

And you say "no one in this country is denied care" You have absolutely no idea whats happening or you are one of the misinformers the Internet is full of.

I'm still waiting for evidence of your claim. Thinly veiled insults do not prove your case.

Not having health insurance is not the same as being denied care. I have no health insurance and I get medical care on a regular basis. I've even had medical bills that I couldn't pay for years at a time, I still got care when I needed it.

No one dies "because of no health insurance".

I say again... NO ONE in this country is DENIED care. Even illegal immigrants get FREE medical care. You don't even have to be identifiable, you get care.

NO ONE is denied care unless THEY, THEMSELVES, CHOOSE to not SEEK the care.... and they are only denied by THEMSELVES.

[carguychris]

Spending for the general welfare predates FDR and the new deal.

+1; I was trying to reflect the fact that the courts have been much more consistent in their rulings since then. During the late 19th and very early 20th century, the SCOTUS went back and forth on the issue with a series of rulings, some of which were muddled and contradicted one another. It is true, however, that since the very beginning, Congress has been authorizing spending programs that go beyond the explicit scope of the Constitution in some way or another, but most of these programs were relatively small in scale compared to the New Deal and did not get directly challenged in the courts.

It's also true that Alexander Hamilton was an early advocate of a relatively unrestricted spending power. FWIW this debate goes all the way back to the drafting of the Constitution; some of the founders did not want to include the phrase "general welfare" in the document at all, for precisely this reason.

However, going back to my earlier argument...

Spending tax monies on a program that benefits citizens across the USA more or less equally has generally been held as constitutional under the Taxing & Spending Clause.

The problem is that the mandate is not a tax spending program, and it's being justified under the Commerce Clause using specious reasoning.

[BGutzman]

Ok not that I will change my mind but for the sake of the forum I will say ok all you say is "true" even though I disagree.

Then the question becomes what is the governments limit to tax and can everything be taxed or only some things?

Do we pay 10%, 50% tax, 70% tax at what point does the state exceed its mandate to tax vs the rights as given in the constitution because certainly to live free must include the ability to feed ones self and ones family and one must be able to own property and to enjoy some level of "freedoms" that are not regulated from stem to stern by the state.

The very foundation of our government was built by people seeking freedom from the governments of various states and the laws of those states generally concerning religious freedoms, the only credible answer then is the state does not have the right to legislate our every breath and every choice. Certainly this must be the foundation of our country, not in whole but in good measure.

[jimjc]

I'm still waiting for evidence of your claim. Thinly veiled insults do not prove your case.

Not having health insurance is not the same as being denied care. I have no health insurance and I get medical care on a regular basis. I've even had medical bills that I couldn't pay for years at a time, I still got care when I needed it.

No one dies "because of no health insurance".

I say again... NO ONE in this country is DENIED care. Even illegal immigrants get FREE medical care. You don't even have to be identifiable, you get care.

NO ONE is denied care unless THEY, THEMSELVES, CHOOSE to not SEEK the care.... and they are only denied by THEMSELVES.
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I`ve supplied the data it`s been published everywhere.............I`m not going to go looking for it because you`re playing this game. You supply the info that everyone in the country that has no healthcare gets "free healthcare" I`ll wait.

[BGutzman]

jimjc

As a member whos been around you for a bit please in the friendliest way possible let me ask you to let your disagreement with the other guy go. Your thoughts and insights are valuable but this course isnt allowed in this forum.

Please let it go...

[nate45]

I'm gonna go read about and talk about firearms and let the SCOTUS debate this one. This is all turning into thinly disguised political ideology, instead of constitutionality. Which when you think about it, is largely what the SCOTUS decision will be.

[Glenn E. Meyer]

Yeah, I agree - the argument is not about how someone here personally gets treated.

It was supposed to be on the constitutional basis but it can't stay there - so -

Closed