[Twenty-seven] states/state attorneys general file lawsuit on health care bill

[Dos Equis]

Illinois Is 40th State to Defend Health Care Choice;
Oklahoma Health Freedom Bill Poised for Ballot
By Christie Herrera, 3/26/2010 8:10:50 AM

Washington, D.C.—Yesterday, Illinois became the 40th state where legislators have introduced, or will introduce, legislation modeled after the American Legislative Exchange Council’s (ALEC) Freedom of Choice in Health Care Act. Illinois House Bill 6842 prohibits a requirement to purchase health insurance and would provide the state with protection in a constitutional challenge of the federal health reform bill.
The Oklahoma Senate also gave preliminary approval Tuesday for House Joint Resolution 1054—a constitutional amendment protecting a patient’s right to pay directly for medical care, and prohibiting penalties for failing to purchase health insurance—to appear before voters on the November ballot. The resolution passed with strong bipartisan support, with 20 Oklahoma House Democrats and 11 Oklahoma Senate Democrats backing the legislation.

“In order to fix a few problems with one of the best health care systems in the world, the President and Congressional leaders are essentially wrecking a car that needs a tune-up,” said Oklahoma Representative Mike Ritze, sponsor of HJR 1054.

“Oklahomans are happy with the current system and want no part of the new one. This legislation will help them send that message to the federal government,” Ritze added.

ALEC’s Freedom of Choice in Health Care Act has already been enacted by the Virginia and Idaho legislatures, and measures in Oklahoma and Arizona will appear before voters on the November ballot. The legislation has also passed one chamber in Georgia, Missouri, and Tennessee and is accelerating in Florida and elsewhere.

A complete map with links to the legislation in each state is available online at http://www.alec.org

The American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) is the nation's largest nonpartisan, individual membership organization of state legislators.

http://www.hawaiireporter.com/story.aspx?c30bb49f-a948-451c-96c8-d4a5cd64aaf6

[Dos Equis]

Dem AGs Rebuff GOP Govs On Healthcare Lawsuits
Tuesday, 30 Mar 2010

Republican governors in two western states want to join in legal challenges to recent federal health care legislation, but each is meeting stiff resistance from the same obstacle: an attorney general from the rival party.

Amid campaign-year jockeying, high-profile health-care disputes have erupted between the states' top elected officials in both Arizona and Nevada.

In Nevada, Democratic Attorney General Catherine Cortez Masto rebuffed demands Tuesday from Republican Gov. Jim Gibbons that she join 14 of her colleagues in suing the federal government over health reform.

Masto said the suit would be unlikely to succeed, while Gibbons said he was "exploring his options" to pursue a lawsuit on his own.

Both Gibbons and Masto are up for re-election.

"I am disappointed the attorney general has refused to fight for the rights of Nevada citizens," Gibbons said. "But I swore an oath to protect Nevada citizens and that is exactly what I intend to do."

In Arizona, Attorney General Terry Goddard, a Democrat, also is declining to sue on his state's behalf. The move angered Republican Gov. Jan Brewer, who asked the GOP-controlled Legislature for authority to go around Goddard and file suit. On Tuesday, Arizona House and Senate committees approved Brewer's request, sending the measures to final votes in both chambers.

Goddard is running for governor, while Brewer is facing a Republican primary challenge from the right, and the issue has emerged as an early battle in the campaign for governor.

"I think the attorney general is derelict in his duties and responsibilities to the citizens of this state," said Republican state Sen. Russell Pearce of Mesa.

Goddard has called Brewer's actions a "shameful stunt to score political points."

Elsewhere, battles have emerged among top state leaders, with distinct political overtones:

— In Colorado, Washington and Wisconsin, Republican attorneys general have sued or tried to sue despite opposition from Democratic governors.

— In Kansas and Kentucky, Republicans lawmakers have demanded that their states sue; the Republican lieutenant governor in Missouri has made a similar request.

— In Georgia, the Democratic attorney general is facing an impeachment resolution after he refused the Republican governor's request to sue. Democratic lawyers in Minnesota and Mississippi hadn't yet decided whether to honor lawsuit requests from Republican governors.

Republicans pushing lawsuits claim that the health care overhaul, signed last week by President Barack Obama, is unconstitutional because it requires people to buy insurance from a private contractor, and claim it eviscerates states' rights.

Republicans in Arizona and Nevada also say the health overhaul will put massive burdens on state Medicaid programs.

Arizona risks losing billions in federal Medicaid dollars if lawmakers don't reverse part of the state budget adopted earlier this month. In response to big deficits, the budget eliminated a health care program for children and dropped health coverage for 310,000 people in the state's Medicaid program.

The cuts would have saved about $400 million in the next fiscal year. Lawmakers have said they have no choice but to reverse them.

Lawsuit opponents argue that there is little chance of success because legal precedent is firmly on the side of the federal government.

In a letter to the governor released Tuesday, Masto of Nevada said under the U.S. Constitution's commerce and spending clauses, "the authority given to Congress is extensive and appears strong enough to support the Act."

Some lawsuit opponents also argue that states don't have standing to sue because the law doesn't require anything of state governments. Rather, the mandate to buy insurance is levied on taxpayers.

And opponents say states would waste tax dollars by joining a suit that will proceed anyway. If successful, the impact of the suit would affect all states, not just those that sue.

Both Brewer and Gibbons say lawyers have offered to take the case for free, including, in Nevada, a Republican running for attorney general. Arizona House Republicans beat back a Democratic proposal to ban the use of state time or money on the suit.

——
http://newsmax.com/InsideCover/US-Health-Care-Lawsuits/2010/03/30/id/354291

[kcballer]

For what it's worth

In July, 1798, Congress passed, and President John Adams signed into law “An Act for the Relief of Sick and Disabled Seamen,” authorizing the creation of a marine hospital service, and mandating privately employed sailors to purchase healthcare insurance.

This legislation also created America’s first payroll tax, as a ship’s owner was required to deduct 20 cents from each sailor’s monthly pay and forward those receipts to the service, which in turn provided injured sailors hospital care. Failure to pay or account properly was discouraged by requiring a law violating owner or ship's captain to pay a 100 dollar fine.

This historical fact demolishes claims of “unprecedented” and "The Constitution nowhere authorizes the United States to mandate, either directly or under threat of penalty...”

Perhaps these somewhat incompetent attorneys general might wish to amend their lawsuits to conform to the 1798 precedent, and demand that the mandate and fines be linked to implementing a federal single payer healthcare insurance plan.

[kcballer]

bump.  John Adams who helped write the constitution didn't think mandated insurance was against it.

[Skip8282]

For what it's worth

In July, 1798, Congress passed, and President John Adams signed into law “An Act for the Relief of Sick and Disabled Seamen,” authorizing the creation of a marine hospital service, and mandating privately employed sailors to purchase healthcare insurance.

This legislation also created America’s first payroll tax, as a ship’s owner was required to deduct 20 cents from each sailor’s monthly pay and forward those receipts to the service, which in turn provided injured sailors hospital care. Failure to pay or account properly was discouraged by requiring a law violating owner or ship's captain to pay a 100 dollar fine.

This historical fact demolishes claims of “unprecedented” and "The Constitution nowhere authorizes the United States to mandate, either directly or under threat of penalty...”

Perhaps these somewhat incompetent attorneys general might wish to amend their lawsuits to conform to the 1798 precedent, and demand that the mandate and fines be linked to implementing a federal single payer healthcare insurance plan.

Interesting.

[Dos Equis]

Ariz. Governor Signs Bill Authorizing Health Suit
Thursday, 01 Apr 2010 
Republican Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer has signed a bill giving her authority to skirt the state's Democratic attorney general and file a lawsuit challenging federal health care legislation.

Brewer signed the legislation Thursday after requesting last week that lawmakers approve it.

Attorney General Terry Goddard, a Democrat, angered Republicans last week by declining to join more than a dozen other states in suing to block the health care overhaul bill signed by President Barack Obama.

Republicans say the federal legislation is unconstitutional in part because it requires people to purchase private health insurance. Goddard and other Democrats say a suit would be unlikely to succeed and thus a waste of taxpayer money.

It wasn't immediately known when Brewer planned to use her new authority to file a lawsuit.

http://newsmax.com/Politics/US-Health-Overhaul-Arizona/2010/04/01/id/354538

[Straw Man]

nothing but a waste of taxpayers money on frivolous law suits

[Dos Equis]

Sections of new health-care law violate the Constitution
Washington state Attorney General Rob McKenna believes he and 13 other attorneys general have a constitutional duty to challenge parts of the new health-care law.

By Rob McKenna
Special to the Times

I WAS sworn in for the second time last year as state attorney general. The oath of office requires that I "swear to support the Constitution of the United States and the constitution and laws of the state of Washington." It's an oath that I'm honored to take — and one that I take very seriously.

Our Constitution guarantees rock-solid rights and freedoms, including free speech, due process, and the right to keep and bear arms, among others. The framers of the Constitution believed in a system of checks and balances that prevents any one branch of government from wielding unstoppable power and infringing on individual rights.

The framers stressed that the rights listed "shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people" and that there are real limits on the powers delegated to the federal government. The 10th Amendment reinforces those limits and protects individual rights, stating that undelegated powers "are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."

I've joined 13 other state attorneys general in a bipartisan lawsuit challenging some provisions of the new federal health-care law. We're concerned that the challenged sections violate the Constitution and are providing an important check on federal power.

Improving access to health care is too important to build on an unconstitutional foundation. For the first time in our nation's history, the federal government will require all Americans to purchase a particular product in the private marketplace: health insurance. The Internal Revenue Service will fine those without a federally approved health-insurance plan.

The Constitution's Commerce Clause allows Congress to regulate interstate commerce. But does it empower Congress to force you to engage in a certain kind of commerce? If Congress can order you to buy certain kinds of health insurance, what else can they order you to buy? Could they require you to buy General Motors vehicles, because the federal government now effectively owns that carmaker?

In addition, the insurance mandate is outside the powers delegated in the Constitution to the federal government, and therefore infringes on individual rights reserved under the 10th Amendment.

We are also concerned that the massive expansion of Medicaid required under the bill violates state sovereignty by taking control of state spending, forcing a budget-busting expansion of Medicaid coverage.

In our state, as many as 300,000 new people will qualify for the program. According to Dr. Roger Stark, of the Washington Policy Center, this will cost the state $1.36 to $6.8 billion over 10 years. And it's important to note that current Medicaid spending contributes to the chronic budget shortfalls we've faced the last two years, leading many lawmakers to propose tax increases.

All Americans should have access to affordable medical coverage. No one should go bankrupt because she gets sick. Those with pre-existing conditions should not be barred from obtaining health insurance. Our lawsuit does not cancel out sections of the health-care bill that address these issues.

As attorney general, I'm an independent guardian of the law. I've sued both the Bush and Obama administrations over their legally questionable environmental policies. I've fought both political parties in the U.S. Supreme Court, successfully defending the voter-approved, top-two primary. My office aggressively pursues illegal political fundraising and advertising activities uncovered by the PDC, regardless of whom, on the left or right, committed those violations.

The lawsuit over the health-care bill is consistent with my commitment to independently fight for your rights, to uphold my oath of office and defend the Constitution.

Rob McKenna is Washington's attorney general.

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/opinion/2011510208_guest04rob.html

[JohnC1908]

nothing but a waste of taxpayers money on frivolous law suits

Somebody that would be in favor of a one trillion dollar bill obviously does not care about a "waste" of taxpayer money.

[Straw Man]

Somebody that would be in favor of a one trillion dollar bill obviously does not care about a "waste" of taxpayer money.

doesn't the less than a trillion dollar bill actually save money in the long run?

These lawsuits have no merit and will just be money down the shitter for states that are already underwater

[Dos Equis]

Somebody that would be in favor of a one trillion dollar bill obviously does not care about a "waste" of taxpayer money.

Tell me about it.

[Straw Man]

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/localnews/2011483297_healthdebate31m.html
UW panelists say lawsuits challenging health bill lack merit
By Nick Perry

The University of Washington billed it as a debate among distinguished law faculty over whether the new federal health-care law is constitutional.

But while the four panelists at a packed event Tuesday may have differed on some of the finer points, they all agreed on the big question: They said the new law passes constitutional muster and that various lawsuits arguing the opposite - including the one joined last week by state Attorney General Rob McKenna - have little merit or chance of success.

Even John McKay, the former Republican U.S. attorney for Western Washington (who was forced out in 2006 under contentious circumstances) said that while he sympathized with some of the political issues in play, he thought the lawsuits lacked merit. In fact, he questioned the timing and thrust of the cases: "One way to say it is, that this has to be seen as a political exercise," he said.

Moderator Hugh Spitzer noted the lack of a vigorous dissenting voice.

"I will say that we tried very hard to get a professor who could come and who thinks this is flat-out unconstitutional," he said. "But there are relatively few of them, and they are in great demand."

Spitzer, an expert in state constitutional law and a UW affiliate professor, said afterward that organizers even considered setting up some kind of video conference to provide the counter perspective. But in the end, he said, the lack of professors taking that position spoke to the merits of the arguments. He said organizers did not invite McKenna because they wanted to stick with academicians.

Sitting on the panel alongside McKay, who these days teaches constitutional law at Seattle University, were UW professors Stewart Jay, Sallie Sanford and Kathryn Watts.

McKay explained the reasoning behind some of the arguments in the legal cases filed in Florida and Virginia — namely, that the federal government has overstepped its authority by forcing Americans to buy health insurance and that the federal government is illegally forcing states to be a part of the scheme.

Jay said that when it comes to the first argument, the federal government has "the power to tax and spend" and the ability to regulate interstate commerce — adding that health care, which makes up one-sixth of the economy, undoubtedly constitutes vital commerce. And he said that states aren't being forced into the scheme because they could opt out of accepting federal health dollars.
Sanford said that when some people don't have health insurance, it changes the cost for everyone else. She cited state estimates that people who pay for health insurance are coughing up about $1,000 a year to help cover those who rely on charity care or who don't pay their medical bills.

The panelists seemed to agree that if any of the cases make it to the U.S. Supreme Court, the justices would be hard-pressed to find the law unconstitutional, given some recent precedents they have set in other cases.

Yet anything is possible — and it all makes for a lively national debate.

McKay said it is an exciting time for anyone teaching constitutional law and that the confrontation over health care — including violence and threats of violence — raises the stakes for the nation.

[Dos Equis]

Indiana Joins Suit Against Health Care Reform

AG Questions Constitutionality Of Law

POSTED: 1:02 pm EDT March 29, 2010
UPDATED: 6:58 pm EDT March 29, 2010

INDIANAPOLIS -- Indiana on Monday joined a lawsuit filed by Florida and 13 other states last week against the health care reform law President Barack Obama signed.

Attorney General Greg Zoeller questioned the constitutionality of requiring people to buy health insurance and the federal government imposing rules on states that he said could be seen as violating sovereignty.
Video: Indiana Joins Suit Against Health Care Reform
 
"Anytime the federal government requires the state to act, the question of sovereignty is appropriate, and the U.S. Supreme Court is in position to answer," Zoeller said last week. "I think the sooner we can have a resolution out of the Supreme Court as to the constitutionality, really the better."

Zoeller said his office received an avalanche of e-mail in the wake of the passage of health care reform, most of it urging him to act, but he made the decision on his own.

The lawsuit asks a judge to declare health care reform unconstitutional because "the Constitution nowhere authorizes the United States to mandate, either directly or under threat of penalty, that all citizens and legal residents have qualifying health care coverage."

"I feel like it's overreaching," Zoeller said, of the health care plan. "I think there are other ways of doing it. I'm not denying we need health insurance reform."


The initial bill for legal representation is $50,000. The cost will be split among the states. Indiana could hire an outside firm and spend more money in the future.

The work is currently being done by Tom Fisher, the state's solicitor general, who would argue Indiana's complaint if it reaches the Supreme Court.

"I think they will be very hard-pressed to ignore the issue, because the individual mandate is at the crux of the statute," Fisher said.

The White House said it believes the lawsuit will fail, and David Orentlicher, a professor of law at Indiana University Purdue University-Indianapolis and former Democratic leader in the Indiana House, agrees.
"There is not a serious constitutional problem here. In fact, we know the government can make you buy insurance … That's what Medicare is," Orentlicher said. "While we are working, we are paying toward our health insurance when we reach age 65."

Indiana will have 21 days to add to the complaint Florida originally filed.

http://www.theindychannel.com/politics/22988851/detail.html

[Dos Equis]

Pawlenty to file lawsuit against health care law
Posted: April 6th, 2010 06:20 PM ET

From CNN's Taylor Harris

(CNN) - Gov. Tim Pawlenty, R-Minnesota, announced Tuesday he intends to file suit against the new federal health care law.

Critics of the law argue that its requirement for individuals to buy health insurance violates the Constitution.

"The federal government is now requiring citizens under penalty of a fine to buy a good or a service, and we think that's an unprecedented overreach by the federal government into the lives of individual citizens," the governor said following a meeting on education reform.

Pawlenty, a potential 2012 presidential candidate, did not say whether he will pursue his own lawsuit or join legal challenges from 14 attorneys general filed last month.


Related: States sue to block health care bill

"At this time, he is considering his options," Brian McClung, the governor's spokesperson, told CNN.

Democratic National Committee Press Secretary Hari Sevugan said in a statement Tuesday that the governor's lawsuit is, "Yet another political ploy by Pawlenty to pander to the radical right-wing of his party."

The Republican governor's remarks come a day after Minnesota Attorney General Lori Swanson, a Democrat, informed Pawlenty that she would not file suit on behalf of the state.

"I have determined that a lawsuit by the state of Minnesota against the United States of America is not warranted and, accordingly, I will not be filing such a lawsuit," Swanson wrote in a letter to the governor.

Swanson added that she will file an amicus brief in support of the United States, "to set forth what I believe to be a correct reading of the Constitution."

Renee Landers, a law professor at Suffolk University in Massachusetts, recently told CNN that the Constitution gives Congress broad power to regulate commerce and promote the general welfare of Americans.

Swanson and Pawlenty are not the first attorney general and governor to butt heads over health care. Last month Georgia's Gov. Sonny Perdue, a Republican, said he would pursue litigation against the new health care law, even though his state's attorney general, a Democrat, advised him not to.

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2010/04/06/pawlenty-to-file-lawsuit-against-health-care-law/?fbid=XPBeW4MfwYo#more-98392

[tu_holmes]

If those states file lawsuits, cut off all government funding to them.

No point in my tax dollars paying for roads or schools in places my kids don't go and I don't drive.

Fuck 'em.

[Soul Crusher]

Fine, but let them keep their tax dollars. 

[Dos Equis]

Five states join lawsuit against health care bill
Posted: April 7th, 2010

(CNN) - Five more states - Indiana, North Dakota, Mississippi, Nevada and Arizona - on Wednesday joined 13 others in a lawsuit against the historic overhaul of the U.S. health care system signed into law last month by President Barack Obama, the Texas attorney general announced.

The lawsuit initially filed by Florida, South Carolina, Nebraska, Texas, Utah, Louisiana, Alabama, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Colorado, Idaho, South Dakota and Washington argues that the legislation's requirement that individuals buy health insurance violates the Constitution.

It calls the health care bill an "unprecedented encroachment on the sovereignty of the states" and asks a judge to block its enforcement.

"The Constitution nowhere authorizes the United States to mandate, either directly or under threat of penalty, that all citizens and legal residents have qualifying health care coverage," the lawsuit states.

White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said last month that the Obama administration expected to win any legal challenge to the health care bill.

Legal experts say the lawsuit is unlikely to succeed.

Renee Landers, a law professor at Suffolk University in Massachusetts, said the Constitution gives Congress broad power to regulate commerce and promote the general welfare of Americans.

"If the federal courts follow existing precedents of the United States Supreme Court, I don't think that the claims will be successful," Landers told CNN last month.

Separately, legislatures in three dozen states are considering proposed measures aimed at blocking elements of the health care bill. But Cal Jillson, a political science professor at Southern Methodist University in Texas, said the Constitution says laws passed by Congress trump state laws.

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2010/04/07/five-states-join-lawsuit-against-health-care-bill/?fbid=XPBeW4MfwYo#more-98543

[Straw Man]

Five states join lawsuit against health care bill
Posted: April 7th, 2010

Legal experts say the lawsuit is unlikely to succeed.

more frivolous lawsuits that are nothing more than waste a taxpayers money so that Repubs can grandstand on the public dime

The irony is that may red states actually receive more in federal subsidies than they pay in taxes

[Dos Equis]

Mo. Lt. Gov. Plans Lawsuit Over Health Care Bill
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: April 8, 2010

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (AP) -- Missouri Lt. Gov. Peter Kinder says he'll seek private funding for his own legal challenge to the new federal health care law.

Kinder said Wednesday that he will file the lawsuit later this month in a Missouri federal court in his official capacity. A spokesman says the suit will focus on issues dealing with seniors and the solvency of Medicare. He wouldn't provide additional details.

No fundraising goals have been set.

The Republican lieutenant governor plans his own lawsuit instead of joining one filed by more than a dozen states challenging the new federal health care law. That suit claims the U.S. government can't mandate that citizens have health insurance or force states to carry out the new law without reimbursing them for costs.

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2010/04/08/business/AP-US-Health-Overhaul-Lawsuit-Missouri.html

[Dos Equis]

Stephen Breyer: Supreme Court Likely To Review Health Care Reform
MARK SHERMAN | 04/15/10

WASHINGTON — Justice Stephen Breyer predicted Thursday that the Supreme Court will one day pass judgment on this year's health care overhaul.

Breyer told a congressional panel that the massive health care law, like most major federal legislation, is a good candidate for high court review.

More than a dozen Republican attorneys general in several states are determined to challenge the law in federal court, arguing that its requirement that Americans get health insurance is unconstitutional.

Breyer said the court's relatively light caseload in recent years will soon be a thing of the past.

"I'd predict that three, four years from today, no one's going to ask us again why we have so few cases," Breyer said at a hearing on the court's budget before the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Financial Services and General Government.

Justice Clarence Thomas said at the same hearing that the court's caseload, a third less than it was 20 years ago, depends in large part on what is happening in Congress. "Until recently, there hasn't been comprehensive legislation of the kind that would fill our docket," Thomas said.

The court still deals regularly with aspects of a 36-year-old federal law on retirement and health benefits as well as a mid-1990s statute that is designed to speed appeals in death penalty cases.

Lawmakers also quizzed the justices about allowing cameras in the courtroom.

Breyer has been much more open to televising court proceedings than others, including Thomas. Americans' understanding of the court would increase if they could see it in action more easily, Breyer said.

But he said the justices also have serious concerns about things being taken out of context and having televised high court hearings used to try to open criminal trials to television cameras. He said juror and witness security must be taken into account.

Rep. Jose Serrano, D-N.Y., the subcommittee chairman, said he worries that commentators might use court coverage to launch broadsides against the justices. "Did you hear Breyer? What a jerk. Did you hear Thomas?" Serrano said.

Thomas, who does not ask questions at court arguments, piped up at that point. "You mean, didn't hear me," Thomas said.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/04/15/stephen-breyer-supreme-co_n_539134.html

[Soul Crusher]

Jose serrano is awful.   He is from my area. 

[Dos Equis]

Virginia health care lawsuit can proceed, judge rules
Posted: August 2nd, 2010
From CNN's Charles Riley

Washington (CNN) – The Commonwealth of Virginia will be allowed to continue its constitutional challenge to the health care bill signed into law by President Obama earlier this year, a federal trial court ruled Monday.

Judge Henry Hudson ruled in a 32-page opinion that the legal challenge mounted by Virginia State Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli should be allowed to continue. The state argues that part of the health care bill – Section 1501, which requires individuals to obtain a minimum level of health insurance – is unconstitutional.

"While this case raises a host of complex constitutional issues, all seem to distill to the single question of whether or not Congress has the power to regulate - and tax - a citizen's decision not to participate in interstate commerce," Hudson wrote in his opinion. "Neither the U.S. Supreme Court nor any circuit court of appeals has squarely addressed this issue."

Cuccinelli voiced his approval of the judge's ruling in a statement issued after the court ruled.

"We are pleased that Judge Hudson agreed that Virginia has the standing to move forward with our suit and that our complaint alleged a valid claim." Cuccinelli said.

But Monday's ruling is a narrow one that only allows the lawsuit to continue. The merits of the state's case will be argued in a full hearing at a later date. It's a fact the White House pointed to in a blog post dedicated to the court's decision.

"Now that this preliminary stage has ended, the government fully expects to prevail on the merits," White House aide Stephanie Cutter wrote. "The Affordable Care Act falls well within Congress's power to regulate under the Commerce Clause, the Necessary and Proper Clause, and the General Welfare Clause. As President Reagan's Solicitor General Charles Fried recently wrote, 'the health care law's enemies have no ally in the Constitution.' "

Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell said the state is looking forward to a full hearing.

"I applaud today's decision allowing Virginia's constitutional challenge to the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act to move forward. Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli has brought forward a specific and narrowly tailored objection to the Act. It warrants a full and thorough hearing in our courts. It is meritorious and constitutionally correct," McDonnell said in a statement.

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2010/08/02/virginia-lawsuit-can-proceed-judge-rules/?fbid=XPBeW4MfwYo#more-116069

[Emmortal]

doesn't the less than a trillion dollar bill actually save money in the long run?

These lawsuits have no merit and will just be money down the shitter for states that are already underwater

Hahahahahahahahahahaha. Save money in the long run?

Hahahahahahahahahahaha!  Oh brother, I just peed myself.

[Soul Crusher]

Hahahahahahahahahahaha. Save money in the long run?

Hahahahahahahahahahaha!  Oh brother, I just peed myself.

Don't even bother emmortal.  You will go page after page with Straw and no matter the evidence you supply, he is as dense as they come. 

[Dos Equis]

Missouri Votes to Block Health Insurance Mandate
Published August 03, 2010 | Associated Press
 
JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. -- Missouri voters on Tuesday overwhelmingly rejected a key provision of President Barack Obama's health care law, sending a clear message of discontent to Washington and Democrats less than 100 days before the midterm elections.

With about 70 percent of the vote counted late Tuesday, nearly three-quarters of voters threw their support behind a ballot measure, Proposition C, that would prohibit the government from requiring people to have health insurance or from penalizing them for not having it.

That would conflict with a federal requirement that most people have health insurance or face penalties starting in 2014.

Tuesday's vote was seen as largely symbolic because federal law generally trumps state law. But it was also seen as a sign of growing voter disillusionment with federal policies and a show of strength by conservatives and the tea party movement.

Legislatures in Arizona, Georgia, Idaho, Louisiana and Virginia have passed similar statutes, and voters in Arizona and Oklahoma will vote on such measures as state constitutional amendments in November. But Missouri was the first state to challenge aspects of the law in a referendum.

Federal courts are expected to weigh in well before the insurance provision takes effect about whether the federal health care overhaul is constitutional.

The intent of the federal requirement is to broaden the pool of healthy people covered by insurers, thus holding down premiums that otherwise would rise because of separate provisions prohibiting insurers from denying coverage to people with poor health or pre-existing conditions.

But the insurance requirement has been one of the most contentious parts of the new federal law. Public officials in well over a dozen states, including Missouri, have filed lawsuits claiming Congress overstepped its constitutional authority by requiring citizens to buy health insurance.

The Missouri Hospital Association spent $400,000 warning people that passage of the ballot measure could increase hospitals' costs for treating the uninsured, but there was little opposition to the measure from either grass-roots organizations or from the unions and consumer groups that backed the federal overhaul.

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2010/08/03/missouri-votes-block-health-insurance-mandate/