|
|
"A comprehensive, collaborative elections resource."
|
Third Federal Judge OKs Affordable Care Act
|
|---|
| Parent(s) |
Issue
|
| Contributor | Brandonius Maximus |
| Last Edited | Brandonius Maximus Feb 23, 2011 11:00am |
| Logged |
0
|
| Category | Legal Ruling |
| Author | Andrew Cohen |
| News Date | Wednesday, February 23, 2011 04:00:00 PM UTC0:0 |
| Description | A federal trial judge in Washington, D.C., Tuesday bluntly rejected the latest legal challenge to the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, ruling that the "individual mandate" requirement in the new federal health care law was a legitimate exercise of congressional power to regulate the nation's health insurance initiatives.
U.S. District Judge Gladys Kessler, a 1994 appointee of President Bill Clinton, declared that Congress had the authority under the Commerce Clause of the Constitution to enact the contentious 2010 law, which requires individuals to purchase health insurance starting in 2014. In rejecting an argument by the law's challengers, she said that an individual's decision not to purchase health insurance was an active choice impacting the cost of health insurance for everyone else.
In her 64-page ruling, Kessler wrote: "Both the decision to purchase health insurance and its flip side -- the decision not to purchase health insurance -- therefore relate to the consumption of a commodity: a health insurance policy ... Because of the cost-shifting effect, the individual decision to forgo health insurance, when considered in the aggregate, leads to substantially higher insurance premiums for those other individuals who do obtain coverage."
Kessler then wrote: "To put it less analytically, and less charitably, those who choose -- and Plaintiffs have made such a deliberate choice -- not to purchase health insurance will benefit greatly when they become ill, as they surely will, from the free health care which must be provided by emergency rooms and hospitals to the sick and dying who show up on their doorstep. In short, those who choose not to purchase health insurance will ultimately get a 'free ride' on the backs of those Americans who have made responsible choices to provide for the illness we all must face at some point in our lives."
A jurist with extensive experience handling terror law cases, Kessler now becomes the third federal trial |
| Share |
|
|
2¢
|
|
| Article | Read Full Article |
|
| Date |
Category |
Headline |
Article |
Contributor |
|
|
