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Can Washington Make You Buy Health Insurance?
· Tuesday, November 3, 2009
Yes, yes, says White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs. Congress has the power to make everyone buy health insurance. "I don't believe there's a lot of case law that would demonstrate the veracity" of comments to the contrary.
Thank you, Mr. Justice Gibbs. We'll see about all that when -- if -- the matter of Congress' power over private commercial judgments of this nature gets to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Meanwhile the knock-down, drag-out over health insurance "reform" shouldn't be allowed to fuzz up another immensely vital question; to wit, how in James Madison's name have we reached the point that Congress can so much as contemplate telling you, and you, and you, and all of us that we'll buy health insurance, like it or not, Buster? Why do we have to? Because the government says so, isn't that reason enough?
For Mr. Justice Gibbs, and the people who employ him, it is. Just about anything Congress decides to do in the name of uplift seems to be constitutional: In other words, in accord with written stipulations as to what the national government may and may not do.
Several problems arise concerning this fine theory:
-- It's nonsense. It contravenes the whole constitutional concept of divided powers: particular functions reserved to particular branches of government. And other powers divided between states and the national government.
-- It threatens liberty. A government that knows no limits to its power can be counted on to step more and more heavily on citizens' rights and privileges. All for the "general good" naturally!
-- It divides the citizens. On the one hand, those who want particular favors from government; on the other hand, those who deny that government has the right to dispense such favors.
The Obama administration, which desperately wants health care to pass, brushes off such concerns as cranky and relevant mainly to wild-eyed Limbaugh and Palin fans, when in fact concerns about the rightful exercise of government power should inform every legislative debate. Those it doesn't inform are likely to end badly.
Majority support of this or that initiative doesn't legitimize the initiative. Wise or foolish, the thing can't be done at all if doing it isn't within the competency of the body making the effort. And that's never mind how many people favor it.
Naturally, reasonable people can disagree about the meaning of prohibitions or permissions written by men long dead. Can we have an Air Force if the Constitution doesn't mention it? What does it mean, "equal protection of the laws"? Is there truly a right to "privacy"? We can argue such questions until the cows come home. Why not, then, some attention to the varied questions arising in the context of health insurance reform? To hear President Obama or Nancy Pelosi or Sen. Harry Reid, you'd imagine a big "Why, sure" succeeds the question, "Can the U.S. government run U.S. health care"? (It runs General Motors, doesn't it? And a lot else since the financial mess began?)
The power to regulate commerce is the power most often invoked in support of the government's right to tell you how and where you can get your health insurance. It's a familiar if feeble stretch of the reasoning powers. Everything under the sun can be seen as affecting interstate commerce: a sneeze, as affecting Kleenex sales; what to order for lunch, if the plastic on the menus reached the restaurant via a truck on a federal highway.
Sure, on those terms, the government can make us buy health insurance. It can make us do anything it wants. That it hasn't, so far, means only it hasn't agreed on every idea designed to convert a free people into a nation of sheep, lolling in pastures supervised thoughtfully by agents of the government.
The health care debate is monumentally important on all possible grounds: not least on the question of what happens if Congress gets away with ordering the American people to buy health insurance -- and if the American people knuckle under. Yes, what next for us, comrades?
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Donald Mattox
Highly unconstitutional!! But then again, Obama doesn't think so.
Posted November 3, 2009 at 1:57:37 AM
g.w.wegmann
Long before Obama was elected president he said the constitution was flawd, and now he is trying to re-write it so it suits him and his "capos".Only he will not have a constitutional convention to do it. He and his band of Marxists will dismantle it piece by piece!
Posted November 3, 2009 at 8:25:53 AM
Peter
Like so much of what COngress is doing and has done it has no Constitutional authority. I for one will not be buying anything that's dictated by a law that is Unconstitutional. Just because the dummy in the White House and the dummies in the Congress think so doesn't make it so! How did we get here? From Freedom to enslavement! God help us all!
Posted November 3, 2009 at 11:03:09 AM
James Gover
Of course when has the current crop of statists in Washington D.C. ever let something like the Constitution stand in the way of their goals? Dear Leader Obama has made it quite clear that he intends to "fundamentally change" America and to "change the foundation" of how this nation operates. My God... are people not listening??? Those words mean something. What are American fundamentals? The rights of the individual to Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness perhaps?! What IS our foundation? The Constitution of the United States?! Well then, this all begs the question - If American fundamentals no longer guide and bind this government... if the good of the collective outweigh the rights of the individual, if we are to toss aside Jefferson and Madison in favor of Marx and Mao... if the Constitution of the United States no longer serves as the foundation on which our nation stands... Are we still the United States of America? Or are we something else entirely?
Posted November 3, 2009 at 11:04:55 AM
Bob Apjok
Makes you wonder if we would have been better of if the the writers would stopped after "Congress shall make no law."
Posted November 3, 2009 at 11:23:47 AM
OregonBuzz
"I bark at no man's bid. I will never come and go, and fetch and carry, at the whistle of the great man in the White House no matter who he is."
Congressman David Crockett
Posted November 3, 2009 at 11:45:38 AM
Mark
I Second and applaud the statements above by Mr. James Gover!!! What a fantastic piece of oratory, Sir
HEAR HERE!
Posted November 3, 2009 at 12:44:44 PM
Lyn
Heil Obama
Posted November 3, 2009 at 3:42:34 PM
Howard Last
Don't call BHO a dummy, he knows exactly what he is doing. Following in the foot steps of Adolph, Lennin, Stalin and Mao.
Posted November 3, 2009 at 4:22:18 PM
MichaelSSEC
If this fraud of a health care bill passes, it will be a shot across the bow to every American who still believes the Constitution means what it says.
Let the coming debate be informed by one more guiding thought. Any such law is a de facto coup, a declaration of war against the Constitution itself and our entire way of life. If Congress should pass this abominable bill, then it shall be time for men of good conscience to remind these would-be tyrants of ANOTHER Constitutional right: the right of the people to keep and bear arms.
The Left is hereby on notice that they shall not take America without a fight. They cannot have her. She belongs to free men and women, and we will surrender only when we are dead.
Posted November 3, 2009 at 4:31:41 PM
Ileana
The only thing that stands between tyranny and the American people right now is the Supreme Court. Who will have the courage and money to sue the U.S. government and challenge its unconstitutional takeover of our businesses, of our lives, of our property, of our Constitution, and of our freedoms. Who will that be? We have talked until we are blue in the face and our representatives in Congress are not listening to us.
Posted November 3, 2009 at 5:23:00 PM
Michael R Johnson
yea, like SSI, they say it is mandatory to participate but never show where the law states that SSI is mandatory.
Liars.
2010 replace them all, democrate or republican whoever is holding the office, replace all of them and the next one taking their place will know, shrink the size of Government immediately or you will be gone next time also.
WAKE UP AMERICA
Posted November 3, 2009 at 5:43:22 PM
Ken
I seriously believe we should only be electing people from this point forward that are consistently and faithfully rooted in our Constitution and the Rule of Law above all else - Political Parties particularly. Some means-testing should be in order - perhaps in the form of thier reponses to a pre-determined set of questions describing their interpretation of the "oath of office" as well as those areas of governance that are allowed or prescribed in the Constitution and their personal pledges to where and how they intend to uphold and defend those above all else.
Posted November 5, 2009 at 8:14:31 AM
Anton D Rehling
The denial of the left on the grassroots uprising against government unconstitutional actions in our country is nothing but a show of contempt for our rights and liberty. We have protested nationwide with numbers in the millions with many supporters that support the cause of freedom not able to attend the pro freedom rallies but none-the-less dedicated to restoration of our Constitutional Republic. It is coming very close for the freedom loving Americans to show up at the next rally with our pitchforks and I am not talking about pitching hay.
Posted November 5, 2009 at 1:08:24 PM
Sherri
So nice to read sound words of wisdom from fellow conservatives... I truly shutter to think what will happen to our great nation if we don't stand up to this foolish leadership....
I am not one for rallies, but I do believe it is time.
Posted November 5, 2009 at 3:19:21 PM