From Reason, here’s one of the more direct and clear explanations why.
Don’t Buy It
The crazy constitutional logic of the individual insurance mandate
A few weeks before Congress passed a law that orders every American to buy health insurance, the Virginia legislature passed a law that says “no resident of this Commonwealth…shall be required to obtain or maintain a policy of individual insurance coverage.” Two weeks later, Idaho’s governor signed a law that declares “every person within the state of Idaho is and shall be free to choose or decline to choose any mode of securing health care services without penalty.”
Supporters of ObamaCare say such legislation, which more than 30 other states are considering, has no force, since the Constitution makes congressional enactments “the supreme law of the land.” But that is true only when federal laws are authorized by the Constitution, and the individual health insurance mandate is not.
The mandate’s defenders say Congress is exercising its power to “regulate commerce…among the several states.” Yet a law that compels people to engage in an intrastate transaction plainly does not fit within the original understanding of the Commerce Clause, which was aimed at facilitating the interstate exchange of goods by removing internal trade barriers.
Read the whole thing, and follow their links which take you to the relevant laws and additional coverage.
Something tells me the lesser states will hide behind the bushes, forget about their 10th Amendment laws, and whimper when the federal agencies beat their chest and send intimidating letters…unless a state like Texas does it and doesn’t budge, and even arrests federal agents who proceed to enforce the unconstitutional laws. Then Obama will be openly forced to behave as a tyrant to assert what he ought not to have, and provoke a united response from the states and the public.
You see, the 10th Amendment means absolutely nothing if the states don’t guard their powers with the same violent ferocity that the federal government guards ITS powers. Barring that, total central domination is nothing more than a function of time and all of this is just academic… our lives will suck in a generation. Just you watch.
Yep. It’s unconstitutional, alright. And if they can mandate we buy insurance, next step is they’ll mandate us to buy multivitamins and condoms. After all, if you don’t buy (and use) vitamins and condoms, you’re taking advantage of the system.
Washington has been hijacked by a tyrant. It’s become nakedly obvious. Now we’re going to find out if the people care enough to do anything about it.
“After all, if you don’t buy (and use) vitamins and condoms, you’re taking advantage of the system.”–Maynard
Lesbians, too?
This means war!!!!!
who needs condoms when there’s free abortions courtesy bart stupak?
Since the Feds forbid insurance companies from selling health insurance across state lines, (requiring them to set up individual entities for each state, hence names like “Insurance Company X of California”), these transactions occur within the individual state. So they’ve aced themselves out of using the Commerce Clause. This cumbersome restriction also helps drive up the price of insurance since there is duplication and redundancy that shouldn’t be part of providing insurance. Allowing insurance companies to provide insurance nationwide is a basic fix that should have been part of a common sense reform package, rather than the power grab we are now witnessing.
I think it’s the other way around. Insurance began early in the country’s history, and sort of grew up as a state regulated enterprise when the constitution actually meant something. There was shipping insurance in the early 1700’s. Now you have lawyer lobbies within states that wield power in the state and contribute heavily to congressmen representing the state, so they will fight federalizing insurance. Banking and lending is another one. The States have licensing schemes and regulations that they impose on all banks including interstate banks like Bof A, and Citi. A lot of the federal banking regulation is aimed at investment banks and commercial banks that mainly lend to other banks. Banks that maintain their name in larger regions have state charters, and may have “of California” or whatever in their charters but don’t advertise that way. Speaking of confiscatory taxation, California taxes a corporation on all profits within the state, and a portion of profits derived outside the state. That is why many chain restruants and other national chains have a separate named corporation operating in California. They also bypass Californias more goofey anticompetitive labor laws by following CA regs. in the state, and having uniform policy outside the state.
Let me get this straight now; You have to buy health insurance, so if you refuse, you pay a fine that is being completely converted into a tax, then if you refuse to pay the fine/tax you will be imprisoned and then you get the health care that you refused to purchase completely free while now imprisoned, these peoples brains must have been sucked out by space aliens…
Low income people will have to choose between buying health care they cannot afford and losing their homes, or refusing to purchase health care and pay the fines and get it free in prison…..so buy health care you cannot afford and be homeless, or refuse to buy it and get it free in prison.
Whoa, let’s not jump to conclusions, people–didn’t a certain member of Congress just say that forcing us to buy a commodity is totally constitutional because of the “good and welfare clause and a couple of other things some guy told me were in there somewhere”? I mean, that is like, SO convincing n’stuff, Mr Conyers!
Unfortunately for me, I live in the Evergreen State. Our lying Governor Gregoire is so enraged that our attorney general Rob McKenna has joined this lawsuit, she has gone so far as to threaten to de-fund his department, a completely illegal move that violates the state constitution. Clearly, the tyrants aren’t just in DC.
The following people are exempt from Obama Deathcare mandates: President Urkel & family, everyone, and their staff, who worked on the Bill, Cabinet members, the Amish, and MUSLIMS, who claim that it is against their religion to buy any insurance.
(this according to Mark Levine). So, I propose that ALL TAMMY ARMY MEMBERS BE EXEMPT TOO, on the grounds that we think the Bill is a piece of crap.
Sounds good to me, but it might be easier if we declare that the United States of Tammy is a religion.
Of course it’s unconstitutional. But honestly, the supreme court voted against private property rights. Does anyone really believe that they are going to rule that this bill is unconstitutional?
Maybe they will say that ‘parts’ of it are unconstitutional, leaving us with an even bigger mess. Maybe they will allow the whole thing. Whatever they do, I personally don’t believe it will be the right thing. But I would love to be wrong about that, believe me.
the mandate should have been the republican target from the get go- you know it’s in contradiction to that thingie, oh what is it called? you know, the what’s -it they pledge to defend and uphold when they take office…
whatever is that process heavy annoyance that keeps dictators and tyrants from making up the rules as they go along?
but they were to busy doing things like oh signing romneycare , conceding that the health care system was an unmitigated disaster only big government could fix and thinking all god’s children had the right to be supported by the successful working serf class unrelated to them by blood or nationality. republicans too have spent generations undermining our constitution- in a word undermining our individual freedoms because the only way to undermine freedom in a democracy is to undermine the necessity of personal responsibility- to give people stuff so they come to believe slavery has more reward then true freedom. free stuff!
but the arguments against deathcare involve nasty things like facts, numbers and examples of provable outright failures . fascists don’t need no bloody arguments because instead of debating things like bills on their merits, the fascists use emotions devoid of reasoning to attain power- a power they never willingly relinquish. hitler himself contended one didn’t need to present arguments to the masses to win them over- f’ing with their emotions and deep seated class and race/nationality based resentments was all that was necessary. right down to the rabid race and jew baiting this administration rolls in like filthy pigs, they have followed not spiritually just the rules for radicals but ‘mein kampf’.
” ‘Because National Socialism is an elementary movement, it cannot be countered with arguments. Arguments could only be effective if the movement had grown by arguments’. Speeches in National Socialist meetings were indeed characterized by very clever manipulations of the emotions of the mass individuals and by strict avoidance of objective argumentation. Hitler, in MEIN KAMPF, emphasized repeatedly that the only correct mass-psychological technique was that of avoiding arguments and of keeping the ‘big final goal’ before the masses. “- wilhelm reich ‘mass psychology of facsism’
and of course causing the masses to foam at the mouth about the evil insurance companies or inflaming them against one another, smearing the opponents as racists and homophobes- it’s the liberal equivalent of hitler and the nazis attacking the jews and enraging the population, already desperate and poverty stricken, against them to violence.
“It is misleading to explain Hitler’s success by National Socialist demagogy, the ‘obfuscation of the masses’ or such meaningless terms as ‘Nazi psychosis’. For the question is precisely why the masses were accessible to demagogy, obfuscation and a psychotic situation. The answer to this question requires an exact knowledge of what goes on in the masses. To say that the Hitler movement had a reactionary function is insufficient. For the mass success of the NSDAP seems to be at variance with this reactionary function. Millions of people affirmed their own subjugation. This contradiction cannot be explained on a political or economic basis, but only mass-psychologically. “- reich mass psych. of fascism.
“Millions of people affirmed their own subjugation.”
shudder.
Who cares. We need to stop being distracted by these kinds of red herrings. The Supreme court will vote 5 to 4, with Kennedy the deciding vote, that the HealthCare law is Constitutional. It’s a done deal, it doesn’t matter whether the Bill (excuse me , the Law) is Constitutional or not. It’s up to us to make it a moot point.. an academic exercise for lawyers. We do this by getting the bill repealed. The only way to repeal the bill is to support anyone who will repeal it with our time and our wallets. We can make the HealthCare law go away in 2013 if we get to work NOW and keep focused. Remember, it is as much our responsibility to protect the constitution as it has been our leaders. We ultimately decide how the Constitution will be treated by who we elect. Let’s take advantage of this fiasco, get involved and see that things never get to this point again on our watch.
Scratch that, I may be wrong…. check this out
http://bit.ly/a3Upep