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Memo to Snyder: Don’t stop the radical reforms now!Federal judge strikes down ObamaCare in its entirety as unconstitutional
January 31st, 2011 | 
Author: 
Dan Calabrese
Holy crap! U.S. District Judge Roger Vinson has just ruled in favor of 26 state attorneys general that ObamaCare in its entirety is unconstitutional. The law does remain in effect until all appears are exhausted, but since the real meat doesn’t take effect until 2014 anyway, that’s essentially irrelevant. (The ruling is embedded in full at the end of this column.)
Granted, this fight is far from over. Everyone expects this question to end up before the Supreme Court. But it’s much more plausible to envision the high court’s 5-4 conservative majority (or at least swing vote Justice Kennedy) to uphold a lower court ruling that the law unconstitutional than it is to imagine them offering that ruling when no lower court had done so.
The key fact is this: As of this moment, the position of the judicial branch of the federal government is that ObamaCare is unconstitutional, and unless that changes, it is not going to be the law of the land. Maybe the GOP won’t have to repeal it after all. Wow.
Of course, the law’s defenders are already in full spin mode trying to minimize the significance of Judge Vinson’s ruling. Writer Andrew Cohen of The Atlantic saw it coming this morning and insisted that all the conservative celebration would represent an overreaction. And because Vinson ruled that the law would remain in effect throughout the appeals process, liberals are whistling past the graveyard that it really hasn’t been struck down at all. The fact of the matter is that they never took the question of the law’s constitutionality seriously.
When the states brought this action, Democrats and the media laughed and mocked the effort. The very idea! Yeah. It’s true. You can’t pass a law that violates the Constitution. Of course, they can still try to convince the Supremes that what they did was perfectly legal. Good luck to them. Vinson opinion
Posted in Dan Calabrese
3 Responses to “Federal judge strikes down ObamaCare in its entirety as unconstitutional”
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Dan, a little more precision is in order here. First, it is not “the position of the judicial branch” that the law is unconstitutional. It is the position of one judge in one district. This is the fourth ruling on the question at the trial court level. Judge Hudson in VA struck down the mandate but not the rest of the law; Judge Steeh in MI and Judge Moon in VA upheld the law in its entirety. The score is 2-2.
Second, it is not accurate to say that Judge Vinson ruled that the entire law is unconstitutional. Rather, he ruled that the individual mandate is unconstitutional and that the remaining provisions, though they may be perfectly legal on their own, cannot be separated from the mandate (they’re not “severable,” in legal terms), so the failure of the mandate drags the whole law down. That is a very different position.
This may seem like hairsplitting that only a lawyer would bother with. But these distinctions have real importance in shaping how the questions will be framed when they get to the Appeals Courts and ultimately the Supreme Court.
That may seem decent though i am just still not too certain that I like it. However will look even more into it and choose personally!
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