Overturn the entire affordable care act? Hmmmm?

There is a national debate over the comments of President Obama to the effect that the Supreme Court is unlikely to overturn healthcare reform in the Affordable Healthcare Act. His comments referenced the traditions of the past 80 years. Our Attorney General, Eric Holder, was called upon by Judge Jerry Smith of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit to explain the President’s position. There are increasing speculations by media personalities that the Supreme Court is poised to find the entirety of the Affordable Healthcare Act unconstitutional.

The issue of universal health care is not a directly constitutional issue. The only issue that has been challenged at the Appeals Court level across the country has to do with the universal requirement to purchase private health insurance, a legislative compromise from the original proposal for a tax supported single payer plan. Consider, this is not the first universal healthcare coverage plan conceived and passed by Congress. Congress passed a law in 1798, supported by both John Adams and Thomas Jefferson that required all merchant marine seamen to contribute through a payroll tax to cover their healthcare for access to government supported federal marine hospitals and contracted private healthcare providers.

The problem with the current statute is that Congress rejected a single payer system supported by a payroll tax. If the concept of reduced healthcare costs through a universal payment system is to work then a private insurance mandate was needed. This strategy protected the private for profit health insurance industry and neutralized their opposition. This required a controversial payment mechanism that may be unconstitutional. But throw out the whole law? Consider the political consequences of that.

Although most people do not like this law in its current form, the support for the assurance of universal healthcare has been historically enduring. President Obama is only the first President to succeed. If the law is overturned in its entirety and President Obama is re-elected we can be sure of a groundswell of support for a single payer system. A Congress that is again Democratic would be far more likely to pass a new stronger health care reform law. And consider, there are three justices planning on participation in this ruling who have publicly known conflicts of interest (Kagan, Thomas and Scalia). What happens to them with a Democratic Congress when Article III stipulates their tenure as "shall hold their Offices during good Behavior". Would they risk an extreme and constitutionally unsupported political ruling?