Monday, January 31, 2011

FL Judge Says Obamacare is Unconstitutional

From Reuters, a half hour ago:
A judge in Florida on Monday became the second judge to declare President Barack Obama's healthcare reform law unconstitutional, in the biggest legal challenge yet to federal authority to enact the law.
U.S. District Judge Roger Vinson, appointed to the bench by President Ronald Reagan in 1983, ruled that the reform law's so-called "individual mandate" went too far in requiring that Americans start buying health insurance in 2014 or pay a penalty.
"Because the individual mandate is unconstitutional and not severable, the entire act must be declared void. This has been a difficult decision to reach, and I am aware that it will have indeterminable implications," Vinson wrote.
Ultimately, the Supreme Court will decide this (most likely in 2012). The President is going to spend the next two years defending Obamacare from the machinations of Congress, but the third branch is the ultimate arbiter of these things. 

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