Much Ado About a Tax

The arguments among the cognoscenti have been going on for months. Does the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA or ObamaCare) violate the United States Constitution?

The arguments that I heard most frequently centered around whether or not the Act violates the Commerce Clause or the Necessary and Proper Clause.

Attorneys, especially those who practice constitutional law are far more versed in these subjects than I, but they are also far more versed than most of my readers. So, when they refer to Ayotte v Planned Parenthood or to Hooper v California, many eyes will glaze over. This is intended for those glazing eyes.

For those lay people who want to know what happened, here you go. Note: I have no formal legal training and I do not practice law.

Article 1, Section 8 of the Constitution discusses the powers given to Congress. Among them are the right to regulate commerce among the several states. Many argued that this would be the point on which the constitutionality of PPACA would turn. And, most of the experts seemed to believe that forcing an individual to make a purchase was beyond the scope of the Commerce Clause. The Supreme Court agreed.

Article 1, Section 8 also contains the so-called Necessary and Proper Clause whereby Congress has the power to make all laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into execution the other powers granted by Article 1, Section 8. Since there was nothing in that section which needed to be executed, the Necessary and Proper Clause did not apply.

Some may recall that the Obama Administration had pledged that those families earning less than $250,000 per year would not see a tax increase. Therefore, the amount that individuals who choose to remain uninsured would pay was written as a penalty, not as a tax.

But, and now for the legalese. the Court through the decision handed down by Chief Justice Roberts, looked to Hooper v California, which says in pertinent part that "every reasonable construction must be resorted to in order to save a statute from unconstitutionality." In English, that means that if there is any way to find a law to be constitutional, then that way should be found.

So, the Supreme Court labeled the penalty to be a tax. And, the first clause of Article 1, Section 8 begins that '[T]he Congress shall have the power to lay and collect taxes ..." So, to the extent that the penalty is, in fact, a tax, Congress was within its constitutional powers to impose said tax.

Much of the law becomes effective in 2014. Of course, we have a major election coming in November and its anyone's guess as to what this will do to the inhabitants of the White House and the Capitol building. If there are big changes, we could see changes to the law. If not, then this law will stand at the very least through 2016.