More on Why Health Care Reform is Constitutional: is Mr. Farah Serious or Seriously Misinformed?

In any event, the Commerce Clause argument is a red herring.  Under Article I, Section 8, Paragraph 1 of the Constitution, Congress can impose taxes to “provide for the general welfare of the United States.” The proposed health insurance bill does not criminalize a refusal to buy health insurance: it simply increases a person’s income tax liability if a policy is not purchased. In the same way, Congress increases people’s income tax liability if they do not have a home loan, do not have real estate taxes to pay, do not have extraordinary medical expenses, or do not have charitable deductions. If Mr. Farah wants to say Congress cannot change a person’s tax liability based on the purchase of health insurance, he must also acknowledge it cannot change that liability based on most personal deductions.

Mr. Farah also asserts that according to Speaker Pelosi, “there is nothing Congress can’t do if it involved interstate commerce,” a thought he finds equivalent to “treason.”  Quite frankly, this is ridiculous.  The Commerce Clause puts certain limits on Congress’ power.  See United States v. Morrison, 529 U.S. 598 (2000),  United States v. Lopez, 514 U.S. 549 (1995).  Nothing suggests that Congress is acting beyond those limits in considering health insurance reform, much less that Speaker Pelosi is intentionally acting beyond those limits. Indeed, as Gonzales and South-Eastern Underwriters show, Congress is acting within the limits the Supreme Court has set.

There is accordingly no “treason” or “coup.” We still live in a “constitutional republic” in which “bounds” are imposed by “the supreme law of the land.” Speaker Pelosi has decades of Supreme Court case law establishing that her health insurance reform bill is within those “bounds.” Mr. Farah simply wants different bounds. That is his right, of course, but he cannot seriously maintain that the proposed bill is outside the bounds that currently exist.

Mr. Farah also presents nothing to suggest how the “Commerce Clause” and the “general Welfare Clause” should be interpreted. Does he think Gonzales was wrongly decided? South-Eastern Underwriters? What about Steward Machine v. Collector of Internal Revenue, 301 U.S. 548 (1937), which upheld the Social Security tax? Is Medicare unconstitutional? What about agricultural subsidies and other spending programs? More generally, how does Mr. Farah think we should decide what is “regulation” of “interstate commerce,” and what is not? What is within Congressional authority to “provide for the general Welfare,” and what is not?

I cordially invite Mr. Farah to read the existing case law, explain why the cases I cite were wrongly decided, state what limits he thinks the Commerce and general Welfare Clauses impose on Congress, explain why those limits are a reasonable interpretation of the Constitution, and discuss how those limits would impact current law and our country. A reasonable debate on the issue would let all of his readers see the impact of what Mr. Farah proposes, and judge accordingly. It also would be more productive than unsupported claims of misconduct by Speaker Pelosi.