Two Years On: Obamacare

That whole "oral arguments aren't all that revealing" assertion? Some folks out there apparently have tried to see whether it holds water or not. (Here's the link (http://themonkeycage.org/) ... scroll down a bit and you'll see the work, especially the references of published studies regarding the overall question). Take it for what it's worth ... I found it interesting.

 

That's really interesting. I'd like to see some even deeper political science empirical studies on oral arguments, but this is a really nice start.

 

It's interesting that the severability clause of Obamacare was removed from House bill when it went to the Senate.

It would seem that someone was thinking at that time that ultimate decision would rest with the Supreme Court.

Without severability clause it puts the Supreme Court in the unenviable position of overturning a law where parts are already in progress and could not be left intact. It makes it all or nothing.

I doubt that it was an oversight.

 

I'd like to see a study on how oral arguments break down when the constitutionality of a statute is at issue, rather than just lumping all Supreme Court cases together. I wonder if the justices are more apt to grill the government in a situation like this, even if the law is ultimately upheld, than the plaintiff? It would be interesting, for example, to analyze the oral arguments from the 1964 Civil Rights Act cases.

 

I thought it was the kind of thing they expected to add to the final language, but then when Kennedy died, and Brown won the seat, the only way to pass the bill was for the House to vote on the bill that had already passed the Senate.

 

The severability clause was to have been added in conference, but there was no conference and the bill went through reconciliation instead. It wasn't by design.

I don't think the lack of a severability clause will sway the justices one way or the other. They'll make their ruling and let the chips fall where they may.

 

Perhaps, but not having it in there adds greater weight to the decision. It would seem to be a lot
easier if they could just disallow the mandatory buy in as opposed to all or nothing.

Clearly there was a reason that it was taken out in committee.

 

Well, just another $17 trillion(!!!!) shortfall discovered in this "saving" bill.

http://dailycaller.com/2012/03/30/another-17-trillion-surprise-found-in-obamacare/

 

Completely irrelevant to the matter at hand.

 

Also, entirely fictional.

 

The more I think about it, the more I am solidly convinced that they will uphold the mandate. The Supreme Court has a method of interpretation in which they give a Congressional statute as much deference as possible - i.e., the baseline assumption is that it is Constitutional. This is one reason that I'm convinced that the tax argument is a clear route to upholding the statute - it may not be a tax as we have all come to think of them, at least structurally, but it's a "reasonable" way to interpret the mandate so as to maintain its Constitutionality. This was discussed a lot in the Enron case where Skilling's conviction was overturned - they didn't want to completely invalidate the honest services act for being too vague, so they held that it applied to kickbacks and bribery and that's it.

 

I project a funding gap in my grocery bill for the week of March 31, 2087.