From the NYT:
The Obama administration prevailed in the first appellate review of the 2010 health care law on Wednesday as a three-judge panel from the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit held that it was constitutional for Congress to require that Americans obtain health insurance.
The ruling by the Cincinnati court is the first of three opinions to be delivered by separate courts of appeal that heard arguments in the health care litigation in May and June. Opinions are expected soon from panels in both the Fourth Circuit in Richmond, Va., and the Eleventh Circuit in Atlanta.
Lawyers on both sides of the case widely expect the Supreme Court to take one or more of the cases, perhaps as soon as its coming term, which starts in October. The speed of the Sixth Circuit ruling could help insure that timing.
You can read the decision here.
Here's a key part of the story:
The Sixth Circuit majority held that the mandate was “facially constitutional under the Commerce Clause” for two reasons.
“First, the provision regulates economic activity that Congress had a rational basis to believe has substantial effects on interstate commerce,” Judge Martin wrote. “In addition, Congress had a rational basis to believe that the provision was essential to its larger economic scheme reforming the interstate markets in health care and health insurance.”
The court directly addressed whether a choice to go without health insurance qualifies as an “activity” that substantially affects interstate commerce, which is the standard set in prior Supreme Court decisions on the breadth of the Commerce Clause.
“The activity of foregoing health insurance and attempting to cover the cost of health care needs by self-insuring is no less economic than the activity of purchasing an insurance plan,” the opinion stated.
The majority emphasized that the case should not hang on distinctions about whether the failure to purchase insurance should be defined as activity or inactivity, a question the Supreme Court has never considered. “The constitutionality of the minimum coverage provision cannot be resolved with a myopic focus on a malleable label,” the judges said.
In his concurrence, Judge Sutton added: “Inaction is action, sometimes for better, sometimes for worse, when it comes to financial risk.” Whether an individual buys an insurance policy or not, the judge wrote, “each requires affirmative choices; one is no less active than the other; and both affect commerce.”
