Plans for President Barack Obama's health care overhaul plan still remain up in the air following a three-day discussion in the Supreme Court. Justices left the argument questioning whether the plan could stay intact if the key mandate regarding individual insurance requirement was voted against. The great controversy with the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act lies with this mandate. Twenty-six states do not want the entire overhaul to pass muster, while other justices agree with certain parts of the plan. The final vote will take place in June (ABC Local 7).
The individual mandate requires all Americans to buy health care or pay a fine. Obama's reason for including this mandate is because it bans insurers from discriminating against the unhealthy through inflated premiums or denying coverage altogether. Insurers need more people to buy insurance or they will have to raise premiums. Millions of Americans currently do not have health insurance, and they simply pass on the cost to the government, businesses, and other Americans with insurance when they suffer from catastrophic medical problems (Heath). .
Justice Anthony Kennedy, oftentimes the crucial, swing vote in these circumstances, said the mandate requiring all individual's to obtain health insurance is "a step beyond what our cases allow. The government is saying that the federal government has a duty to tell the individual citizen that it must act, and that is different from what we have in previous cases and that changes the relationship of the federal government to the individual in the very fundamental way" (ABC Local 7). .
Obama argues that his plan falls under the commerce clause, which gives Congress the power to regulate interstate commerce. The fine instated if citizens don't comply and buy insurance is regulated under the spending and taxing authority. Many opponents of the mandate say the clause covers economic activity but not inactivity.