The first part of the opinion ponders the question of whether or not the Supreme Court can hear the merits of the case. In Section II Justice Roberts essentially lays out his framework for how he sees the case from a matter of statutory interpretation and constitutional interpretation. These two types of interpretation are not the same and as a result can lead to seemingly different results even though both forms of interpretation revolve around the term "tax". Prior to oral argument the federal government had made the argument that because the mandate was a tax the Anti-Injunction Act (AIA) applied meaning that the suit was not properly before the court until the tax provisions become effective on January 1, 2014. Later the federal government backed away from this argument and said that the mandate, for the purposes of the AIA, is not a tax and therefore the jurisdictional issue could be resolved and the merits of the case could be heard by the Supreme Court. At oral argument, Solicitor General Verrilli argued that the AIA did not apply because, statutorily, the mandate was not a tax. However, for the purposes of the Constitution the mandate should be considered a tax. In Section II, Justice Roberts argued that Congress can define terms however it sees fit and that clearly the term penalty (which is how the "mandate" is termed in the ACA) is not the same as a tax for the purposes of the AIA and the ACA which both used the term tax as a separate entity from a mandate. A common tool of statutory interpretation is that where a definition for a word is found, and Congress deviates from using that word, the deviation ought to carry meaning that cannot be ascribed to the defined word. According to Chief Justice Roberts, because the mandate is defined as a penalty and not as a tax, which is already defined, Congress must have acted intentionally in terming the mandate as a penalty and therefore the mandate should not be considered a tax under the AIA.
When Justice Roberts turned to the merits of the case he dealt with the primary question on everyone's mind and ruled that the mandate was an unconstitutional exercise of the Commerce Clause. Roberts noted that there is a vast distinction between compelling individuals who are already active in a market to doing further economic behaviors, like when compelling farmers to grow limited amounts of a crop to make sure that crop prices remain stable, as opposed to compelling individuals who are inactive in a market to become active in that market. Justice Roberts found the federal government's argument unpersuasive that everyone was already participating in the healthcare market, or that they eventually would. Roberts also noted that the Commerce Clause is a potent tool for the federal government. When the federal government uses its authority pursuant to the Commerce Clause, Congress can force states and individuals to comply with laws like civil rights legislation. (Katzenbach v. McClung). Although the sweep of the Commerce Clause is necessarily broad, there are limits to this power. Most importantly the limit applies to cases which do not inherently deal with commercial activity. Lopez v. U.S.; Morrison v. U.S. Although Roberts found that a novel application of the Commerce Clause does not spell doom for the new application, it does speak to the potential change in power, as would have been the case here. Ultimately, Roberts found there is a significant distinction between those regulations which properly target those already in a market and those regulations which incorrectly force others to enter a market against their will. For this reason, the Commerce Clause cannot be used to enforce the individual mandate.
Justice Roberts also spent some time discussing the nature of the Necessary and Proper Clause because some filed briefs argued that, pursuant to that clause, the mandate could be upheld. Roberts held that the Necessary and Proper Clause is not an individual font of power separate from the other traditional congressional powers. Instead, it is properly invoked to justify a congressional action only after the action has been deemed a valid exercise of power under the Commerce Clause, the taxation power, the spending power, or the 14th Amendment powers.
At this point some news analysts stopped reading and assumed that the individual mandate was ruled unconstitutional. However, a more full reading of Roberts' opinion reveals that Roberts holds fast to a very important doctrine, called the Ashwander Doctrine, which is a set of informal Supreme Court rules that dictate when the Supreme Court will rule on the constitutionality of a law. Crafted by Justice Brandeis, the rule essentially was designed as a way of internally limiting the Supreme Court's ability to invalidate congressional laws. Seeing Congress as a co-equal branch of government, the Justice Brandeis noted that the proper balance between the separate branches of government is to use judicial review sparingly against Congress. Justice Roberts invoked one of the last principles in the Ashwander Doctrine to justify his further ruling: if there are serious doubts as to the constitutionality of a law, the Court must first ascertain if there is a alternate construction of the law that might avoid invalidating the law.
By determining that the taxing power provided a sufficient valid justification for the individual mandate, Justice Roberts held that the mandate was constitutional pursuant to the taxing power. In this section, which ultimately saved the ACA, Roberts deemed that the mandate functioned like most taxes. The mandate essentially offers individuals a choice, they can buy healthcare or they can pay the tax. If they fail to pay the tax there is no criminal enforcement. Combining these findings together, Roberts ruled that the tax did not force individuals into one position or the other but, like so many other taxes, provided a valid choice for an individual. Justice Roberts held that the tax here carried no penalty and similar taxes have been upheld by the Court and the same should be true in this case. N.Y. v. U.S.
Furthermore, Justice Roberts described the boundaries of the tax power. Previously, tax lawyers and judges have determined that Congress is generally free to tax whatever behavior they want because the 16th Amendment gave Congress that power. I know this because my tax law professor, who is also a tax judge, said so in class, much to most of the students' bewilderment. Justice Roberts backed away from that principle and noted that there are limits to the taxing power, namely that direct taxes are expressly forbidden by the Constitution. Direct taxes, according to Roberts' history of the direct tax restriction, are those that deal with a capitation tax (such as an equal dollar figure assessed per individual) or a land tax by the federal government. Roberts felt that those two forms of direct taxation could not be applied to the mandate. Further restricting the tax power, Justice Roberts fond that taxes cannot be punitive. Despite these restrictions Roberts found that where a tax truly does offer a choice to an individual the tax will be valid. Thus, the mandate, under the taxing power, was constitutional.
Finally, Justice Roberts dealt with the Spending Clause. The Spending Clause generally affords Congress a free hand when drafting spending agreements between the federal government and the states. The typical arrangement for the spending clause is that states will receive federal dollars to implement a program if the states are willing to give up some of their sovereignty on the matter and allow the federal government to do its proposed action. Many of our laws are done this way such as interstate highways, civil rights litigation laws, and education laws. Because these laws necessarily involve the state's consent, the state allows the federal government to intervene where the 10th Amendment would normally bar federal action. Because of the broad nature of the spending clause there are restrictions that the Court has previously found. 1) The negotiation must be generally fair between the state and federal government. The Federal government is allowed to provide large inducements to convince the states to allow entrance to federal conduct but in doing so, the proposed law must truly allow the states to reject the federal governments offer. 2) The proposed spending must be topically related to the action being committed by Congress. Therefore, if a highway spending project is proposed, the federal dollars attached to the bill must be topically related to highways and road use or else the spending could be unconstitutionally coercive. 3) As espoused by Roberts in his opinion, Congress is free to deny the states federal dollars for proposed legislation, but it is not free to deny previously allocated federal dollars for a program that is functionally different from the proposed legislation. The ACA allowed the Secretary of Health and Human Services to deny all Medicaid spending to a state if the state failed to expand Medicaid under the ACA. Roberts felt that this action put a figurative gun to a state's head. The ACA represented a significant shift in mission between the original purpose of Medicaid, which covers four types of individuals, and the ACA's expansion of Medicaid which would cover anyone who is below 133% of the federal poverty level. As a result, Roberts determined that the federal government cannot make past Medicaid funding contingent on the Medicaid expansion in the ACA. Thus, the Medicaid expansion is constitutional in so far as future expansion dollars can be denied if the state chooses not to expand Medicaid. But the federal government cannot impermissibly deny a state past Medicaid dollars for failure to expand Medicaid.
No comments:
Post a Comment