The Constitutionality of National Health Reform Law

News Articles

Health Care Reform in the Courts

 Supreme Court of the United States: Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act Website

1. Severability of the minimum coverage provision (90 minutes of argument):
(a). "The question presented is whether the ACA must be invalidated in its entirety because it is nonseverable from the individual mandate that exceeds Congress’ limited and enumerated powers under the Constitution." (NFIB v. Sebelius)
(b). "[T]o what extent (if any) can the mandate be severed from the remainder of the Act?" (Question 3, Florida v. HHS)

2. The constitutionality of the minimum coverage provision (2 hours of argument):
"Whether Congress had the power under Article I of the Constitution to enact the minimum coverage provision." (HHS v. Florida)

3. The Anti-Injunction Act (1 hour of argument):
"Whether the suit brought by respondents to challenge the minimum coverage provision of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act is barred by the Anti-Injunction Act, 26 U.S.C. §7421(a)." (Added by the Court in its order granting certiorari, question presented in Liberty University v. Geithner)

4. The constitutionality of the ACA's Medicaid expansion (1 hour of argument):
"Does Congress exceed its enumerated powers and violate basic principles of federalism when  it coerces States into accepting onerous conditions that  it  could not impose  directly by threatening to withhold all  federal  funding under the single largest grant-in-aid program, or does the limitation on Congress‘s spending  power  that this Court  recognized in  South Dakota v. Dole, 483 U.S. 203 (1987), no longer apply?" (Question 1, Florida v. HHS)