The court voted 2-1 to uphold the mandate that almost every American be required to purchase health insurance. The opinion was written by Judge Laurence Silberman, who was appointed by Ronald Reagan in 1985.
Silberman was joined by Judge Harry Edwards, who was appointed by President Jimmy Carter. Judge Brett Kavanaugh, an appointee of President George W. Bush, was the opposing vote. Silberman wrote that the mandate was a legitimate use of legislative power. But he did express some reservations about its impact on individual freedom.
Silberman concluded: "That a direct requirement for most Americans to purchase any product or service seems an intrusive exercise of legislative power surely explains why Congress has not used this authority before–but that seems to us a political judgment rather than a recognition of constitutional limitations.It certainly is an encroachment on individual liberty, but it is no more so than a command that restaurants or hotels are obliged to serve all customers regardless of race, that gravely ill individuals cannot use a substance their doctors described as the only effective palliative for excruciating pain, or that a farmer cannot grow enough wheat to support his own family."
Silberman also wrote that "right to be free from federal regulation is not absolute," and that it was imperative that Congress "be free to forge national solutions to national problems, no matter how local -- or seemingly passive -- their individual origins."
Kavanaugh, the lone dissenter, took the position that a seldom used law that bans courts from prohibiting taxes before any are actually paid was grounds for barring the suit altogether.
The District of Columbia Circuit Court is the fourth appeals court to hear a lawsuit challenging the health-care reform law and the second to uphold the individual mandate, according to Politico. One court ruled against it; the other declined to rule on the case.
The U.S. Supreme Court justices could rule as early as this week on which of the legal challenges to the law they will consider.
