States to Congress: 'Don't tread on me...'

Two weeks ago, I wrote about the dismal performance of California legislators as they rushed to pass $200 billion worth of health-care reform at a time when their state is facing bankruptcy.

This week, I’ll focus on the flip side of the coin and highlight the efforts of some states to stop the insanity.

On Wednesday, the Tennessee Senate voted 26-1 to order that state’s attorney general to file a constitutional challenge against any federal legislation that mandates the purchase of health insurance.

Since forcing citizens to buy insurance is at the heart of the so-called “health-care reform” effort, this kind of challenge could represent a crippling blow to the Obama administration’s plans.

Nor is Tennessee alone. In Virginia, on Feb. 1, the Democratic-controlled Senate approved three bills too make it illegal to require residents of Virginia to purchase health-care coverage. And all told, more than 30 states are contemplating similar laws or constitutional amendments to assert their 10th Amendment rights under the U.S. Constitution.

That amendment states simply that “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”

Since the U.S. Constitution is mute on the question of health-care mandates, a strong case can be made that only the states have a right to order the purchase of health insurance. There is also the outside chance that as part of each individual’s rights to “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness,” they and they alone can determine how they will spend their own money. Or is that 233-year-old idea considered TOO revolutionary for our own good?

Well, sorry, but the whole idea of the federal system was to limit the power of central government, by ensuring that states and their people would maintain sovereignty over themselves. If the courts determine now that states cannot protect their own citizens from an unconstitutional encroachment by the federal government, then we need more than a tea party; we really do need a revolution.

The entire justification for the federal health-care takeover is the so-called interstate commerce clause of the U.S. Constitution which establishes that Congress shall have the power “To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian tribes.”

Now how you get from regulating commerce “among the several states” to ordering each and every citizen of the country to purchase health insurance is beyond me, but it seems that it must require a tall dose of gullibility and a heaping helping of servitude. One law professor notes that, “Since 1935, the Supreme Court has struck down only two federal laws as outside the Commerce Clause while upholding dozens.” He says the health-care takeover will be similarly rubber-stamped by the Supreme Court.

That’s why it is vital for the states to stand up for the people. They are the last line of defense.

n Frank Miele is managing editor of the Daily Inter Lake and writes a weekly column. E-mail responses may be sent to edit@dailyinterlake.com