Tag: Supreme Court

Cato Study: Heretofore Unreported ObamaCare ‘Bug’ Puts IPAB Completely beyond Congress’ Reach

By
Michael F. Cannon

Today, the Cato Institute releases a new study by Diane Cohen and me titled, “The Independent Payment Advisory Board: PPACA’s Anti-Constitutional and Authoritarian Super-Legislature.” Cohen is a senior attorney at the Goldwater Institute and lead counsel in the Coons v. Geithner lawsuit challenging IPAB and other aspects of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010, a.k.a. ObamaCare.

From the executive summary:

When the unelected government officials on this board submit a legislative proposal to Congress, it automatically becomes law: PPACA requires the Secretary of Health and Human Services to implement it. Blocking an IPAB “proposal” requires at a minimum that the House and the Senate and the president agree on a substitute. The Board’s edicts therefore can become law without congressional action, congressional approval, meaningful congressional oversight, or being subject to a presidential veto. Citizens will have no power to challenge IPAB’s edicts in court.

Worse, PPACA forbids Congress from repealing IPAB outside of a seven-month window in the year 2017, and even then requires a three-fifths majority in both chambers…

IPAB’s unelected members will have effectively unfettered power to impose taxes and ration care for all Americans, whether the government pays their medical bills or not. In some circumstances, just one political party or even one individual would have full command of IPAB’s lawmaking powers. IPAB truly is independent, but in the worst sense of the word. It wields power independent of Congress, independent of the president, independent of the judiciary, and independent of the will of the people.

The creation of IPAB is an admission that the federal government’s efforts to plan America’s health care sector have failed. It is proof of the axiom that government control of the economy threatens democracy.

Importantly, this study reveals a heretofore unreported feature that makes this super-legislature even more authoritarian and unconstitutional:

[I]f Congress misses that repeal window, PPACA prohibits Congress from ever altering an IPAB “proposal.”

You read that right.

The Congressional Research Service and others have reported that even if Congress fails to repeal this super-legislature in 2017, Congress will still be able to use the weak tools that ObamaCare allows for restraining IPAB. Unfortunately, that interpretation rests on a misreading of a crucial part of the law. These experts thought they saw the word “or” where the statute actually says “and.”

How much difference can one little conjunction make?

Under the statute as written, if Congress fails to repeal IPAB in 2017, then as of 2020 Congress will have absolutely zero ability to block or amend the laws that IPAB writes, and zero power to affect the Secretary’s implementation of those laws. IPAB will become a permanent super-legislature, with the Secretary as its executive. And if the president fails to appoint any IPAB members, the Secretary will unilaterally wield all of IPAB’s legislative and executive powers, including the power to appropriate funds for her own department. It’s completely nutty, yet completely consistent with the desire of ObamaCare’s authors to protect IPAB from congressional interference.

It’s also completely consistent with Friedrich Hayek’s prediction that government planning of the economy paves the way for authoritarianism.

Topics: 
General, Government and Politics, Health Care, Law and Civil Liberties

Can the Government Destroy Propety Values ‘Temporarily’ Without Compensation?

By
Ilya Shapiro and Trevor Burrus

This blogpost was co-authored by Trevor Burrus.

A seemingly complicated legal case that has caught Cato’s attention, CCA Associates v. United States, boils down to a simple constitutional question: If the government reneges on a contract and forces a property owner to rent apartments at below-market rates for longer than originally agreed, does it constitute a taking under the Fifth Amendment (which would require the government to pay just compensation)?

In 1961, Congress amended the National Housing Act to create incentives for private builders to supply housing to low- and moderate-income families. Builders were given below-market mortgages backed by the federal government and, in return, the owners agreed to certain restrictions from the Department of Housing and Urban Development, the most relevant being limitations on raising rent. Owners were also given the right to pre-pay the 40-year mortgage after 20 years, however, freeing them at that time from their rent-control obligations.

In 1990, as one 20-year period came to a close, Congress took away the owners’ right to pre-pay their mortgages. In 1996, however, Congress returned the property owners’ right to pre-pay. Therefore, between 1991 (when the original 20-year period would have lapsed) and 1996, the property owners were forced to rent at below-market rates.

CCA Associates is one of many similarly situated property owners who are suing the federal government for its clear act of duplicity. CCA Associates’ case, among many others, has been bouncing back and forth between the Court of Federal Claims and the Federal Circuit for many years.

One of the key questions is how to determine the degree to which the government’s actions economically affected CCA Associates’ property. One view is that there was substantial economic impact during the five-year period between when Congress eliminated and then restored the pre-pay right – CCA Associates lost approximately 81% of the property’s possible value during those five years. Another view looks at the impact during the five-year period as fraction of the entire life of the property, not just the diminished value during the five-year period. Under this calculation, CCA Associates only lost 18% of the total value of the property.

The Federal Circuit adopted the latter formula and held that 18% is not a substantial enough economic impact to constitute a Fifth Amendment taking. Cato has joined the National Federation of Independent Business, the Center for Constitutional Jurisprudence, and Professor Steven Eagle of George Mason University Law School on an amicus brief urging the Supreme Court to take CCA Associates’ case.

We argue that adopting the Federal Circuit’s answer to the so-called “denominator question” – that is, whether the denominator in the “economic impact” fraction should be the entire life of the property or the shorter (here five-year) period during which the government temporarily took the owners’ right to rent at the market price – could preclude all possible claims that the government committed a “temporary taking.” By choosing a big-enough denominator, courts can always characterize an economic impact as being below the constitutional threshold.

We also argue that, in applying the Supreme Court’s factors in the famous 1978 Penn Central case (which set up the analytical framework for regulatory takings), the Federal Circuit incorrectly treated the factors as a magic formula and ignored other relevant factors. Finally, we point out how courts are obviously confused about the proper standards to apply in these cases, thus creating a perfect time for the Supreme Court’s guidance.

The Court will decide this fall whether to hear CCA Associates v. United States.

Topics: 
Government and Politics, Law and Civil Liberties, Regulatory Studies

Obamacare’s Unconstitutional—-Let’s Implement! No Wait, We’re Not Implementing—-Yes We Are!

By
Michael F. Cannon

The Washington Post reports:

For 14 months, a bipartisan group of 17 states has been quietly collaborating with the Obama administration to help build a foundation for the health-care reform law’s success.

The group includes some of the law’s staunchest supporters working alongside a handful of its bigger detractors. They are backed by $3 million in funding from eight nonprofit organizations that hope to see the Affordable Care Act succeed.

Together, they have come up with a tool to help consumers navigate the health insurance exchanges—the marketplaces that each state is required to have by 2014.

In other words, at the same time Alabama, Arizona, Colorado, and Kansas are suing to overturn Obamacare as unconstitutional, officials in those states are helping to implement the same unconstitutional law.

The Post reports, without rebuttal, several myths about the states’ role under Obamacare. It refers three times to the “tight deadlines” states face under the law. (There are no deadlines. HHS has said that if states decline to create exchanges, they can change their minds later.) It claims, “If a state does not have a framework in place by 2013, the Department of Health and Human Services will come in and do the job itself.” (That’s highly questionable. Obamacare appropriates zero funds for federal exchanges and HHS has admitted it doesn’t have the money.) It quotes Kansas insurance regulator Linda Shepphard as saying, “There is no work being done to build an exchange in Kansas at this point.” (Well, which is it? Is Kansas doing “no work,” or is it “collaborating with the Obama administration”?) I’d say certain state officials got some ‘splaining to do.

In the video below the jump, I explain to state officials why flatly refusing to create an Obamacare exchange is the best thing they can do for their states.

Topics: 
Government and Politics, Health Care

States Should Flatly Refuse to Create ObamaCare Exchanges (New Cato Video)

By
Michael F. Cannon

This new Cato Institute video explains why it is in no state’s interest to create an ObamaCare Exchange.

Many thanks to Cato’s very talented Caleb O. Brown and Austin Bragg.

For the more-words-no-pictures version, click here or here. For a word about ObamaCare profiteers the pro-Exchange lobby, click here. Click here to read about what is happening in the states.

Topics: 
General, Government and Politics, Health Care

The Federal Government Can’t Give Itself More Power Just By Signing a Treaty

By
Ilya Shapiro

With ObamaCare, immigration, affirmative action, gay marriage, and the other hot-button issues rolling through our courts this year, some of you may have overlooked a little case on the Treaty Power, United States v. Bond, which was at the Court last year and may well make it back next year.

I’ve covered Bond before, and Cato has filed two amicus briefs in the case (before the Supreme Court and then in the Third Circuit on remand). As I described it last year, Bond is “your typical sordid tale of adultery, toxic chemicals, and federalism.” It’s a bizarre scenario you can read about in the previous links, but the issue that has drawn Cato’s attention—and that of Paul Clement, who remains Mrs. Bond’s counsel—is whether Congress can regulate the conduct of something solely because the United States is party to a treaty regarding that subject.

That is, even though Congress does not have the power to pass, for example, general criminal statutes, if Congress ratifies a treaty calling for such statutes, the dominant reading of an old precedent called Missouri v. Holland is that its power increases beyond constitutional limits. Not only would this mean that the Executive has the ability to expand congressional power by signing a treaty, but it would mean that foreign governments could change congressional power by abrogating a previously valid treaty—thus removing the constitutional authority from certain laws. Cato’s briefs have taken issue with such an interpretation of the Treaty Power, tracking the argument made by new Cato senior fellow (and Georgetown law professor) Nicholas Quinn Rosenkranz in his magisterial Harvard Law Review article, “Executing the Treaty Power.”

Earlier this month, the Third Circuit upheld Mrs. Bond’s conviction because the statute under which she was convicted duly implemented the Chemical Conventions Act and a lower court can’t overrule Missouri v. Holland. The court cited Cato’s brief and Nick’s article, however, and a concurrence by Judge Thomas Ambro, after also citing John Eastman’s article about the case in the Cato Supreme Court Review, specifically called on the Supreme Court to clarify the meaning of Missouri v. Holland.

The Court will have an opportunity to do so, with Paul Clement currently preparing a cert petition, which Cato will again support. In the meantime, you can listen in on a teleforum the Federalist Society is having about the case, featuring Prof. Rosenkranz (Fed Soc membership required, which costs $5-50 per year).

Topics: 
Foreign Policy and National Security, Government and Politics, Law and Civil Liberties

College Applicants Should Be Judged on Their Merits, Not the Color of Their Skin

By
Ilya Shapiro

The Supreme Court has waded back into the affirmative action thicket, taking up the issue of the proper role, if any, of race in college admissions, in the case of Fisher v. University of Texas at Austin, which it will be hearing this fall, likely in October.

Abigail Fisher, who is white, was denied admission to the University of Texas at Austin even though her academic credentials exceeded those of many admitted minority applicants. She challenged UT-Austin’s consideration of race in selecting its incoming freshmen but lost before the district court in light of the Supreme Court’s 2003 ruling in Grutter v. Bollinger.

In Grutter, a divided Court held that using race as a factor (but not one tied to a set number of points or quotas) was justified in the name of diversity. But UT-Austin’s admissions program treats race in a different way, and gets different results, than did the admissions program Grutter upheld at the University of Michigan Law School.

The Fifth Circuit panel nevertheless affirmed the district court, but Judge Emilio Garza specially concurred to say that while he was bound by Grutter, that decision seemed to conflict with other precedent and with the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause. The Fifth Circuit then voted 9-7 against rehearing the case en banc (before all judges on the court), over a sharp dissent from Chief Judge Edith Jones that emphasized how the ruling would allow states to play fast-and-loose with Grutter’s narrow-tailoring requirement.

Now before the Supreme Court, Cato filed an amicus brief supporting Abby Fisher and arguing that the Fifth Circuit showed blind deference to UT’s policy rather than the constitutionally demanded strict scrutiny. The lower court explicitly declined to evaluate the merits of UT’s decision to consider race, instead assuming the institution’s good faith. Under this rule, a public university’s mere assertion of a diversity interest, irrespective of the university’s precise circumstances or actual motivations, trumps an applicant’s right to be treated as an individual rather than a racial specimen.

We also point out that the Fifth Circuit ignored the Supreme Court’s requirement (from the 1989 case of City of Richmond v. J.A. Croson Co.) that the government demonstrate a “strong basis in evidence” for racial classifications in order to smoke out the illegitimate motivations that can underlie such schemes. That is, Grutter upheld Michigan’s racial preferences because the school showed that minority enrollment would have plummeted to almost nothing without them, while UT had already achieved real diversity (beyond even that created by Michigan’s preferences) with a race-neutral law that guarantees admission to anyone graduating in the top 10 percent of a Texas public school.

Finally, we note that even if UT could show that racial preferences were necessary for some legitimate reason, its chosen paradigm for applying such preferences is arbitrary. For example, UT justifies preferences to Hispanics by pointing to the need for a “critical mass” of such students, even as it denies preferences to Asians, who comprise a smaller portion of the student body.

We urge the Supreme Court to reign in UT’s unbridled use of race in admissions decisions and take an important step toward ensuring that young Americans are judged on their qualifications and character rather than their skin color.

Topics: 
Education and Child Policy, Government and Politics, Law and Civil Liberties

Obamacare’s Constitutional Defects, First Amendment Division

By
Ilya Shapiro

On May 11, the Department of Health & Human Services finalized rules requiring insurers to tell any of their customers who get premium rebates this summer that the windfall comes courtesy of Obamacare.  Here’s the official required language:  “This letter is to inform you that you will receive a rebate of a portion of your health insurance premiums. This rebate is required by the Affordable Care Act-the health reform law.”

Given that Obamacare is already increasing costs for most patients – insured or otherwise – I wonder who the lucky few will be who get a chance to read the government’s prose.  Moreover, it’s a bit rich to create this “language mandate” when HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius had earlier advised insurance companies not to speak against Obamacare’s cost-increasing features.  As the Competitive Enterprise Institute’s Hans Bader put it:

Obama’s HHS secretary sought to gag insurers that disclosed how Obamacare’s mandates are increasing the cost of health insurance, even though such speech is clearly protected by the First Amendment, telling them if they did so, they could be excluded from health insurance exchanges. Prior to that, the Obama administration attempted to gag insurers from disclosing how Obamacare harms Medicare Advantage participants, drawing criticism from First Amendment experts like UCLA law professor Eugene Volokh, the author of two First Amendment textbooks.

Beyond the unseemliness of it all, however, there’s also a constitutional problem:  The government can’t require people to make politicized statements, whether that’s “Live Free or Die” on license plate or the labeling of consumer products where the labels aren’t justified on fraud-prevention or public health grounds.  See some other examples and legal analysis in Bader’s post at CEI’s blog.

The bottom line is that just like the First Amendment stops the government from censoring speech, it stops it from forcing speech.  And just like there’s no “health care is unique” exception to the Commerce Clause, there isn’t one to the First Amendment.

Topics: 
Government and Politics, Health Care, Law and Civil Liberties

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