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2011-09-29 13:00:11
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The Justice Department said the justices should hear its appeal of by a three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit, in Atlanta, that struck down the centerpiece [核心]of the law by a 2-to-1 vote.
“The department has consistently and successfully defended this law in several courts of appeals, and only the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled it unconstitutional【违反宪法的】,” the Justice Department said in a statement. “We believe the question is appropriate for review by the Supreme Court.
The Supreme Court will uphold the law.
On Monday, the administration announced that it would not seek review from the full 11th Circuit. Its Supreme Court petition was not due until November.
The administration did not explain why it did not take routine litigation steps that might have slowed the progress of the challenges enough to avoid a decision in the current Supreme Court term. It did say in its brief that the 11th Circuit’s decision striking down the central piece of a comprehensive regulatory scheme created “a matter of grave national importance.”
A decision striking down President Obama’s signature legislative achievement only months before the election would doubtless be a blow. But a decision from a court divided along ideological lines could further energize voters already critical of last year’s 5-to-4 campaign finance decision, Citizens United.
A decision upholding the law might also both help and hurt Mr. Obama’s chances. It would represent vindication, but it could also spur 【激发】some voters to redouble their efforts to elect candidates committed to repealing it.
The three federal courts of appeal that have issued decisions on the law so far have all reached different conclusions, with one upholding it, a second — the 11th Circuit— striking it down in part, and a third saying that threshold legal issues barred【此为原型，阻挡】 an immediate ruling.
The views of the appeals court judges have not uniformly tracked the presumed views of the presidents who appointed them. Judge Jeffrey S. Sutton, appointed by President George W. Bush, joined the majority in a 2-to-1 decision of the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit.
Also on Wednesday, two sets of plaintiffs[原告，反义词，被告 defendant] who had won on the core issue in the 11th Circuit filed their own requests for Supreme Court review.
“Time is of the essence,” wrote Paul D. Clement, a former United States solicitor general who represents 26 states that are challenging the law. “The grave constitutional questions surrounding the A.C.A. and its novel exercise of federal power will not subside until this court resolves them.”
The 11th Circuit, in a decision issued in August, ruled that a part of law requiring the purchase of insurance — the so-called individual mandate — was an unconstitutional exercise of Congressional power.
The majority decision, written by Chief Judge Joel F. Dubina and Judge
Hull, said, “We have not found any generally applicable, judicially
enforceable limiting principle that would permit us to uphold the
mandate without obliterating the boundaries inherent in the system of
enumerated Congressional powers.”
The United States solicitor general, Donald B. Verrilli Jr., disputed that analysis in the administration’s brief. The law, he wrote, requires most people to buy insurance “rather than rely on a combination of attempted self-insurance and the back-stop of care paid for by other market participants.” The individual mandate, he went on, “like the act as a whole, thus regulates economic conduct that substantially affects interstate commerce.”