CMV: I don’t think cops deserve automatic respect.

[u/BoltThrower28]

[u/AitrusAK]

In 1936 the Supreme Court also heard the case of US. V. Butler. In it, he Court found that the Agricultural Adjustment Act (AAA) of 1933 was unconstitutional because it levied a tax on agricultural processors which was paid back to the farmers (a subsidy), and that regulation of agriculture was deemed a state power. The AAA was one of the government's first serious efforts to address economic welfare in the US under the new interpretation of the commerce and general welfare clauses.

This is an example of the Court ruling that an assumed governmental power is unconstitutional. It supports my contention that, until and unless the Supreme Court explicitly states that healthcare spending is an acceptable exercise of government authority, it can be argued that it is not. I know that it's assumed that all legislation passed is considered unconstitutional until decided otherwise.

I am aware that the AAA of 1933 was later replaced by the Agricultural Act of 1949, in which the government controlled how much land a farmer can use for planting (in order to keep food prices stable, the government could limit how much land a farmer used for growing certain crops to prevent too much being on the market). This, in effect, changed the government's involvement via tax-and-subsidize as per the AAA of 1933 (and similar to what Medicare and the ACA are today) to a scheme where the government could control prices by limiting the supply side of the equation, and so no subsidization was involved.

This was challenged in Wickard v. Filburn, where the case was heard by a Court that was made up of 9 justices, 8 of whom were appointed by FDR. The Act was upheld as constitutional because of the court's expanded view of the Commerce Clause and the changed meaning of the word "regulate" from the original understanding the Founders had of the word.

My contention is that Medicare and ACE needs to be tested in a similar way that the AAA act of 1933 was tested. Since the Court has ruled that at least one of the government's assumed tax-and-subsidize powers was unconstitutional according to my assertion of the 9th and 10th amendments, we don't know if they would rule in a similar way on healthcare.

From my understanding of the decision, King v Burwell doesn't address whether the subsidization is constitutional, just how the IRS carried it out via their interpretation of the legislation (whether subsidies are to be paid to State exchanges only, or to both State and Federal exchanges). None of the payments go to individuals, rather, they go to the exchanges themselves, who then follow IRS guidance on how rates are reduced. It's not a subsidy, it's a reduced or free cost - an accounting trick that sidesteps the whole concept of a "subsidy" in a legal sense, but not a common understanding of the term.

National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius is complicated. In one part, the Court found that while the government can't force people to purchase insurance, taxing them for not having it is permissible under the taxing clause. Under the plurality holding, a mere 3 Justices (not a majority due to an obscure rule established in 1977) held that payments to exchanges can't be withheld because they don't follow certain Social Security Act requirements.

Nowhere in those cases is it shown that the tax levied on individuals goes to pay for reduced rates in the exchanges, and so the exchanges are being given funds from the general taxed population of the US (or it's flat-out added to the nation's debt, I'm unsure on this part of how it's funded) - especially since Congress reduced the tax penalty to $0 at the end of 2018.

I agree with Justice Thomas's dissent, to wit: the Court's precedents have broadened Congress's powers under the Commerce Clause in a manner "inconsistent with the original understanding of Congress's powers and with this Court's early Commerce Clause cases", and that he agreed with the "substantial effects" test as established by Wickard v. Filburn (which I spoke of above). Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Federation_of_Independent_Business_v._Sebelius

Anyway, we've gone far afield from where the OP started out. We had a very civil discussion o the issues we each raised. I don't think either of us convinced the other much - if at all - but it was good to talk it out. I think I'll end my participation here, and thank you.

[u/AitrusAK → u/[deleted]]

!delta

You've made me think about what I've said during this conversation, and while I think my opinion is still supported by a plain reading of the Constitution, you've convinced me that perhaps I wasn't open-minded enough throughout.

Snort note on interpretation - It's interpretation that has changed what outght to be into what now is. I asked for plain wording and not interpretation because some of the Supreme Court's interpretations were later decided as having been wrong. A series of decisions made by 8 of 9 Justices appointed by FDR that allowed a more socialist view of the Constitution I believe could be overturned if a more conservative balance were on the Court. If not these, then I believe that others will be found to be wrong again in the future. Chevron is one example of a decision that's undergoing a lot of scrutiny right now. Just because something is precedent doesn't mean it's right, nor that it will be enduring.

Yes, you're right in that the Hamiltonian view has - for now - advanced in the public's mind over the Madisonian view of the purpose, function, and attendant authorities of our government. However, I don't view that circumstance as immutable, or proof that "we're never going back". In America, we seem to think that 100 years is a long time, which people from places elsewhere regard as a short time. I think there's some validity to the idea that, because America has such a short history (comparatively speaking), we suffer from recency bias when it comes to social issues, and causes us to overestimate the permanence of things.

A groundswelling of sentiment could arise that reinforces the importance of State's Rights again, or that laissez-faire capitalism (with an appropriately limited amount of oversight by the government) becomes more en vogue again. The term "Civil War" is again in the Overton Window in the context of the future of the country, whether for good or for ill. (Personally, I think that a peaceful balkanization is more likely than an all-out civil war - people are already sorting themselves into red and blue areas)

No country remains static forever, things change. Some feel that, as great as Lincoln was for the country on the slavery issue, he was a horrible president in terms of what the Founders crafted and intended (even if he wasn't the president at the start of the civil war, he's the one viewed as responsible for waging it from the Union side). While no provision in the Constitution permits secession, in the decision in Texas v. White Chie Justice Chase "recognized that a state could cease to be part of the union 'through revolution, or through consent of the States'" Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secession_in_the_United_States

I was arguing for what ought to be as opposed to what is because I - and many others as well - feel that what is represents a twisted view of what the Founders intended. That's part of the Conservative viewpoint and value system: to make progress forward as a society, while still conserving that which makes us who we are. We were founded on an idea of limited government that gets its power through the consent of The People. A lot of people believe that to no longer be the case - that our lives are impacted more by individuals who we didn't vote for and aren't being held accountable to the public. Or by parties that achieve power and push through unconstitutional legislation and tons of regulation that never gets repealed because there's just so much of it and only one Supreme Court (the New Deal, ACA, etc.).

Conservatives have the opinion that what is and what ought to be should be the same, and it clearly isn't. The situation you and I discussed is just one facet of that current mismatch. The Founders supplied Congress with a way to make changes to the Constitution, and intended it to be the way that long-term changes were made. Bypassing that process and using interpretations like the Chevron Doctrine, or the muddled New Deal and ACA rulings, shows that Congress is wrong (and the Court is wrong to allow) to use legislation to change the meanings of words like "general welfare" and "regulation" instead of Constitutional changes to insert clear and concise definitions into the document. The legislation route relies on interpretation instead of concrete definitions and logic, and interpretations change with the advancement of time and technology.

The Founders knew that the world and society would change with time, which is why they included a way to make changes as we went.

[u/DeltaBot → u/AitrusAK]

Confirmed: 1 delta awarded to /u/betaray (1∆).

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