Senate Passes Health Reform Bill, Republicans Challenge Constitutionality
Filed under: Health Law, Proposed Legislation
The Senate has passed its version of a Health Reform bill, 60-39. The votes were cast, with Vice President Joseph Biden presiding, at 7:00 am on Thursday, December 24th. The Washington Post reports that
Sen. Robert C. Byrd (D-W.Va.), who is 92 and ailing, bellowed when his name was called: “Mr. President, this is for my friend Ted Kennedy. Aye.”
Aye indeed.
Washington Monthly notes that a number of Republican Senators, many of whom in recent months had formerly brushed aside the issue of constitutionality for the provision for insurance mandates, have experienced a change of direction– if not heart– and have openly challenged that which they formerly embraced.
For an explanation of the mandate’s constitutionality, Washington Monthly cites this article, “Is it Unconstitutional to Mandate Health Insurance?” by Professor of Law and Public Health, Wake Forest University, Mark Hall–which originally appeared here on Health Reform Watch, and was later cited by the Washington Post’s Ezra Klein among numerous others.
Posts from Health Reform Watch have been cited by media sources throughout the country, including The New York Times, Washington Post, L.A. Times, Kaiser Health News, The Health Care Blog, NPR's Planet Money Blog, Duke Univ. Med. Center News, American Health Line Alerts, BusinessWeek.com, Concurring Opinions, Balkinization, The New England Journal of Medicine, Harvard's Nieman Foundation for Journalism, Las Vegas Sun, Maggie Mahar, Ezra Klein, Tom Geoghegan, and the official homepage of the Office of the Democratic Majority Leader of the House of Representatives, Steny Hoyer.
