The Supreme court upheld the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act on the grounds that its controversial central provision – the requirement for almost all Americans to buy health insurance, known as the individual mandate – is legal because the measure amounts to a tax.
Obama was given no preview of the decision and had to wait for the announcement just like everyone else, and was reported to have been euphoric when the news came through.
The court’s decision to uphold the most controversial aspect of the law — the individual mandate — had Democrats hailing the ruling as a “win” and Republicans denouncing it in the sharpest possible terms.
President Obama, said in brief remarks at the White House that it was time to “move forward.”
“I know there will be a lot of discussion today about the politics of all this, about who won and who lost. That’s how these things tend to be viewed here in Washington,” Obama said. “But that discussion completely misses the point. Whatever the politics, today’s decision was a victory for people all over this country whose lives will be more secure because of this law and the Supreme Court’s decision to uphold it.”
Speaking from the White House, he said: "Whatever the politics, today's decision was a victory for people all over this country whose lives will be more secure because of this law and the supreme court's decision to uphold it."
“Historians will compare this to F.D.R.’s Social Securityand Lyndon Johnson’s Medicare,” said the historian Robert Dallek, who has written about both presidents. “This is another step in humanizing the American industrial system.”
The chief justice, John Roberts, provided the crucial vote in joining the four more liberal judges in upholding the law. The four conservative judges held that the law is "invalid in its entirety".
Political historians would note another bit of irony: while a U.S. senator, Obama voted against Roberts' confirmation to the high court. Obama praised Roberts' qualifications, but questioned his philosophy.
Mitt Romney expressed his displeasure with the ruling on Thursday, he also signaled how he would try to capitalize on it between now and November.
“What the court did not do in its last day in session,” Romney said. “I will do on the first day as President of the United States. And that is, I will act to repeal Obamacare.”
Mitt Romney, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, told supporters in Virginia on Tuesday: "If Obamacare is not deemed constitutional, then the first three and a half years of this president's term will have been wasted on something that has not helped the American people."
Romney, whose opposition to the law has been a rallying cry on the stump, continued: "If it is deemed to stand, then I'll tell you one thing. Then we'll have to have a president -- and I'm that one -- that's gonna get rid of Obamacare. We're gonna stop it on day one."
Sources:
US Newsguardian
ABC News
chicagotribune
CNN
NYTimes
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