Courting Disappointment

The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals threw out Virginia's lawsuit against the Affordable Care Act, but looking at the news this evening you'd never know.

The three-judge panel determined that a lawsuit by Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli and challenging the health care law's individual mandate should be dismissed on jurisdictional grounds. In a separate ruling, the majority determined that a separate lawsuit by Jerry Falwell's Liberty University should not proceed as well. In previous hearings, judges had expressed skepticism that Virginia had the standing to challenge the mandate section of the bill given that it applied to individuals and not state institutions.


The Department of Justice praised the decision in a statement:

"We welcome the dismissal of these two challenges to the Affordable Care Act. We also continue to appreciate the rulings of other courts on the merits upholding the constitutionality of the Act. Throughout history, there have been similar challenges to other landmark legislation such as the Social Security Act, the Civil Rights Act, and the Voting Rights Act, and all of those challenges failed as well. We will continue to vigorously defend the health care reform statute in any litigation challenging it, and we believe we will prevail."

In Cuccinelli's case, the court decided that Virginia's claim that they would be harmed by the mandate because it conflicts with a state law barring the state from requiring citizens to obtain health insurance was insufficient to show standing. Writing the majority opinion, Justice Diana Gribbon Motz suggested that if Cuccinelli's suit were allowed to proceed, it could lead to an onslaught of politicized and frivolous legal challenges.

That's actually downright amusing.  The judges basically said "Hey look, this lawsuit is complete crap. If we allow this to proceed, then you're going to have states suing over every single Federal law they don't like."  Which they would, of course.  That's the whole point of the lawsuit.

Good for the Fourth Circuit to call BS on the proceedings and toss the suit out.  The rest of the courts need to do the same.  It's Obama Derangement Syndrome, in legal form.