I think this recent surpeme court ruling could have far reaching results for the average American. Obama Care and some Federal Gun laws come to mind
I comes from a rather weird case. Never underestimate the power of a women scorned....
http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/10pdf/09-1227.pdf
When petitioner Bond discovered that her close friend was pregnant by Bond's husband, she began harassing the woman. The woman suffered a minor burn after Bond put caustic substances on objects the woman was likely to touch. Bond was indicted for violating 18 U. S. C. §229, which forbids knowing possession or use, for nonpeace-ful purposes, of a chemical that "can cause death, temporary inca-pacitation or permanent harm to humans," §§229(a); 229F(1); (7); (8), and which is part of a federal Act implementing a chemical weapons treaty ratified by the United States. The District Court denied Bond's motion to dismiss the §229 charges on the ground that the statute exceeded Congress' constitutional authority to enact. She entered a conditional guilty plea, reserving the right to appeal the rul-ing on the statute's validity. She did just that, renewing her Tenth Amendment claim. The Third Circuit, however, accepted the Government's position that she lacked standing. The Government has since changed its view on Bond's standing.
Held: Bond has standing to challenge the federal statute on grounds that the measure interferes with the powers reserved to States. Pp. 3–14.
(a)
"In amicus' view, to argue that the National Government has interfered with state sovereignty in violation of the Tenth Amendment is to assert the legal rights and interests of States and States alone. That, however, is not so. As explained below, Bondseeks to vindicate her own constitutional interests. The individual, in a proper case, can assert injury from governmental action taken in excess of the authority that federalism defines. Her rights in this regard do not belong to a State."
It's a pretty narrow ruling regarding standing. As I see it, it's not about the merits of her argument, but rather whether she has standing to make it. They said she does.
I don't see how it would effect ACA if it reaches the Supreme Court.
Standing is everything if you're trying to get it into the Federal food chain.
Virginia unfortunately has very poor Federal Judges that refuse to hear most Civil Rights, Gun cases and Police abuse cases...because of standing.
It's a lot like the old loitering laws...widely abused.
It doesn't seem like much of a decision to me. If the both the prosecution and defense agree before cert. was granted it sounds like the third circuit either clearly erred or there was a circuit split and the third circuit was far out of line of the rest of the country. Especially with the fact that there was a unanimous decision from the court, it sounds like it was a no brainer. I like Justice Ginsberg's opinion. In a sense, if you are charged with a crime, you have standing to challenge the constitutionality of that law under any clause of the constitution. My reading of the citation of Tennessee Electric, a civil case, seams very like it would be different from the constitutional rights of a person accused of a crime. Because of this, I don't know how much precedence this decision would set for civil actions such as the ACA.
Peter, in the federal system Virginia is known as "the rocket docket", due to the fact that judges don't usually entertain many arguments. It is well known nationwide.
The dope dealers in San Fran arguing federal drug laws comes to mind.
What will eventually happen comes down to dollars. Uncle Sam CAN place conditions on allocation of funds. Montana for years refused to comply with fed-mandated speed limits. It was the threat of losing federal highway dollars that even finally convinced them to comply. I think we will see more states asserting their rights, only to have them backtrack when their rich Uncle in Washington tells them "as long as I'm paying your bills, you'll do as I say."
Reminds me of the old saying: A government big enough to give you everything you need is a government big enough to take it away. I think it was Ford or Nixon who stated that.