Do People Have a Right to Healthcare

So you acknowledge that something doesn't have to be mentioned specifically to apply?

 

Norris was implying that the founding fathers would specifically have mentioned healthcare had it been such a large part of the economy back then. My assertion that they didn't specifically mention agriculture was intended to refute that.

 

I'm mentioning the written bill of rights, not ordaining the author as having perfect language that would be no different than written today.

I haven't said it is a right, btw. I said it was a reasonable expectation to have access to affordable healthcare in in the 21st century, if one is being allowed life, liberty and the poh. Suddenly because Jefferson didn't explicitly name something that was not culturally or technologically invented yet, it is... Unreasonable to expect working towards affordable access?

 

To expand, is the administration of healthcare not done so across state lines? If I have Blue Cross/Blue Shield of Tennessee, but I get sick while on vacation in Cape Hatteras & am hospitalized there, does not a commercial transaction take place across state lines? It does. Therefore, it is within traditional Constitutional authority for the federal govt to regulate healthcare and insurance. Since that's the case, that regulatory power could/would include implementation of a national healthcare coverage program while remaining well within powers expressly laid out in the Constitution.

 

Gotcha.

 

Pursuit of happiness is in the Declaration of Independence. The Constitution guarantees that one can't be deprived of life, liberty or property without due process of the law.

Pursuit of happiness would be a nightmare scenario in that the pursuit of happiness can mean infinite different things to different US citizens.

Just a point of clarity.

 

I suppose not, but you are actually mentioning the Declaration of Independence.

 

There was some pretty specific things about agriculture in the Constitution. Took all the way until the 1860s to correct some of it, too.

 

5th Amendment?

 

Pedantic aside, no, people don't have a right to healthcare. And the Constitution has no bearing on it, as it isn't a guide for how people treat each other, it is a guide for how people are treated by government.

So unless the argument is that Government Doctors should be freely available to all people, the Constitution has no bearing, whatsoever.

 

Perfectly stated.

I am perfectly willing to believe that some other obligation to provide healthcare may continue to exist, even despite a lack of legal compulsion.

But what is it, how strong is it, and to what end should it now reach, even in absence of a legal mandate?

Tough, but I think fair, question: Absent the courts ruling that healthcare is a right, does the matter then (and automatically) become a purely moral issue, instead? And if that's true, then the only way to enact any legitimate program to help people is to pass legislation...would be to base the action on what some (perhaps quite rightfully) see as being a purely moral obligation (while, to be fair, many others would disagree and do not).

If so, this discussion is going to make for some strange bedfellows, because just about everyone has argued for / against legislating morality on any number of other issues, but may have to reverse course, here. And I'm not saying that this isn't a (very) good and (very) necessary thing, at all. But it is just so much more gray, in a world that seems increasingly unwilling to acknowledge beyond the black and white.

To prevent the slings and arrows (or to mitigate them), I am willing to say that I do agree with others, that a moral imperative does exist for societies ensuring for the health and safekeeping of its citizenry. Now, what that looks like, what does it cost, who is required to do what, what responsibility does everyone have, what are its limits, etc. etc., are all of the details where this could easily fall apart.

So, how best to decide those things?

 

Clarification:

I was commenting only on if a single payer system could pass Constitutional test. I think it could under interstate commerce.

 

I agree with this.

I'd love to see healthcare break the neverending partisanship cycle our govt and people are stuck in. I try my best to be a pragmatist. I don't care who comes up with an idea. Any idea should stand on its own merit, not the merit of who voiced it.

 

Gotcha

 

My mistake.

I sincerely wish you and your profession nothing but financial success and professional joy. I do not expect you to be laboring without fair compensation, nor do I expect a handful of people to pay for everyone else's care. It's a complicated issue.

 

Looking at this from a purely financial standpoint, expelling Mississippi, Alabama, and Louisiana would go a long way in making healthcare more affordable. Not a suggestion, just thinking outside the box.

 

My opinion really isn't coming from a professional standpoint. I'll be fine career-wise whichever way things go.

 

Nick Saban on the market in 2018. Butch just went 7-6. Raise and extension.

 

Solved.

 

I agree with Judge Napolitano

"Is health care a right in America?

In a word, no. Rights are either natural immunities -- existing in areas of human behavior that, because of our nature, must be free from government regulation, such as life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, as well as speech, the press, religion, travel, self-defense and what remains of privacy -- or legal claims that we qualify or bargain for, such as the right to vote, which the Constitution presumes, and the right to use your property to the exclusion of all others and the right to purchase a good that you can afford.

But the federal government cannot create a right that the Constitution does not authorize. It can’t constitutionally transfer wealth from taxpayers or employers to others and then claim that the others have a right to the continued receipt of the transfers. The Supreme Court has ruled that even Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid are government largesse that Congress could terminate because no one has a right to them.

Of course, the federal government has been creating expectations that it calls rights for centuries. To stay in office, members of Congress bribe the rich with bailouts, the middle class with tax cuts and the poor with made-up rights to all sorts of things.

Yet under the Constitution, health care is not a right; it is a good -- like an education or a gym membership. You work hard, you decide what goods to purchase. If government gives you the good, that does not magically transform it into a right. Bravo to the courageous House Republicans who recognize this."

http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2017/03/30/is-health-care-right-or-good.html

I dont watch FoxNews ( I will watch tucker Carlson clips on the net) but its good to hear that the Judge got his job back.