The Supreme Court Ruling And The Future Of Healthcare

     The Supreme Court's decision to uphold the Healthcare Law Passed in 2010 is in my opinion the right one.  Although I despise the current system in regards to healthcare, I feel as though it is better than nothing.

     For this is not the end of the struggle in this country over Healthcare, but the beginning.  It is the beginning of healthcare as a fundamental right in this country.  As shocking as this may seem to some it reminds me of Plessy v. Ferguson.  From which we got the "Separate but equal" the following was copied and pasted from www.watson.org

"That [the Separate Car Act] does not conflict with the Thirteenth Amendment, which abolished slavery...is too clear for argument...A statute which implies merely a legal distinction between the white and colored races -- a distinction which is founded in the color of the two races, and which must always exist so long as white men are distinguished from the other race by color -- has no tendency to destroy the legal equality of the two races...The object of the [Fourteenth A]mendment was undoubtedly to enforce the absolute equality of the two races before the law, but in the nature of things it could not have been intended to abolish distinctions based upon color, or to enforce social, as distinguished from political equality, or a commingling of the two races upon terms unsatisfactory to either." [5]

The lone dissenter, Justice John Harlan, showed incredible foresight when he wrote

"Our Constitution is color-blind, and neither knows nor tolerates classes among citizens. In respect of civil rights, all citizens are equal before the law...In my opinion, the judgment this day rendered will, in time, prove to be quite as pernicious as the decision made by this tribunal in the Dred Scott case...The present decision, it may well be apprehended, will not only stimulate aggressions, more or less brutal and irritating, upon the admitted rights of colored citizens, but will encourage the belief that it is possible, by means of state enactments, to defeat the beneficient purposes which the people of the United States had in view when they adopted the recent amendments of the Constitution." [6]

     Justice John Harlan was a man who was truly wise and although a much different case, his words cannot be denied, as they ring true despite the passage of time.  "Our Constitution ...neither knows nor tolerates classes among citizens"  In the preamble of our constitution the Founding Fathers in the name of the "We The People"  ordained and established this constitution for the United States of America.  Now healthcare does discriminate on a defacto class basis, not on color but on wealth.

     The law passed in 2010 will work on giving more Americans access to the franchise, not of voting but of healthcare through insurance.  In order to achieve healthcare equality, and quality in this nation we must all be guaranteed an equal level of care, this will be fought by the insurance corporations, but it is a fight we must prepare for it is necessary that we win.

     In order to speed up this process laws must be made which prohibit all health insurance companies from creating and selling plans only in certain states, a Republican idea to drive down costs.  This would give more power to the federal government to regulate it as interstate commerce.

     Once health insurance companies simplify their various plans and all options are available to all people throughout the country, legislation can be written, a rebirth of the public option, or as some have called it a medicare for all.  This legislation should be written so that this public plan will cover all required health needs of the people.  This will guarantee a basic equal level of healthcare for all citizens, and with all citizens in the pool it's costs will be lower.  Health insurance will then cover all other nonessential aspects of the healthcare industry, and supplement the government public plan lowering costs even more for the consumer.

     Conservatives such as the infamous John Stossel will say that we already have the best healthcare and that numerically based evaluations are not an adequate measure. and had this toy say "a country with high-quality care overall but 'unequal distribution' would rank below a country with lower quality care but equal distribution." And he is right, you can get the best care here in many respects, but only the best can afford it.  Another thing to take into consideration is that their people are healthier from the start, their water is held up to higher standards, as is their air, they produce less harmful emissions in lesser quantities and their healthcare systems focus on keeping a person healthy not just treating them when they are sick, hence our great pill pushing culture.


     John Stossel and his peers would love to live in the Victorian age, technology was constantly evolving and changing more and more products were invented and only a select few could afford them.  Society has evolved from that era in time just as we have evolved from the days of slavery,  and just like the days of slavery they must be remembered but never should we return to them.