Yesterday,
the Supreme Court rejected the latest challenge to the Affordable Care Act
(ACA). The consolidated case of California, et al. v. Texas, et al. posed two
critical questions for the Justices: (1) is the ACA’s individual mandate
unconstitutional now that there is no penalty for not buying insurance? and (2)
if the individual mandate is unconstitutional, is the entire ACA
unconstitutional?
In its
decision, the Supreme Court did not actually answer either question. Instead,
in a 7-2 decision, the Court dismissed the case ruling that the parties
challenging the ACA (eighteen states and two individuals) did not have standing
to raise these issues.
