Human rights and morals also play into health care debateJulie Wells
– Sr. Copy Editor –
Fourteen attorneys general across the United States are standing up to challenge the constitutionality of the recent health care bill. Amid controversy, partisan bickering and consumer confusion, many are left asking “Why?”
Why is health care so polarizing? Why wouldn’t conservatives, especially professing Christians, want to provide health services to all in need? Unfortunately, too many hot button issues, including morality, legality, tradition and the Constitution, are being pressed into one argument, so no concise answer seems possible.
Though providing for the health care of millions of Americans seems ideologically sound, there are religious principles at stake.
Various religious groups do not choose to partake in the health care system at all, believing that dependence on modern medicine lessens one’s faith in God and the remedies of nature.
Under the new, federal law, these groups of individuals would be forced to either partake in funding the mandated coverage or pay a penalty.
A monetary punishment, in effect, for the personal and spiritual beliefs which have never before been under federal jurisdiction, and that isn’t even counting the more bitterly debated health care issues.
Even if abortion and other religiously controversial issues are eventually completely removed from the bill, Constitutional issues are still on the line, and the attorneys general may have more legal ground than the Democrats in power would like to admit. Federal law has usurped the individual rights of states on more than one occasion.
However, the essential argument, states’ rights vs. federal power, still lingers.
Most famously, states’ rights were soundly defeated through the arduous battles of the Civil War where more was at stake than the ending of slavery.
Almost every rational adult would say that the end of slavery was one of the best decisions ever made by a legal system.
However, the fact that the rights of the states to be left to decisions not specifically designated to Congress were wholly denied has certainly had a ripple effect on the precarious balance of powers in our governmental system
This is where the state attorneys general of Florida, Colorado, Alabama, Indiana, Nebraska, Texas, Pennsylvania, Washington, Utah, South Dakota, Idaho, Michigan, South Carolina and Virginia are registering their complaint. For the federal government to forcibly mandate purchasing of anything for every citizen is unheard of.
No, car insurance does not count. If you choose to drive (a privilege, not a right) then you choose to partake in the system. If you are a working citizen, you are forced to pay into social security. However, health care reform takes it a step further: being a citizen obligates a person to partake. Moreover, the powers of the states are being stripped away. Individual states cannot opt out of the health care overhaul, and so the federal government encroaches deeper into the lives of individual citizens and elevates itself above the balancing power of the states.
As citizens who are witnessing historical decisions being made, there is confusion and difficulty in deciding what is “right.” What is morally, legally, constitutionally and ethically best? Only history will reveal that.
Could providing health care be as paramount to human rights as the end of slavery? Doubtful. Could this legal conflict bring about a fundamental split in the unified country of America?
Hopefully not. However, it is a debate worth having.
Brushing one more issue underneath the proverbial rug will only widen the crack that is forming beneath foundation of American politics. Instead of encouraging the debate that could preserve the founding document of our country, partisan fighting has turned to name calling and rushed legislation on both sides.
And it all needs to stop. Rallying, arguing and even suing are perfectly within the bounds of tradition and legality, and are actually a part of the healthy development of a functional society.
It is only when one side is overwhelmingly ignored, silenced or forced into submission that dissonance turns to discontent and vigilance to violence.
