The Supreme Court announced today that it has decided to rule on whether the health-insurance mandate in the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (“health-care reform”) is unconstitutional, and if it is, whether that negates the entire law. This is what everyone has been expecting pretty much since the day that President Obama’s signature legislative victory passed through Congress in March of 2010. Court after court has ruled on the constitutionality of the mandate; some found in favor, some found against. But it was always going to end up in the hands of the Supreme Court — and, more specifically, the75-year-old hands of Anthony Kennedy, the likely swing vote. The court’s ruling is expected to come in late June of 2012, in the heat of a general election campaign that, probably, will be between two guys who both embraced the individual mandate at some level of government.
