Supreme Court Says Liberty University Case is Not Over
11/26/12
By Hadley Heath
The Supreme Court ruled today that the Liberty University case was owed a second hearing at the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals. For everyone who thought ObamaCare's constitutional challenges were over with the Florida case, guess again.
In fact, there are many cases still open, and new cases open all the time.
Liberty's case is different from the challenges to the individual mandate and the Medicaid expansion. That's why SCOTUS says the challenges are still legitimate. Liberty University started out challenging the law for its potential use of public funding for abortions. The original complaint also pointed out that some religious dissenters are offered exemptions from the law's mandates, while others are not. The case expanded in 2012 to include a challenge to the HHS contraception mandate.
Interestingly, this case is also one of the several that challenge the employer mandates in the law. Along with Oklahoma's challenge to the IRS rule, and the actions that many states have taken to block the implementation of statewide exchanges (trojan horses for employer taxes), this case could have an impact on the functionality of the law's employer-sponsored insurance provisions.
Keep an eye on this case, the Fourth Circuit will give it a second hearing and could decide on it by spring 2013, opening another route back to the Supreme Court.
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