The reason the Health Law may not pass the Supreme Court

Over the next nine month we may finally reach a resolution regarding weather the Affordable Care Act is constitutional or not. Rulings have been mixed so far, with most lower courts backing the ACA. With that being said, however, there is still a strong possibility that the law will not pass. This is not necessarily due to the politics of the matter or whether a more substantial healthcare system has the support of the American people. Rather it is regards to how the law was written and the fact that the legislation was not written as a tax, rather as a fine for people who choose not to have healthcare.

President Obama and Congressional Democrats decided to write the law in this manner because they believed that if the ACA was written as a tax it would not gather enough votes in Congress to pass. This creates a problem because it forces the Justice Department to explain how this law still manages to limit Congressional power. If the law were an income tax, than people could "choose" not to pay it by not working and earning income, citizens have no such choice when it comes to a fine.  Because limiting federal powers is one of the bedrock values of the Constitution, this argument may become the core of the upcoming Supreme Court case, as yesterdays NY Times article on the subject explains:
"The case focuses on whether Congress overstepped its constitutional authority in enacting parts of the law. Lower courts have reached divergent conclusions.
Even judges in lower courts who ultimately voted to uphold the law have homed in on the question of the limits of government power, at times flummoxing Justice Department lawyers.
“Let’s go right to what is your most difficult problem,” Judge Laurence H. Silberman, who later voted to uphold the law, told a lawyer at an argument in September before the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. “What limiting principle do you articulate?” If Congress may require people to purchase health insurance, he asked, what else can it force them to buy? Where do you draw the line? "
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/14/us/politics/health-law-debate-puts-focus-on-limit-of-federal-power.html