As most of the better legal scholars have noted -- despite much of the right-leaning hullaballoo -- this case isn't really about very much. It is yet another attempt to invalidate a central component of a 900 page statute, by positing a befuddling, and counter-intuitive reading of five words in one subsection -- a subsection that deals with calculating the AMOUNT of a subsidy; not whether the subsidy should exist at all. It is beyond serious dispute that Congress intended to create near universal coverage in passing the ACA of 2010.
And so, it is the position of many legal scholars (who follow these matters closely) that the Supremes have agreed to take the case precisely to put to a final, non-appealable death the notion that five words may ever be a place where Congress intentionally hides an elephant -- deep inside a. . . mousehole.
And the central job of the Supremes here -- having already ruled that the ACA of 2010 was a valid exercise of Congressional power -- will be to uphold the intent of the Congress in passing a valid, necessary and proper (albeit complex) 900 page statute. From the excellent amicus brief of HCA, a large Tennessee based corporate hospital chain, then -- a bit of the persuasion:
. . . .In Petitioners’ view [the parties seeking to overturn this ACA provision], however, Congress made residents of every state eligible for a subsidy, only to then deny subsidies to every resident of certain states through the application of a formula for calculating the amount of the subsidy. Specifically, because the amount of the subsidy is tied to the cost of a plan offered on an “Exchange established by the State,” id. § 36B(b)(2)(A), Petitioners argue that the calculation works out to $0 for every resident of a federally-facilitated Exchange state.
Congress does not hide “elephants” in such “mouseholes.” Whitman v. Am. Trucking Ass’ns, 531 U.S. 457, 468 (2001). No member of Congress – not to mention the millions of Americans who have relied on the promise of subsidies and are now overwhelmingly satisfied with their coverage – would have understood these five words buried in a formula as making the promise of affordable coverage illusory for large swathes of the population.
The text of the statute confirms what common sense suggests: the ACA’s subsidy-calculation provision does not have the massive import Petitioners seek to give it. Rather, the ACA’s definitions make clear that every “Exchange” is treated as “established under section 1311” – the section obligating states to establish Exchanges – even when the federal government is in fact operating the Exchange under section 1321. 42 U.S.C. § 300gg–91(d)(21). Section 1311 itself specifies that every Exchange is, by operation of law, “a governmental agency or nonprofit entity that is established by a State.” 42 U.S.C. § 18031(d)(1) (emphasis added). And in directing HHS to operate “such Exchange,” Congress confirmed that a federally-facilitated Exchange under section 1321 is still, for statutory purposes, an Exchange established by the state under section 1311. ACA § 1321, 42 U.S.C. § 18041(c)(1). Together, these provisions make clear that Congress used “Exchange established by the State” in § 36B as a statutory term of art, not as a roundabout way to deny affordable coverage to residents of states that decline to run their own Exchange. . . .
Petitioners’ interpretation cannot be accepted for the additional reason that it would “undermine in a substantial way the [statute’s] purpose.” Maracich, 133 S. Ct. at 2200. There is no need to resort to legislative history to divine the fundamental legislative purpose of the ACA, because the statute makes it plain: “achiev[ing] near-universal coverage. . . .”
The fundamental question in this case is whether the ACA is in fact “a comprehensive national plan to provide universal health insurance coverage,” NFIB, 132 S. Ct. at 2606 (2012) (op. of Roberts, C.J., joined by Breyer & Kagan, JJ.), or instead contains a trap door through which millions of Americans may fall. Every tool of statutory interpretation indicates that Congress intended the former. With subsidies available on the federally-facilitated Exchanges, the newly insured are able to take personal responsibility for their care, emergency room usage is dropping, women are gaining access to needed care, and the costs and benefits of expanding coverage are being shared throughout the health care system.
Without the subsidies, an otherwise coherent regulatory scheme may come apart at the seams: the newly insured could lose coverage, the positive trends in the delivery of care noted above could be reversed, the economic logic of the ACA could be disrupted, the federally-facilitated Exchanges could slide into dysfunction, and even the previously insured could lack access to a viable alternative market.
This Court should follow the interpretation that makes sense of the ACA’s interconnected provisions. That interpretation is that subsidies are available to every “applicable taxpayer,” without regard to whether his or her state has elected to run its own Exchange. . . .
Of course you will read much right leaning rhetoric suggesting that. . . the ACA of 2010 sky is about to fall. You may safely ignore it. You heard it here first. [A very good, plain English version of this discussion appears on the editorial pages of The New York Times, this Sunday morning, as a light silvery snow drifts down here, once again. Fly safely one and all.]
