The commentary on John Roberts's solo walk into the Affordable Care
Act wilderness is converging on a common theme: The Chief Justice is a
genius. All of a sudden he is a chessmaster, a statesman, a Burkean
minimalist, a battle-loser but war-winner, a Daniel Webster for our
times.
Now that we've had more time to take in Chief Justice Roberts's reasoning, we have a better summary: politician. In fact, his 5-4 ruling validating the constitutional arguments against purchase mandates and 5-4 ruling endorsing them as taxes is far more dangerous, and far more political, even than it first appeared last week.
This is a minority view. By right-left acclaim, at least among elites, the Chief Justice has engineered a Marbury v. Madison-like verdict that camouflages new limits on federal power as a reprieve for President Obama's entitlement legacy and in a stroke enhanced the Supreme Court's reputation—and his own. This purported "long game" appeals to conservatives who can console themselves with a moral victory, while the liberals who like to assail the Chief Justice as a radical foe of democracy can continue their tantrum.
It's an elegant theory whose only flaw is that it is repudiated by Chief Justice Roberts's own language and logic. His gambit substitutes one unconstitutional expansion of government power for another and rearranges the constitutional architecture of the U.S. political system.
Read more: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303561504577496603068605864.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEADTop
Now that we've had more time to take in Chief Justice Roberts's reasoning, we have a better summary: politician. In fact, his 5-4 ruling validating the constitutional arguments against purchase mandates and 5-4 ruling endorsing them as taxes is far more dangerous, and far more political, even than it first appeared last week.
This is a minority view. By right-left acclaim, at least among elites, the Chief Justice has engineered a Marbury v. Madison-like verdict that camouflages new limits on federal power as a reprieve for President Obama's entitlement legacy and in a stroke enhanced the Supreme Court's reputation—and his own. This purported "long game" appeals to conservatives who can console themselves with a moral victory, while the liberals who like to assail the Chief Justice as a radical foe of democracy can continue their tantrum.
It's an elegant theory whose only flaw is that it is repudiated by Chief Justice Roberts's own language and logic. His gambit substitutes one unconstitutional expansion of government power for another and rearranges the constitutional architecture of the U.S. political system.
Read more: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303561504577496603068605864.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEADTop
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