I’ve heard Hillary say a lot of stupid things before, but this takes the cake. Now, I understand she’s a socialist and all, but to say health care is a Constitutional right is quite a stretch..
“We have to start asking ourselves, ‘Do we want to enshrine discrimination in our health care system, the one area where of our lives where we’re most vulnerable?’†Clinton told the crowd.
“The Constitution says you can’t discriminate against somebody because of what color they are or what religion they are,†she went on. “Why is it OK to discriminate against somebody who is born with a heart defect, or who is diagnosed with prostate cancer?”
Um, Senator Clinton, if you’re talking about the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, you might want to check out the Amendment just above it. You know, the one which bans slavery and involuntary servitude. Because if you’re implying that doctors and such should be forced to supply services without pay, involuntary servitude is precisely what you’re advocating here.
On the other hand, if she is implying there is a right to have the government provide said services, she is equally as wrong. Courts have consistently ruled that neither government or its agents have any obligation to provide any services or protection to an individual citizen. See here for a number of ugly cases involving police protection; which despite being one of government’s most universally accepted purposes, still isn’t an individual right.
I had a discussion with a Democratic friend once about the role of government, and he was quite shocked to learn the courts have repeatedly ruled there is no duty for government to provide services or protection to the individual. At first he dismissed the mountains of precedent (dating back to the guys who wrote the Constitution..) as the work of “activist judges,” then tried to play the preambulary General Welfare card.
The idea that this clause somehow bestows unto Congress the power to swaddle us in bubble wrap (at gunpoint), or that it creates a “right” to receive services from government is probably the most widespread misconceptions about Constitutional law.
For starters, the term is “general welfare,” not “individual welfare.” While the outcome can overlap at times, the legal concepts are miles apart. For instance, the CDC is an entity which protects the public health in general by tracking contagions, statistics and such, but isn’t expected to protect any individual from every disease. At a more local level, the theory of “general welfare” is a bit easier to grasp. When a city builds roads, it helps even those who do not drive by providing a channel through which goods can be brought into the area. Nor does a city or State need to build an expressway to each and every house/farm/etc.. for individual drivers to benefit.
To create an individual “right” to government services from either the general welfare clause or the Fourteenth Amendment would not only go against the very principles by which the Constitution was established, the results would be completely untenable. Think for a moment about all the services which government at all levels provide on a discretionary basis or with various requirements for eligibility. Now imagine what would happen if you had a “right” to demand that these services be provided directly to you, rather than the general public..
How exactly would the government find staff and funds to provide a 24 hour police detail to every man, woman, and child who asked? Or to provide an FDA inspector to act as a personal taste tester to every household in the United States? How fast would the budget explode if HUD and the USDA had to provide free housing and food stamps to everybody, regardless of income? Or using the road example from above, could some guy living in a secluded cabin demand a highway be built to his front door? Etcetera, Etcetera..
Going back to the original topic of health care service, an individual right to same would require the government provide a personal in-house doctor to anybody who requested one. And, no, this isn’t a straw man argument. This is pretty much why every court who has heard a protection/service liability claim has thrown them out. A right, by definition, is something which the government cannot deny access to. Even to deny it momentarily without due process, as with other rights, would cause what the courts refer to as “irreparable harm.”
Even if an overwhelming majority of people never chose to exercise these newly discovered individual “rights,” it would open the government up to an endless stream of civil rights lawsuits which would cripple the courts. Likewise, all medical malpractice suits would likely be transformed into civil rights suits. In the end, such lawsuits could ultimately bankrupt every level of government.
Putting aside all logistical arguments, the concept of a “right to services” has an even deeper fundamental flaw. For there to be any right to a governmental service, one must start with the absurd assumption that there is a right to government itself.
Think that one over really carefully, as it tends to be something most people have never thought of.
Assuming there was a “right” to government, what would you do if you woke up tomorrow and every politician in the country had mysteriously disappeared? Could you sue your neighbors for not providing a government for you? And where exactly would you sue them if there was no government courts? Or what if you woke up on, say, a deserted island? Would you sue yourself in an international court for violating your own “right” to be governed?
Anyhow, if Hillary and her socialist friends want a policy fight over “universal health care,” bring it on. They should just leave the ridiculous notion of it being a “right” alone. But somehow, I don’t think they thought their cunning plan all the way trough…