Vote 'YES' on H. Res. 475 

December 7, 2011

U.S. House of Representatives
Washington, DC  20515

Dear Representative,

Representative Phil Roe (R-Tenn.) recently introduced H. Res. 475, expressing the sense of the House of Representatives that the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) is unconstitutional. On behalf of the more than one million members and supporters of the Council for Citizens Against Government Waste (CCAGW), I urge you to support this resolution.

Taxpayers have watched the national debt climb to $15 trillion, and President Obama’s landmark healthcare legislation was perhaps most illustrative of Washington’s reckless and profligate behavior. The $2.5 trillion package is packed with tax increases, insurance mandates, Medicare cuts, and unfunded Medicaid expansions.

Most troubling is the individual mandate provision in the PPACA, which beginning in 2014 will require citizens to either purchase health insurance or pay a financial penalty to the government. H. Res. 475 expresses the sense of the House that the individual mandate in the PPACA violates the Commerce Clause and the 10th Amendment, and as such, must be repealed. Rep. Roe’s resolution articulates further that if the individual mandate and the penalty provision are ruled by the Supreme Court to be unconstitutional, then the PPACA is unconstitutional in its entirety, since the individual mandate provision is not severable from the overall legislation.

The government takeover of healthcare that has begun under the PPACA is not only unconstitutional, it will also exacerbate the nation’s fiscal distress. Passage of H. Res. 475 would represent an important step toward fully repealing the PPACA and replacing it with a pro-growth, fiscally responsible healthcare reform plan that addresses medical liability reform, health insurance pooling, tax incentives, customizable programs for individual states, and insurance regulation reform. I urge you to support Rep. Roe’s resolution. All votes on H. Res. 475 will be among those considered in CCAGW’s 2011 Congressional Ratings.

Sincerely,

Thomas Schatz,
President