Legal News

Florida Judge Stays Health-Care Ruling, But Mandates Quick Appeal

By Ashby Jones

This just in: A federal judge in Pensacola on Thursday declined to order the Obama administration to stop implementing its health care law.

But U.S. District Judge Roger Vinson ordered the administration to seek an expedited appeal within seven days of his January ruling which struck down the entire law as unconstitutional. Click here for the WSJ story; here for the 20-page ruling.

The administration had sought clarification from Judge Vinson on whether the effect of his ruling would start immediately. In his opinion issued Thursday, Vinson clarified that, yes, the ruling was meant to start immediately — and would have the effect of operating as an injunction against the implementation of the law.

But then Vinson decided to treat the government’s motion to clarify in effect as a motion for a stay. He granted the stay, but mandated that the case be appeal be moved along quickly. He wrote:

Although the defendants' pleadings present a reasonably persuasive argument for why the "public interest lies" in having my declaratory judgment and de facto injunction stayed pending appeal, almost every argument that the defendants have advanced speaks much more persuasively to why the case should be immediately appealed and pursued in the most expeditious and accelerated manner allowable. As both sides have repeatedly emphasized throughout this case, the Act seeks to comprehensively reform and regulate more than one-sixth of the national economy.  It does so via several hundred statutory provisions and thousands of regulations that put myriad obligations and responsibilities on individuals, employers, and the states. It has generated considerable uncertainty while the Constitutionality of the Act is being litigated in the courts. The sooner this issue is finally decided by the Supreme Court, the better off the entire nation will be.

In other words, “I’m done with this thing. But let’s get a move on.”

Full post as published by Law Blog - WSJ.com on March 03, 2011 (boomark / email).