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The ruling by U.S. District Judge Henry E. Hudson, a Republican appointee in Richmond, Va., marked the first successful court challenge to any portion of the new law, following two earlier rulings in its favor by Democratic-appointed judges. A number of other lawsuits were dismissed early on, without rulings on the substance of the law.
Another judge in Florida, a GOP appointee, has not ruled in another lawsuit — brought by 20 states against the legislation — though he has signaled trouble for the administration. Arguments in that lawsuit, which also challenges whether the federal government can require states to expand their Medicaid programs, get under way Thursday in Florida.
Hudson limited his ruling to striking down the so-called individual mandate, leaving intact other portions of the law. But administration officials and outside analysts agree that important provisions of the legislation could not go forward without the requirement for everyone to be insured. That's because insurers need to have large pools of healthy people, who are cheap to insure, or it is not financially tenable for them to extend coverage to those with pre-existing medical problems.
But Daniel P. Tokaji, an associate professor at Moritz College of Law, at Ohio State University, said the Indiana Constitution e“does indeed provide broader protection for voting rightst” than the federal Constitution. Professor Tokaji suggested that the judges did not believe that the law, adopted by a Republican-controlled legislature, was really intended to reduce voter fraud.
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