Mandating that everyone buy health insurance is a great idea, says . . . Rick Santorum?

By Mark Watson

Has former U.S. Senator Rick Santorum (R-Pennsylvania) fallen into the trap set forth by Washington’s Beltway mentality regarding mandates for citizens?

Listening to him guest host on Bill Bennett’s national radio show on Friday suggests that he is embracing mandates.

Santorum and a caller were discussing various problems associated with the country’s health care insurance industry.

Santorum agreed with the caller that one way to correct the problems with health care insurance was to require everyone to have health insurance for life while eliminating the right of insurance companies to refuse coverage to anyone with a pre-existing disease.

Santorum and the caller then attempted to analogize health insurance with automobile insurance saying that everyone has to have auto insurance.

The level of constitutional and insurance industry ignorance displayed by the colloquy between Santorum and the caller is amazing.

States don’t mandate drivers to have insurance protecting themselves or their own vehicles from harm caused by negligent operation of their cars. No, states require drivers to have insurance to protect others caused by negligent operation of their cars.

States currently require drivers to have specific minimal insurance coverage for the protection of the public. Auto insurers offer greater coverage, at additional cost of course, to its policy holders for cataclysmic coverage. Santorum seems to want to compel Americans to have both minimum and catastrophic coverage for health insurance for life.

By the way, Senator, at least for now, the only citizens who have auto insurance are those who actually operate a motor vehicle on public streets. Automobile insurance is statutorily required by every state for everyone driving on their roads to protect others from one’s negligence. Not many 10-year-old children own cars and likely do not have auto insurance.

If Santorum believes all Americans should be required to buy health insurance, what else will citizens be required to buy? A car, a house, a three-piece suit, brown shoes or, better yet, a CD of all of Barack Obama’s uplifting speeches?

By the way, Senator, negligently operating one’s body does not cause harm to other people’s bodies or property. How many cars and lives are destroyed by someone operating a life with multiple sclerosis?

When written, the Constitution did not authorize Congress to require any citizen to do anything. Rather, Congress was specifically forbidden from interfering with Americans’ lives.

While there have been 27 amendments to the Constitution, none of them suggests that Congress is empowered to dictate how Americans live their lives. Certainly no amendment surrenders Americans’ right to make their own life decisions such as whether to buy health insurance or brown shoes.

The Constitution’s original seven Articles authorize Congress to regulate commerce between the states. The Articles do not authorize Congress to regulate American citizens engaged in commerce.

An essential difference between Democrats and Republicans has been that Democrats reject limitations imposed on the federal government by the Constitution, while Republicans accept such limitations on the government.

If former Republican Senator Rick Santorum buys into the notion that people should be compelled to have health insurance for life, or anything else Congress deems necessary, those claiming there is little difference between the two major parties may have a point.