WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court, after three days of arguments on President Obama’s healthcare overhaul, appeared ready to strike down not just the requirement that individuals have insurance, but the entire law, invalidating a major piece of domestic legislation for the first time since the Depression.
That prospect, unthinkable to many experts as recently as last week, will not be certain until the justices rule on the case, probably in June.
But the electric set of arguments that ended Wednesday revealed profound skepticism about the law by the court’s five-member conservative majority, which appeared openly hostile to its scheme for mobilizing the federal government to achieve universal healthcare.
In question after question the nine justices revealed themselves as sharply divided as Congress and the American public over the virtues of Obama’s law.
But unlike Congress — whose slim Democratic majority allowed passage of the law in 2010 — the court has a narrow majority of Republican appointees. If un Read more…
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