Coercing Congress members to vote for healthcare plan: Physicians' file lawsuit

The following is being issued by LibertyProtection.net:

On Thursday, March 18, lawyers from the U.S. Department of Justice will appear in Federal District Court for oral argument in opposition to a request by physicians opposed to President Barack Obama's healthcare bill for an injunction barring his Administration "from undertaking in the future to intimidate or coerce any member of Congress" to vote for the plan.  The court challenge, filed on behalf of Daniel G. Anderson of Chevy Chase, Maryland, and nine prominent physicians from Maryland, Virginia, and the District of Columbia, claims that President Obama "already has abused his executive powers in an effort to leverage control over the vote of key moderate Senators" and that if he is not barred from similar actions, "irreparable harm is actual and imminent."

Administration lawyers will ask Chief Judge Peter J. Messitte (Case No. 8:10-00017.PJM) to deny the doctors' injunction and dismiss the suit on the grounds that the physicians have no standing to bring the action against the Obama healthcare plan and that the issue is a "political question."  In an opposing brief Hagerstown attorney R. Martin Palmer argued that if "Obamacare" were to become law by unconstitutional means, the physicians would suffer "irreparable harm" in being forced to practice medicine "deficiently" and subject them to "arbitrary outside restraints."

At the heart of the physicians' suit is their claim that President Obama has overstepped his constitutional powers:

"Plaintiffs only seek to enjoin a particularly pernicious form of coercion and intimidation, namely the making of threats regarding the use of the President's Executive powers in ways that are adverse [to] the constituents of one or more of the members of Congress in order to pressure those members into voting for (or against) legislation.  This practice involves the use or abuse of the President's Executive powers to leverage control over the Legislative branch, thereby leading to the concentration of powers in a single branch of government that allows for the exercise of arbitrary power and tyranny."

The court hearing comes at a sensitive time for Democratic leaders in Congress seeking to bring a bill to the floor of the House of Representatives by the end of this week.   With "Obamacare" supporters hard-pressed to find the required votes, pressures of the kind asserted in the physicians' suit are likely to be employed against hesitant lawmakers.  In addition, questions that have been raised about potential use of the "reconciliation" process in the Senate, or "deeming" the Senate bill passed in the House, serve to highlight the constitutional concerns raised by the doctors.

At the links, view in their entirety the brief in opposition to the Obama Administration's motion to dismiss the suit and the physicians' original complaint.