One week after the 2011 General Assembly convened, the House passed a bill fully engaging North Carolina in the nationwide battle against the Obama administration’s health insurance mandate. House Bill 2, The Healthcare Freedom Protection Act, passed the House Feb. 2 and is on its way to the Senate.

If it becomes law, H.B. 2 would exempt North Carolinians from the federal mandate requiring individuals to purchase health insurance from a government-approved provider and direct Attorney General Roy Cooper to join the multi-state lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the law.

Republicans and Democrats debated the constitutionality of the federal law for more than three hours.

Democrats cited the Commerce Clause and the General Welfare Clause of the U.S. Constitution. Republicans argued that the federal power to regulate interstate commerce did not include the power to regulate economic inactivity (the failure to purchase health insurance).

“The Commerce Clause did not override the entire constitutional arrangement of limited government,” said Rep. John Blust, R-Guilford.

Rep. Phil Haire, D-Jackson, said the idea of mandating that people invest in their future is not new. He cited Social Security and Medicare as federal programs that meet that test. Haire said the mandate was necessary to spread the cost of health care insurance evenly across the nation.

“If we could get more young people into the pool, the cost of health care would come down,” he said.

Haire compared the attempt to exempt North Carolinians from the federal insurance mandate to the state’s attempt to secede from the Union 150 years ago.

“We all know what happened as a result of that,” he said. “We had a war … and North Carolina had more casualties than any other state.”

House Minority Leader Joe Hackney, D-Orange, said the requirement to purchase health insurance wasn’t really a mandate.

“You don’t really have to do it, you just have to pay a small tax if you don’t do it,” he said. He compared health insurance to auto insurance, noting that “you get fined and potentially go to prison” if you don’t buy coverage as a driver.

Hackney also said it was unfair for the uninsured to pass off their health care costs to the taxpayers.

Republicans argued that there is no difference between a tax and a fine. Blust said that the mandate passed off the cost of health care services from those using them to those not using them.

Several Democrats, including Wake County Rep. Jennifer Weiss, expressed concerns about people who paid much higher premiums, or couldn’t get health insurance at all, because they have pre-existing conditions.

Rep. Sarah Stevens, R-Surry, countered that she and three of her sisters are breast cancer survivors. “When we buy health insurance it’s expensive, but it’s a choice we make,” she said. “I’m not asking anybody else to share the cost of my health insurance.”

House Majority Leader Paul “Skip” Stam, R-Wake, said the debate was about more than health care or the Constitution. “More than anything,” he said, “it’s about what you think about yourself.”

“Are you a citizen or are you a child?” he asked. “Are you a ward of the state? Or are you part of the people that direct the state?”

He said North Carolina should not “act as the parent for our citizens who are adults and who are not incompetent or otherwise [impaired].”

Rep. Verla Insko, D-Orange, said it was a waste of time to debate a “federal issue” that was already being addressed in federal courts.

Hackney called the bill meaningless, saying it wouldn’t make a difference if one more state joined the lawsuit against the federal legislation.

Blust disagreed, saying as more states get on board with the lawsuit, it would carry more weight. He said it was important to let the nation know where North Carolina stands on the issue.

“The federal government, under the Commerce Clause, does not have the power to compel our citizens to make them purchase things or to punish them for inaction,” Blust said.

Several lawmakers expressed concern that, even though the bill gives the state’s attorney general the “duty and standing” to bring or defend a legal action against the mandate, Attorney General Roy Cooper could refuse to join the lawsuit.

More than half the states have sued to overturn the mandate, and Monday, Florida U.S. District Court Judge Roger Vinson ruled the mandate a violation of the U.S. Constitution, placing the entire legislation in legal jeopardy.

“I think there is a misunderstanding of the role of the attorney general,” Stam said. He has a “duty to defend the statutes that the General Assembly passes,” he said. “I have every expectation that if we pass this law, the attorney general will do just as instructed whether he believes in it or not.”

The bill passed 66-50 and now goes to the Senate.

Sara Burrows is an associate editor of Carolina Journal.