Hot Topic Program: Our Intensifying National Debate: Is Health Care Reform Constitutional?

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With the Supreme Court having granted five and one-half hours of oral argument over two days concerning the constitutionality of health care reform – the most time allotted for oral argument in the past 46 years – one of the most hotly debated constitutional cases in a generation has now reached the Supreme Court.  This panel will preview arguments being heard by the Court.  Two architects of the constitutional challenge, Professors Randy Barnett and David Oedel, the only two law professors who are counsel in the case, will offer some personal views of the challengers’ main arguments.  Two highly prominent defenders of the constitutionality of health care reform, Professor Jack Balkin and Dean Erwin Chemerinsky, will offer contrasting views.  Dean Laura Underkuffler will moderate an intimate exploration of the latest, still-evolving thinking about what has become a set of landmark legal issues in the nation’s life.