Health care law: Supreme Court to consider challenge

US Supreme Court Justices agreed to look over a challenge to President Barack Obama’s health care bill on Monday, which could lead a decision by June 2012, The New York Times reported.

The Supreme Court will hear a challenge brought by a group of Republican governors and attorney generals from 26 states, the National Federation of Independent Business and two individual plaintiffs, the Wall Street Journal reported. Although it has been expected the Supreme Court would intervene in this bill, a staple of Obama’s career in office, this has finally given some direction as to how it would get done.

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The challenge will raise the main issue of whether Congress exceeded its constitutional powers when it required most individuals to have health insurance or pay a penalty. The court is now expected to hear oral arguments in March and a decision by late June, on the brink of the 2012 presidential election, The Times reported.

The nine-member court will also fold in an additional case on the tax implications of the health care law, Fox News reported.

The law, known as the Affordable Care Act, raised issues with opposing parties, who feel it would hurt small businesses and compromise individual choices on medical care, USA Today reported.

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"This is going to be the most heavily covered Supreme Court case in history, even more so than Bush v. Gore, because that was so compressed," says Washington lawyer Thomas Goldstein, USA Today reported. "This will run from today until the summer."

The health care bill was signed by the president in March 2010, extending insurance coverage to almost all Americans, USA Today reported.