Did SCOTUS decision help states seeking to lower the drinking age? Minnesota lawmaker thinks so
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A Minnesota lawmaker is citing the U.S. Supreme Court decision upholding the Affordable Care Act in her quest to get the state to lower the legal age for drinking in bars and restaurants.
Democratic State Rep. Phyllis Kahn says the 2012 Supreme Court decision limited Congress’ ability to place conditions on federal grants to states—including the law withholding highway funds to states with drinking ages below the age of 21, report the Washington Post and the St. Paul Pioneer Press. Some law professors, however, disagree with Kahn’s assessment, according to the Washington Post.
Kahn has introduced a bill that would allow bars and restaurants to serve alcohol to those who are age 18 or older, and an alternative bill that would allow service in bars and restaurants when the youths are accompanied by a parent or guardian. The bills would still bar liquor stores from selling alcohol to those who are under age 18.
She argues that allowing social drinking in bars and restaurants would cut down on binge drinking on college campuses. And she believes the Supreme Court decision upholding the health-care law protects Minnesota from losing highway funds if it lowers the age.
The 2012 Supreme Court decision upheld the health-care law’s insurance mandate under Congress’ taxing power and upheld the law’s Medicaid expansion, with a caveat. The Medicaid expansion was constitutional, the Supreme Court said, as long as the federal government did not withdraw existing Medicaid funds from states that refuse to go along with the expansion. The court ruled in the consolidated cases U.S. Department of Health and Human Services v. State of Florida and National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius.
The Supreme Court had previously upheld a law withholding 5 percent of highway funds from states with lower drinking ages in the 1987 decision South Dakota v. Dole. In the Affordable Care Act case, Roberts said the threatened Medicaid funds represented a larger threat to state budgets than the amount at stake in Dole and “is economic dragooning that leaves the states with no real option but to acquiesce in the Medicaid expansion.”
Law professors interviewed by the Washington Post said the condition on federal highway money is likely to survive. Among them was University of Michigan law professor Sam Bagenstos, who said the amount at stake in the Medicaid expansion is much larger than the threatened highway funds. “I don’t think they have much of a case at all,” Bagenstos said.
Hat tip to How Appealing.
