mr. roberts and his supreme court. he and four liberal justices upheld the the bill, the provision that said people have to get health care or pay a penalty. these five justices ruled itç constitutional. pete williams is nbc justice correspondent, i want to ask you the big question of the day. chief justice roberts appointed by george bush, why did he do what he did today? >> we can't say that for sure. we can only look at his words. you have to go back to when the case was argued to say that while justice roberts did have some skepticism, there were questions that he might he support the law. a huge stunner in that sense because he in essence had signalled he might do it. i think you have to say this is really two decisions. first of all, the supreme court with justice roberts joining with the four conservatives agreed with one of the conservative criticisms of this

law, that congress had no power, constitution remembers congress has to power quote to regulate commerce. the opponents said if you don't have insurance, therefore you can't be regulated, this is beyond congress' power. chief justice roberts agreed along with the other four justices. but the chief justice said it doesn't stop there. because the obama administration had made this second argument that congress had the power under its very broad taxing authority and that's where the chief found common ground with the four liberals on the court to say it's constitutional. so legally, the guts of the law are left in tact. the only real change that today's decision made is to the medicaid side of the law. the states had argued that by being forced to eitherç accept all these new medicaid requiremented, if they said no, the government said fine, you're

out of medicaid and that's where the court said no, you can't go that far. so, a major decision by the chief justice. let's go to anthony kennedy. the usual swing vote, supreme court, who basically succe succeeded -- one was the lawrence case, basically found for sexual liberty among consenting adults. here, it seemed he was following that libertarian approach. remember the old phrase, keep the government out of board room and bedroom. it seems he's one of those people. he didn't go with this taxing authority recognition by the chief justice. >> i think that's a very fair reading, chris, of what he said. and you know, that's also consistent with the concerns he expressed during the oral argument of this case. he thought this was a vast overreaching by congress and joined his conservative colleagues in saying so today. >> yeah, well said. pete, you're the best.

it's great to have you. by the way, i think our ties are in total agreement today, which is one of those other strange phenomena. thank you so much. let's turn now to what this means to the presidential race and i think it means a lot. howard fineman and john heilemann, national affairs editor for "new york magazine." you wouldn't want to be sitting home somewhere right now. theç importance of this. let's go up side, downsi side. >> had he lost, i think his re-elections chances were close to nil. he's a change agent. this is the thing he staked his first term on. had it been thrown out by the supreme court, it would have been terrible. now, the flip side and to quote churchill, there's nothing more exhilarating than to be shot at

without result. >> yes. >> so, wow. it's a huge -- >> except i don't like to use ballistic language. >> it's a huge jolt of electricity and energy. >> to come over and get embroidered for our progressive viewers, one te wins 98-97, but it's the whole ball game. >> even though no republicans in congress ever supported this, he now has e bipartisan of at least one figure, chief justice john roberts. can't go bigger than john roberts. >> shortly after the court's decision was released and so chuck said this today. the better the decision the faster the president's response. so here he was at high noon today. let's listen to the president. >> earlier today, the supreme court upheld the

constitutionality of the affordable care act. the name of the health care reform we passed two years ago. inç doing so, they've reaffirm a fundamental principle, that here in america in the wealthiest nation on earth, no illness or accident should lead to any family's financial ruin. i know whether the debate over this law has been devicive. i know a lot of coverage through this health care debate has focused on what it means politically. well, it should be clear by now that i didn't do this because it was good politics. i did it because i believed it was good for the country. i did it because i believed it was good for the american people. >> and quite a little chuckle there today because he's running the mandate, the main spring training of this bill approve y by the high court is running about 30%. obama's running better than 30%. >> there's no question that if you're the white house, this is

the preferable outcome. on policy grounds, it's a huge victory, but nothing that happened today made the law more popular. the law is still really unpopular. pieces of it there are kind of popular, but of it, talk to democratic pollsters about this law. >> let me ask you a simple question. you said preferable. is howard right if this would have been going down -- >> from the romney campaign's point of view, being able to stand up and say the president wasted a year and a half and passed a law that was unconstitutional would have been a huge political win for the romney campaign and aç devastating loss for the obama administration, but we now are going to have a fight for three months over this law. >> you think? >> absolutely. the romney campaign thinks they still have a -- this law is really unpopular and they are going to run --

>> that's -- we're going to do a whole segment on that tonight, whether romney really thinks this is a change he wants to rattle. >> as unpopular as the individual mandate is in the otherwise somewhat popular piece by piece health care law, president obama would prefer a three-month argument on this to a three-month exogis of how the economy is. >> want to talk about jobs or health care? >> jobs, but i don't think he's going to back off this criticism. if you look at a piece of legislation polling 70-30 and you're a republican -- >> he created the model for this thing. >> he is pledging to repeal and replace the law. >> he gets 60 votes this senate to do that, all this bs about he's going to repeal. it takes 60 votes to create and i believe 60 votes to decreate. >> they had reconciliation. >> how do they kill with reconciliation? >> democrats pass it with

reconciliation, no reason you can't repeal. republicans will try. >> practically 60 votes. >> chris. >> stop the music. you forget history here? 60 votes. >> i recall the reconciliation process. >> they got arlen specter and the two republicans from maine. go ahead. >> i was just going to say that the, i forgot whatjiu(j going to say because i'm so damn excited. >> i am, too. he's the only guy that's not excited. this is the game changer. >> all right, so mitt romney, this is great for mitt romney to solidify the base. that's true. he's going to talk about taxes. he's going to say this is a tax, it's a tax and mitt romney came out today, stood in front of the capitol and said barack obama's going to tax you more et cetera, et cetera. but if mitt romn chooses to focus on the health care bill for the next three months, he will be taken off the the table his number one argument to be

elected -- >> by the way -- >> which is barack obama has blown it on the economy. >> by the way, not to get too tough with you, my friend because as mcloughlin would say, there's an element of truth. if this is held up as a tax, you simply reduce the tax to zero because you can move numbers around. >> but you -- if you don't think the republicans if they get control of the senate and have a republican president that they will try to use reconciliation to repeal this law i think it's crazy to think they won't try to do that. they hate this law. >> the fact is, the polls show that health care is like number four or five in people's concerns about what's number one in their minds. >> i tell you, the unemployment rate gets down to 7.5, they won't talk about anything. here's the president talking about the decision would only energize their party further, the republicans, against the law and the president. some republicans are making the best of this. making lemonade out of this lemon. >> i think the real outcome nv

the today's decision is to strengthen our resolve to make sure that this law is in fact pealed. >> the decision today really indicates we have entered an age in which the government, washington, will be controlling health care unless something changes. >> today was not a good day for freedom, for struggle american families who wish to keep the health care that they have. i respect the ruling of the supreme court and i respectfully and disagree with it. >> maybe i'm wrong. who do you want here? so when did they use the 60 votes to get the super majority? >> we're not going to go back and -- all the the legislature maneuvering they got at the end, the democrats employed reconciliation at one toint pin

get that through. >> but in the actual passage of the bill, they didn't do it. >> we're both half right. >> couldn't have done it without 60 votes though. now i'm at a loss here. let's talk about the second part of this thing. the boring part. the medicaid part. with medicaid now, they cannot sanction the states by completely screwing them basically if they don't go along with this expansion, anybody who makes less than 33% of the poverty level. >> right. >> okay. thank you. this is such a big day for howard and i, we can't get over giggles. we're going to go to the tapes of you and me. coming up, is this a fight with mitt romney? is he going to keep it up? i don't think anybodyç wants t hear mitt romney talk about health care since he created it up in massachusetts and that might be brought up. and as expected, the house's vote to hold attorney general in contempt with some walking out in protest. what a huge day in american politics and this is "hardball,"

the place for it, politics. >> the government could decide we're going tax you if you don't eat broccoli on tuesday. apparently, that's now constitutional. but i don't think it's a very wise law. it's very important to understand how math and science kind of makes the world work. in high school, i had a physics teacher by the name of mr. davies. he made physics more than theoretical, he made it real for me. we built a guitar, we did things with electronics and mother boards. that's where the interest in engineering came from. so now, as an engineer,

i have a career that speaks to that passion. thank you, mr. davies. another lesson today on how perilous it is to predict what the supreme court will do. a lot of people like to look at it in trade, the online market to predict the future. got the health care decision wrong today. this week in advance of the decision, the guess was relatively 75%. ouch. didn't happen. our retirement s, especially in this economy. but with three kids, being home more really helped. man: so we went to fidelity.

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public opinion, the health care law remains unpopular. that's mainly thanks to the individual mandate, the idea that almost everybo has to get health insurance or pay a penalty for not doing it. today, the president tried to defend that provision. >> uninsured people who can afford care get sick and show up at the emergency room for care, the rest of us end up paying for their care in the form of hher premiums. that's why even though i knew it wouldn't be politically popular and resisted the idea when i ran for this office, we ultimately included the provision that people who can afford to buy health insurance should take the responsibility to do so. in fact, this idea is enjoyed support from members of both parties including the current republican nominee for president. >> of course, romney has strongly defended mandates in the past. he was vowing to defend the bill, but will obamacare become a major part of this campaign?

will he have a choice? mark halperin, senior political analyst here at msnbc. michael steele, former chair of rnc. i have to ask you, in terms of the nature of this campaign we're facing with an unemployment rate that looks to be around 8, we know where the situation lies now. so what will be the deciding factors? will it be something like this that rolls out and becomes a bigger story even than it was today? >> i think it has that potential, particularly if the romney team does not come to the table with a level of specifics about what he would do. this whole repeal and replace idea, i love it, but the reality of it is once the house moves next week to repeal, someone's going to have to start talking about what the to replace it with. what's important is that the messaging of on the heels of this ruling has to be one of take i taking the country to the next step in terms of what republicans say and i think this

thing could be a sleeper in this election. >> have you heard any republican alternative to the man dadate f paying for this thing? >> there are individual pieces out there that particularly the 14 members of the house who are doctors, have talked about.ç that has to come together in a way to say if we don't do the mandate, what are we going to do and how are we going to pay for it. we've got a lot of taxes that come online next year and that is how obama's planning to pay for this. this now becomes i think a sleeper issue. >> you know, fdr had a wonderfully sarcastic way of talking about the republican party. they always take something the democrats have just done and say we could do that, too, in a way that won't cost you anything. they always do that after the fact. can they get away with it this time? the democrats will cost you this mandate or penalty. we can give you preexisting coverage, adult children coverage, but it won't cost you anything. >> i don't think you have to

look back any further than the last election where republicans were shockingly deficient in offering an alternative to deficit reduction, but said the president's not doing a good enough job. vote for us. they didn't have any ideas. it may end up being the same on health care. people inside the beltway and northeast corridor are skeptical of the bain argument. i think health care on the other side may be it. when i go out with governor romney and he talks about repealing obama care is as raw as anything else he talks about. i don't think it's a reach at all to say obamacare has higher taxes and small business doesn't like it. republicans have been talking for montes aboutç how it relat to the president's record on the economy, so i think for sure he'll talk about it and i don't think he'll talk about it reluctantly. i think it will be one of his strongest arguments. >> stay on this, mark.

does the fact that the supreme court relied on the taxing authority of the president to basically give this constitutional muster. will that give the republicans an argument right there? >> they certainly think so. i read about 200 republican tweets and press releases today and almost all of them focused on that. i think the president's remarks today are a great start for him to try the to make the case about why the mandate is a conservative idea. why it's a necessary thing. i think he's going to have to keep that up because i don't think governor romney is going to back off and i don't think most voters are going to care about what he did in massachusetts. the incumbent won't get rid of it, he'll implement it. >> mitt romney today said he disagreed with the court's decision and promises to repeal health care if he wins the election. >> what the court did today was say that obamacare does not violate the constitution. what they did not do was say that obamacare is good law or

that it's good policy. obamacare was bad policy yesterday. it's bad policy today. obamacare was bad law yesterday. it's bad law today. if we want good jobs and a bright economic future for ourselves and our kids, we must replace obamacare. that is my msion. that is our work and i'm asking the people of america to join me. >> that was rather like talking with aús]aff written script, but it might work. mitt romney has strongly backed health care however, mandates, even. the president's plan was modelled on romney's in massachusetts. today, video was found of romney defending mandates in order to bring health care costs down. this is from 2006. not a million years ago. >> regards to the mandate, the individual responsibility program, which i proposed, i was very pleased to see that the

compromise from the two houses includes the personal responsibility. that is essential for bringing health care costs down for everyone and getting everybody the health insurance they deserve and need. >> you know, the whole of presidents down there, just sort of feed in the script, the voice in the statue that speaks a different line. he just went from one to another based on the script. how does he do this? they don't care who chops this program. >> absolutely and i think that's going to be the corner stone of the romney strategy going forward. like a lot of folks who began to realize, i don't think he backs off. he pushes full steam ahead and going to link it to the economic argument as much he can. how it ties into jobs and the small businesses. the weight of the tax burden on the taxpayer as well as businesses. interesting though is what the

president does and started to do today is fashioning this ironically from a conservative. you know that a conservative personalç responsibility argumt which i think is going to be fascinating for him to make, especially because he was against the mandate and romney was for the mandate before he was against it, so these two gentlemen have crafted a very interesting dialogue. >> president obama doesn't want to talk about it anymore. he said so today. when ever they start move on, mark, every time i hear the word, move on, that means please. i'm clinching. michael steele, mark halperin, thank you, gentlemen. up next, see what happens when a republican member of congress thinks the law's been overturned. i'm not going to say which networks had this story completely wrong, but you can guess it wasn't this one and this is "hardball," the place for politics. >> time and again, he has shown political courage. i think, i said to him. i said this is a cost of

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for the rest of your life. visa. supporting athletes and the olympic games for 25 years. people everywhere go with visa. back to "hardball." the supreme version. if you thought this was a big day free of political side shows, wait for this. initial reporting on the decision not on msnbc led many to believe the health care law had been struck down. and resulted in some premature celebrations by republicans. a tweet from michigan congressman, quote, this is a big win for liberty in the constitution. it was short lived, however, but he wasn't alone. a cell phone captured a congresswoman reacting to the

misinformation.ç >> speak! >> oh, thank god -- no -- >> they took it away? >> yes, yes! >> get this. the president himself also got wrapped up in the confusion. he, too, initially thought it was struck down. white house aides said obama walked into the oval office, white house council followed after giving the president two thumbs up, that the law survived what was a roller coaster, but even those who did have the facts straight got caught up in the heat of the moment. executive director of the democratic national committee had three words to tweet. it's constitutional, then used a

b word that rhymes with witches. kind of reminds me of this moment just after the bill was passed. [ bleep ]. moving on, just days after reviving his phony death panel warnings, sarah palin tweeted quote, obama lied to the american people again. he said it wasn't a tax. obama lies. freedom dies. that's sarah palin. freedom dies? really, governor? it might just be rand paul who takes the cake with his statement on the ruling. quote, just because the couple of people on the supreme court declare something to be constituti constitutional doesn't make it so. actually senator paul when the supreme court says something is constitutional, by definition, it is. but now to switch gears, this whole historic decision really comes down to two people who

provide the key swing vote. just a few years ago, the two men shared another historic event. >> i, barack hussein obama, do solemnly swear -- >> that i will execute -- >> that i will execute -- >> the office of the president of the united states faithfully and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the constitution of the united states. >> preserve, protect and defend the constitution of the united states. >> so help you god? >> so help me god. >> congratulations, mr. president. >> up next t house votes. ♪ [ honk! ] ♪ [ honk! ] ♪ [ male announcer ] now you'll know when to stop. [ honk! ]

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how math and science kind of makes the world work. in high school, i had a physics teacher by the name of mr. davies. he made physics more than theoretical, he made it real fome. we built a guitar, we did things with electronics and mother boards. that's where the interest in engineering came from. so now, as an engineer, i have a career that speaks to that passion. thank you, mr. davies.

i'm jane wells with your

cnbc market wrap. the dow sheds 25. s&p is off three and the nasdaq is down 26. the supreme court's decision on the president's overhaul since big companies lower. jpmorgan shares lost 2.5% following a report that losses from derivatives trades could total up to $9 billion. that's it from cnbc first in business worldwide. back to "hardball." welcome back. today, the republican-led house of representatives took the unprecedented step of holding eric holder in contempt of congress and leaders led by the congressional black caucus staged a walk outto protest the vote. >> there's something evil about

using the house, especially something as severe as holding someone in contempt of congress. to further political aims is not want to american people sent us here. >> the action on the floor today is unprecedented in the history of america. never before in history has the the congress held a cabinet officer in come contempt. that's why we are here in this courtyard to say to our republican colleagues. shame on you. shame on you. shame on you. shame on you. >> white house communications director expressed the administration's disgust about the vote with a statement that reads in part at the beginning of this year, republicans announced one of their top priorities was to investigate

the administration and to ensure president obama was a one-term president. today, we saw the house of representatives perform a trans pare parentally political stunt. jus one day earlier, a fortune magazine reports that the entire fast and furious investigation was based on a lie. the claims about it, catherine wroteç the article and say horowitz writes for the "washington post," had an exclusive interview with the former head of the atf in phoenix. i want to start with getting to the "fortune" magazine issue right now. what is the issue here, i read the issue and it seems to me saying there is no substance to the charge that they walked these guns, they purposely allowed laws to be broken and guns to fall into the hands of the cartel in mexico so they could track those guns. tell me what the piece says about that. >> what it says is that there was no operational tactic by the

atf to choose to let guns flow into the hands of criminals. rather, there was a protracted, intensive fight, debate, with federal prosecutors about the grounds, legal grounds, for seizing these guns and arresting suspects. >> so, what is this whole fight about if there wasn't an attempt to give guns, allow guns to fall into the hands of killers what's led to the killing of those people. i mean, why, if your article's correct, there's no substance at the bottom of this story to verify this defand manvendra for paper, everything. >> whistleblowers inside of phoenix group seven tasked with p &h(lc% ininvestigatiininvestigation claimed they had been forced to sit back and watch as guns flowed to criminals.

what my article says is that they had a tremendous grudge against the supervisor they accused of orchestrating this. they didn't say it was intensetiintensive debate with prosecutors and were denied that permission. didn't say any of that. >> well, let me go to sari horowitz at the post. what's your reading on this based on the "fortune" magazine piece? is this hard evidence that the united states government by a policy of fast and furious allowed guns to fall into the hands of the bad guys, if you will, the mexican cartel? >> the man who i interviewed was the boss. a special agent in charge of the phoenix office. he was the boss of the people in the "fortune" magazine article and agreed with the premise of

that article that they didn't intentionally want guns to end up in the hands of criminals, but were constantly told they did not have probable cause to seize these weapons. see, they had a noble intention in this operation, which is they wanted to penetrate a drag, a firearms organization. didn't want to just keep arresting the small purchases, the street level guys. and to do so, they felt like they had to watch the straw purchasers. they did not have the legal grounds, they say, to go in and arrest those straw purchasers or the middlemen who they were giving the guns to. >> could they have picked these people up on gun violations? if they had said no, every time we see what looks to be a gun violation at any level, we're going to nail them because that will stop the trafficking. >> the tricky thing there is if someone goes into a gun store and buys a gun legally,right, and then passes it on to someone

who is not prohibited from buying a gun, it's very hard to prove in court that there's a violation. they didn't want to arrest straw pufsers. >> your piece basically is a larger, nearly impossible to stop with guns and criminals, it just seems to me that this is a pretty clear case, but why do you have people coming out of the agency itself. the higher authority saying no, you let them buy those guns, you let them go, the laws be flouted and your response. >> when you know ef when you have a situation that is highly public, there is a rush. in this case, the atf and justice department initially backs the agents on the ground, but i should say they never really asked them in any details fashion what happened.

there was as i said, a rush for the exits and people started, the blameç started rolling downhill until these agents had basically found themselves alone. people are not really interested, people in authority, finding out what exactly happened. >> well, you know, it seems to me there's a couple of those. maybe you two can't follow this, but i'moing to ask you to follow and project from your reporting. here's the question. here you have the nra in this country, which is so powerful as we know that. going after members of congress and saying you've got to vote our way on this or we're going to strike called against you in the next election and yet here they are charging the atf with not doing enough arrests for gun violations. isn't that extraordinary for them to take that posture here? >> the whole thing is extraordinary and you know, chris, in washington, it's all about politics. but you know, there's a very, very important point that needs to be made here.

the whole vote today came down to something that happened with a letter written on february 4th by the justice department to congress basically say iing we don't have any instances where we've ever not seized guns. turned out, that letter was wrong and they had to withdraw it. what issa and the republicans want is all the -- in the justice department since the letter was written to see if there was a cover up. who knew what win. >> thank you very much. great reporting. up next, back to health care. we'll talk about the political consequences, but what does it mean for actual people? patients, want to be insured properly. the ground game. we're going to get to it in a moment. this is "hardball," the place for politics. [ male announcer ] eligible for medicare?

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trouble with a car insurance claim. [ voice of dennis ] switch to allstate. their claim service is so good, now it's guaranteed. [ normal voice ] so i can trust 'em. unlike randy. are you in good hands? because of this law, there are other americans, other sons and daughters, brothers and sisters, fathers and mothers who will not have to hang their fortunes on chance.ç these are the americans for whom we passed this law. >> we're back, of course, that's president obama today speaking after the supreme court upheld his health care law. we've talked a lot about the politics of the the big decision by the supreme court. but how is it going to affect real people? worked on the affordable health care act as an adviser to

president obama and chairs the medical ethics and health policy here in pennsylvania. and author of critical care, also a blogger for the "new york times." i want to get to you about a cancer patient or leukemia patient. bring it down to what it meant to you in a patient like that. the ruling today. >> well, the issue of why we need theffordable care act was really brought home to me one afternoon when i was taking care of a new leukemia patient who started to talk to me about death panels and i told him there was no such thing because he said oh, really, because i hoped there health insurance and he was convinced that the care he would need to cure his leukemia would bankrupt his family. he ran his own business. he had worked his whole life. his wife had health insurance, but he was not on her policy. and i'm guessing from things he told me, he couldn't afford it.

but whatever the reason, he wasn't insured. he'd always been healthy then he was suddenly very, very sick. and his wish was for the govern assassinate him rather than his family having to lose their livelihood to save his life. >> well, how will his condition be difference in terms of the $20,000 for these chemo injections which staggers most of us watching. how can anything cost $20,000 for an injection. but what will his situation be if what's been passed into law now. how's it look now for him? or a person like him? >> it looks so much better. there's so many provisions in the affordable care act that should help so many americans who couldn't get insurance get it. there are subsidies that will go to people who can't afford insurance. there are plans to expand medicaid. there are also a lot of provisions to lower the cost of premiums. and that will make insurance

more affordable for the average americ. so there's lots of different ways including state-run insurance exchanges that people who in the past couldn't afford insurance should be able to. >> well, let's go to emanuel. that's what real life is, of course. it's frightening the cost of med since. $20,000 for an injection. but will the individual mandate which was what was at stake today and the chief justice found with the 5-4 majority. now we know we have to do something. no walking into an e.r. with some financial effort on your part. how's that going to work on buying insurance presume yums? >> it's going to bring it down. >> people who are going in to get services from a doctorç an they don't pay for them, someone's got to cover those costs because they're not free. whether it's the x-ray machine or the lab tests. the hospital folds it into the charge who et gs -- >> and hits all the insured people.

>> on a family premium it was over a thousand dollars. so that'll go down. >> because a lot of healthy people who are young will be getting themselves insured, right? >> well, a lot of healthy people will be insured. but also everyone will have coverage. so will pay in. in addition states were often pays hospitals or doctors who provided this uncompensated care out of general revenue. and it's not only that the premiums will go down, those who didn't have insurance will now get preventive tests. they'll be able to take care of themselves. the number of services they need will go down. >> this seems like when you explain it as a provision, it sounds simple. everybody's got to kick into the extent of their ability. why does this darn bill have to be as fat as an old sears robuck catalog? i mean it. most people don't like that. they don't like why it's so big and complicated if it's as simple as you said.

>> let me point out two facts. the decision today, 199 pages deciding one issue in the bill. they've got a lot of issues that take up time. and the second issue, it doesn't just deal with this access problem. it dealt with the doctors and nurses we have, withç preventi. almost 20% of the whole economy. you can't regulate that and get a good law in a short bill. >> okay. thank you very much, zeke. >> but wait. >> why did you bring your prop? >> this is my good luckharm for this bill. it's broccoli. now you have to eat your broccoli to stay healthy. >> i don't like it, but i'll eat it when i have to. i eat when i'm told to. teresa, thank you for joining us and giving an insight to real people. and for the big picture. when we return, let me finish with the decision made possible by one man. chief justice john roberts.

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let me finish tonight with mr. chief justice john roberts. what a treasure in human existence is the unpredicted. those moments someone does something that staggers the rest of us that is so phenomenal that it blows us away. justice roberts did just that. he was judicious looking at the obama health care act from all

angles. how from each perspective the act does or does not pass muster with the constitution. he said looking at that angle from which the obama measure could beç ruled to square with this organizing document. admitted to looking for it until he found it. so the big question, what pushed him? what made him look until he found the root for the obama health care act acceptability? what encouraged him to go beyond the interstate commerce clause and find the taxing authority, the provision he believed gave obama's act its okay by the constitution? my hunch knowing justice roberts and his wife just a bit is his motive was high morality. he wanted to do good and went with the oath to respect the constitution. he wanted to protect both. that's the heart of it. and the one shot this country has at looking at the welfare of all our people and the way it would score with the constitutionally limited government. social justice runs deep and wide crossing those sad divides

between right and left and holds a central belief to look out for our brothers and sisters on this earth. it goes against the notion every man for himself and there's something of obligation to our fellow man kind. it is worthy, it is good. and today the supreme court, the highest court in our country agreed with it. saying when it comes to health and health care, we have no obstacle to doing what is right. let's all put our heads in the pillow tonight saying this is a good day to our countr and a good day to know we live in a country that is trying hard each generation to be better. that's "hardball" for now. "politicsnation" with al sharpton starts right now. welcome to "politicsnation." i'm alç sharpton. tonight's lead, historic day. for the next hour, we'll cover all parts of the supreme court's momentous decision to uphold president obama's health care

law. a law that will improve the lives of millions of americans. we'll look how it will effect the presidential election. we'll look at the surprising vote to preserve the law. a vote by bush-appointed chief justice john roberts. and we'll with talk about presidents who have for a hundred years tried to bring health care to all americans. now barack obama has done it. we'll speak to two members of congress in just a moment for their reaction. but i want to begin with what happened inside the supreme court today. joining me now is jeffrey rosen, law professor at george washington university and legal editor of "the new republic" and ian millhiser. he was inside the courtroom today. thank you for joining me. >> thank you. >> jeff, let me start with you.