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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Nov. 3, 2009

CONTACT: Strother Smith, President, 10th Amendment Foundation, Inc.
276.614.5956; ceo@10thamendmentfoundation.org

Constitutional lawyers pledge court fight on Constitutional grounds if Obama signs proposed health care plan

Bristol, Va./Tenn. (Nov. 3, 2009) – Constitutional lawyers have pledge to challenge the proposed health care plan in federal court the very day President Obama signs it, the founder of the 10 Amendment Foundation announced today.

“After considerable study and analysis of the bill regarding the constitutional issues involved, our board of trustees voted today to challenge the health care plan on constitutional grounds the very hour it becomes law,” said Strother Smith, founder of the 10th Amendment Foundation, based in Bristol, Va.

“We have been working with attorneys general and well-placed Constitutional attorneys in several states and are confident that we will have strong multi-state participation if we ask for it.”

Smith said the proposed health care plan violates the 10th Amendment, which reserves to the states or to the people powers not specifically mentioned in the Constitution. Smith has been an attorney for 43 years and has argued cases before the U.S. Supreme Court. He founded the foundation as a result of networking that resulted from the April 15 tea parties in Virginia and Tennessee, and it has chapters in several states.

“This health care plan violates many parts of the constitution,” Smith said. “There is absolutely NO paragraph, word, or phrase in the Constitution that can be stretched far enough to allow the federal government to have any say whatsoever over health care delivery or health care insurance for any individual (except for Federal employment, in or out of the military, or those in Federal incarceration).”

The Web site of the foundation is http://www.10thamendmentfoundation.org.

The web site with detailed information about the constitutional problems with the health care plan is:

http://www.10thamendmentfoundation.org/National_Healthcare.html.

“We would file what is known as a Bill of Complaint in federal court in Roanoke, asking for a declartory judgment and mandamus, ruling that the health care plan is unconstitutional because it violates the 1st, 4th, 5th, 9th, 10th, 14th and 16th Amendments to the Constitution.”

Smith said the mandamus action should have the effect of preventing the federal government from putting any element of the health care plan into action until its merits have decided by the U.S. Supreme Court.

Editors: Strother Smith is available for interviews. Contact him by calling his cell phone, 276.614.5956, or by email: ceo@10thamendmentfoundation.org.