Is Health Care Guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution?

The topic of discussion for this Constitution Monday is the Democrat claim about health care being a right and not a blessing. The Democrat Party platform in 2016 proudly proclaimed, “We believe as Democrats that health care is a right, not a privilege.” In 2020, the Democrat Party platform was “We must guarantee health care, not as a privilege for some, but as a right for every single American.” Now in 2024, the Democrat platform is “Health care should be a right in America, not a privilege.”

Democrats believe that if a lie is repeated often enough that people will accept it as truth. This only applies to those who do not study the U.S. Constitution. Health care is not a right! Steve McKee published an article at The Daily Signal about this topic. 

Decades before Hillary Clinton, Bernie Sanders, Joe Biden, and Kamala Harris began chanting the mantra, leftists [of] all kinds have seemed to believe endlessly repeating “health care is a right” will somehow make it true.

But it’s not. And claiming it to be one is lazy, ignorant of natural law, or just plain deceptive.

It’s important to first clarify that proponents of health care being a right are ultimately advocating for universal health insurance. All Americans already have access care at some level. More than 90% of the population is covered by private plans, Medicare, or Medicaid, and even those with no insurance whatsoever can’t be turned away from an emergency room for financial reasons.

Admittedly, that’s a limited and inefficient option that satisfies no one, but it’s the paying for health care, not the provision of it, that’s the core issue.

That pinpoints the problem of claiming health care as a right; namely, it ain’t cheap. I don’t know anyone who isn’t in favor of all Americans having convenient access to high quality care, but its provision, like the provision of any service, requires the labor of others.

That’s something no one can presume. As the cliché goes, your rights to swing your fist stop at the tip of my nose.

“Free” health care requires doctors, nurses, techs, and all the people who provide the equipment, machinery, medicine, and supplies in the vast health care system to unwillingly bear the cost. That’s not only immoral, it’s unsustainable. If beer, bread, and basketballs were free, there would soon be no beer, bread, and basketballs.

English Enlightenment-era philosopher John Locke wrote that we are all born with inalienable natural rights that are God-given and can never be taken away. Among the rights Locke cited were “life, liberty, and property,” the latter of which was exchanged for “the pursuit of happiness” in the Declaration of Independence.

Note, however, that none of those rights require the labor of others. Even the last one is a right only of pursuit, not attainment. Government is there to protect our rights, not provide them.

McKee explained that the Genesis of the Democrat understanding of “rights” date back to President Franklin D. Roosevelt in his 1944 State of the Union address.

“As our nation has grown in size and stature,” Roosevelt said, our “political rights proved inadequate to assure us equality in the pursuit of happiness.” He proposed a “Second Bill of Rights” that included the right to “a useful and remunerative job,” to “earn enough to provide adequate food and clothing and recreation,” to “a decent home,” to “a good education,” to “adequate protection from the economic fears of old age, sickness, accident, and unemployment,” and yes, to “adequate medical care.”

What a wonderful world it would be if all these things could be ours simply by declaring them to be rights. Unfortunately, somebody must pay for them.

McKee continued by explaining that Roosevelt’s idea of a “Second Bill of Rights” was never introduced in the U.S. Congress, but it was included in the United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights that was ratified in 1948.

This international wish list guarantees, among many other things, “the right to rest and leisure,” including “periodic holidays with pay” (Article 24); the right to “food, clothing, housing and medical care” (Article 25); and “the right to free elementary education” (Article 26).