We have to stop Obamacare right here in South Carolina.

HB 3738, the bill titled “The Health Benefit Exchange Act” is the first step that states are mandated to take to implement Obamacare. This bill is scheduled to be heard TOMORROW by the Ways & Means committee.

South Carolina has joined with 27 other states in challenging the constitutionality of Obamacare and we are winning. HB 3738 is NOT a plan B, there cannot be a plan B when we have not exhausted plan A, we must stand firm. Our legislators have been deceived into thinking that we must have HB 3738 in place to avoid the federal government setting up the exchange for SC but this is NOT true, the guidelines for setting up an exchange are so arbitrary that if it is necessary we have years to do so, it does not need to be and should NOT be implemented now.

NOW we must continue our fight, we must educate our state representatives on the dangers of appearing double minded. Rumor has it that HB 3738 is planned to be added to the Ways and Means Committee agenda at the last minute and passed without discussion.

What can we do?

1. Call these state representatives:

Anderson County:
*   Rep. Dan Cooper*, chairman of Ways and Means – (803) 734-3144 or (864)260-4025
*   Rep. Brian White* – (803) 734-3113

Greenville County:
*   Rep. Dwight Loftis* – (803) 734-3101

Laurens County:
*   Rep. Mike Pitts* – (803) 734-2830

Aiken County:
*   Rep. Roland Smith *- (803) 734-3114

Lexington County:
*   Rep. Kenny Bingham* – (803) 734-3138
*Rep. Mac Toole* – (803) 734-2973
*Rep. Chip Huggins* – (803) 734-2971

2. Email. www.scstatehouse.gov click the link to email your representative

3. Visit your state legislator in Columbia TOMORROW at noon. The committee meeting is scheduled to take place an hour and a half after session adjourns, we estimate this to be around 1:30PM. Help with transportation, carpooling opportunities, and/or gas money is available for those willing to volunteer their time.

4. Reach out to at least two other people to call or email these representatives as well.

5. Read about the potential detrimental effects of HB 3738: www.cato.org

In a legal blow to the Obama administration, a U.S. District Court Judge ruled that a key provision of the recently-enacted health care law requiring individuals to have health insurance is unconstitutional.

U.S. District Court Judge Henry Hudson wrote in his opinion that the legal provision mandating health coverage, specifically known as Sec. 1501, “exceeds the constitutional boundaries of Congressional power” and should be stripped from the law.

The ruling is most certainly expected to be appealed to the Supreme Court, and many legal experts had expected the high court will eventually rule on the overall constitutionality of the Patient Protection and Affordability Act.

The ruling originates from a legal challenge filed by Republican Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli. Virginia currently has a law on its books that says patients are not required to own health insurance and therefore was in violation of the recently-passed healthcare law. Virginia decided to pursue a separate legal challenge to the law from the joint lawsuit filed by 20 Republican state attorneys general.

In the Virginia case, the Obama Administration argued that it was well within its constitutional boundaries to enact an individual mandate for health insurance, citing the Commerce Clause in the U.S. Constitution and two other cases that have ruled in favor of the White House.

Hudson, who was appointed by President George W. Bush in 2002, said he found flaws in the White House’s argument saying that “at its core, this dispute is not simply about regulating the business of insurance – or crafting a scheme of universal health insurance coverage – it’s about an individual right to choose to participate.”

The legal argument against the health care law revolves partially around the question of what is an interstate economic activity. Typically activities like farming wheat or buying electricity over interstate lines were considered well within the broad constitutional grounds of the Commerce Clause.

But Virginia argued that the action of not buying – therefore not participating – in the economic activity of health insurance could not be something Congress could regulate, tax or penalize . Meanwhile the White House argued that the accumulative effect of people not purchasing health insurance would in effect qualify as an activity covered by the Constitution’s Commerce Clause.

Hudson did not rule if the entire health-care law was invalid, saying that the Court requires more expert testimony and facts to rule on that question. Instead, Hudson carved Sec. 1501 out of the health-care law and is leaving the higher courts to rule on the broader law down the road.

The Court also did not issue a freeze on the broader provisions of the law, ruling against Virginia in this case, meaning that U.S. consumers will be largely unaffected until higher courts rule on the law.

In a statement, the Justice Department said it was “disappointed” with Judge Hudson’s ruling and said “there is clear and well-established legal precedent that Congress acted within its constitutional authority in passing this law and we are confident that we will ultimately prevail.”

Hudson’s ruling was not the first U.S. District Court to rule on the constitutional grounds of the Patient Protection and Affordability Act. Two Courts – the Western District of Virginia and the Eastern District of Michigan – have ruled that all provisions of the health care law were constitutional.

In a victory for the White House, Judge Hudson also determined only the mandate is unconstitutional, meaning the administration may move forward implementing the rest of the law.

The administration argues that the mandate, which requires most Americans without health insurance to pay $695 or 2.5% of their income, whichever is higher, was a tax. During the debate to pass the law, supporters argued the mandate did not amount to a tax, and instead was a penalty. Congress has greater authority to tax and Judge Hudson said the mandate “cannot be converted into a tax by the simple expedient of calling it such.”

“This is a good example of the leaps of logic the federal government needed to prevail,” said Cuccinelli of the administration’s tax argument. “And today, they did not prevail.”

The Obama Administration is expected to appeal this decision to the Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals. Judicial analysts say that ruling will be the last stop before the U.S. Supreme ultimately settles this issue.

In a separate case, the administration and its opponents are waiting for a second significant U.S. District Court challenge; this one involving 20 states in a Florida federal court.

When asked about the potential impact on health care reform in a particular region if one District Court ruled against the law and the other District Court has not, the administration officials said the ruling should not expand beyond the area that court oversees.

The officials also said the earliest Court of Appeals decision would be sometime in the second half of next year, and that the Supreme Court will likely be asked to hear one of the cases after that. They said the legal challenges would be resolved by 2014, when much of the law will be implemented.

Meanwhile, lawmakers continue to push for changes to the law. Senator Ben Nelson (D-NE) is preparing a bill to overhaul the individual mandate.

One idea gaining traction would replace the individual mandate with a voluntary system featuring an open enrollment season. Americans could opt not to have health insurance. If they later decided they wanted insurance outside of the enrollment window, they could pay a steep penalty to obtain coverage, said two sources.

Changes to the individual mandate would meet opposition from both parties. Democrats are reluctant to overhaul a significant piece of the law’s foundation. For Republicans, removing the law’s mandate may weaken the constitutional challenges to it, a source said.

House Republicans plan on voting to fully repeal the health care law early next year. Even if it passes, the bill would be largely symbolic as it would never pass the Senate and, even if it did, the president would certainly veto it.

Shares of some major health insurance companies such as Aetna (NYSE:AET), WellPoint (NYSE:WLP) and United Health Group (NYSE:UNH) rose modestly on the ruling.

When I saw that Kathleen Parker’s March 24 op-ed, “Stupak’s original sin,” defined me as a “backstabber,” it reminded me of a Bible verse. Matthew 7:3 asks, “Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye?”

The true motives of many blogs and organizations claiming to be pro-life have become clear in recent days: to politicize life issues as a means to defeat health care reform. One group even sent an e-mail to supporters saying they are “working feverishly to stop this legislation from going forward.”

The pro-life groups rallied behind me — many without my knowledge or consent — not necessarily because they shared my goals of ensuring protections for life and passing health-care reform but because they viewed me as their best chance to kill health-care legislation.

Last November, an amendment I introduced succeeded in making sure the House health-care-reform bill contained the current law prohibiting public funding for abortions. I was disappointed that the Senate could not pass my language and only mustered 45 pro-life votes, far short of the 60 votes needed to keep the amendment intact.

Many of my Democratic pro-life colleagues and I worked tirelessly in the days leading up to the final House vote on health-care reform to strengthen the legislation’s restrictions on abortion funding. We proposed numerous procedural and legislative options, but ultimately all of our efforts required the 60 votes we could not obtain in the Senate.

Once it was clear that the House leadership would eventually obtain the 216 votes necessary to pass health-care reform, I was left with a choice: Vote against the bill and watch it become law with no further protections for life or reach an agreement that prevents federal funding for abortions.

Therefore, I and other pro-life Democrats struck an agreement with President Obama to issue an executive order that would ensure all Hyde Amendment protections would apply to the health-care reform bill. No, an executive order is not as strong as the statutory language we fought for at the start. We received, however, an “ironclad” commitment from the president that no taxpayer dollars will be used to pay for abortions.

Throughout history, executive orders have carried the full force and effect of law and have served as an important means of implementing public policy. Perhaps the most famous executive order was the Emancipation Proclamation signed by President Abraham Lincoln in 1863. More recently, in 2007, President George W. Bush signed Executive Order 13435, restricting embryonic stem-cell research. This executive order protected the sanctity of life and was “applauded” and “welcomed” by pro-life advocates. That these same people would now claim that President Obama’s executive order maintaining the sanctity of life is not worth the paper it is written on is disingenuous at best.

Some, including Parker, have criticized Obama’s executive order as unenforceable in the courts and therefore just a “fig leaf.” Yet the language that critics point to is standard language with any executive order, including Bush’s ban on embryonic stem-cell research. Again, many of these pro-life groups did not express concern over the Bush language but claim it is unacceptable under Obama.

To further protect against federal funding for abortion, during floor debate on the health-care reform bill I engaged in a colloquy with Rep. Henry Waxman to make clear congressional intent that the provisions in the bill, combined with the executive order, will ensure that outcome. Such colloquies are often referred to in court cases when an attempt is being made to determine Congress’s intent. This, too, was no minor concession by those opposed to our efforts, and it is a tremendous victory for those protecting the sanctity of life.

I have said from the start that my goal was to see health-care reform pass while maintaining the long-standing principle of the sanctity of life. The president’s executive order upholds this principle and current law that no federal funds be used for abortion. I and other pro-life Democrats are pleased that we were able to hold true to our principles and vote for a bill that is pro-life at every stage of life and that provides 32 million Americans with access to high-quality, affordable health care.

President Barack Obama came into office promising hope and change. But he might get more change than he hoped for. By foisting ObamaCare on a deeply unwilling country he might have set the stage for the largest civil disobedience movement since the civil rights era, which, if it plays its cards right, could undo his legislation and his legacy.

President Obama is betting that come November the bruising, yearlong battle that he has just dragged the country through will be a distant memory. But that profoundly underestimates the dismay of a large segment of the public that sees what he signed Tuesday as a fraudulent piece of legislation based on fraudulent thinking backed by fraudulent facts enacted through a fraudulent process. (Yes, Americans do care about “process,” Mr. President. It’s another name for representative government.)

President Obama tried for a year to convince the country that the cure for rising health care costs and the swelling ranks of the uninsured was a de facto government takeover of the health care system–only to be rebuffed in poll after poll. And if there was any doubt as to where the public stood, it was put to rest by Republican Scott Brown’s stunning December victory in Massachusetts, the land of Big Government.

But instead of backing down President Obama went for broke using tactics more reprehensible than the “business as usual politics” that he had pledged to change when he came to office.

First, there were the budgetary magic tricks that he and his Congressional enablers got the highly respected Congressional Budget Office to perform. The last CBO assessment–that pushed the bill through–showed that the Obama plan would reduce the federal deficit by $138 billion over 10 years. The reality, once all the double counting and fantasy savings are eliminated, is that it will add $562 billion.

But the CBO is not the only entity whose honor Democrats have violated–perhaps beyond repair. Federal taxpayers will also get hurt royally when they have to pay for all the sweetheart deals that Obama’s Cogressional minions cut behind closed doors and whose true scope will only become apparent in the coming months. (Bart Stupak is rumored to have gotten $700,000 for airport repairs as his sell-out price.)

Worst of all were the shameless parliamentary tactics that Democrats deployed. The Founders deliberately constructed many roadblocks for new laws to prevent elected officials from straying too far from the will of the people. But Democrats could care less about parliamentary niceties.

They are poised to use the so-called nuclear option or “reconciliation” to square the House and the Senate bills. This option will allow the Senate to circumvent the normal committee process to make fixes to the House bill through a simple majority without risking a filibuster. But reconciliation is meant exclusively for budgetary matters–not ramrodding sweeping social legislation on a party-line vote. This is why the Senate parliamentarian–a completely nonpartisan figure–has to approve its use for every fix. But Democrats are poised to have Vice President Joe Biden overrule him should he dare to stand in their way. In short, instead of bending the cost curve, President Obama is bending the rules of accountable government.

It is hardly surprising then that Americans are feeling a growing panic as they watch their constitutional republic descend into a banana republic. President Obama is fond of quoting Mahatma Gandhi’s line that “we should be the change we want to see.” But Gandhi also said that “civil disobedience becomes a sacred duty when the state has become lawless and corrupt.” Americans instinctively understand this which is why pockets of resistance to ObamaCare are already emerging. The question is only whether they can be constructively harnessed into a grassroots, Gandhi-style civil disobedience movement powerful enough to undo this monstrosity.

The prerequisites for any movement’s success are credible leaders and a moral high ground. The first means that opponents of ObamaCare cannot–cannot–let Mitt Romney come within sniffing distance of their cause. He is trying to position himself at the forefront of the Repeal ObamaCare movement to further his presidential ambitions. But he couldn’t be a worse spokesman given that as governor he was responsible for implementing a universal coverage program in the Bay State that is identical in every essential respect to ObamaCare, including the individual mandate. He has to be banished from every anti-ObamaCare panel, podium and platform lest the movement be accused of partisanship and hypocrisy.

As for maintaining the moral high ground, ObamaCare opponents have to be very careful when invoking rhetoric from the revolutionary period. Tea Partiers quote the Founders, especially Thomas Jefferson who said that the “tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of tyrants.” But any hint of violence–even inadvertent–will compromise their cause because there are crucial differences between our colonial and current rulers. The colonial rulers were monarchs who used violence to extract taxes from Americans to enrich themselves and their motherland. But Democrats are imposing mandates to force Americans to do something for their own alleged good–and taxes to redistribute wealth among Americans. This is wrong and completely at odds with the spirit of American freedom and self-reliance. But the Repeal ObamaCare movement can only succeed if it convinces potential beneficiaries of redistributionist policies of the rightness of its cause.

This can’t be done by threatening a civil war–even metaphorically–against them. Gandhi’s ahimsa–or nonviolent resistance that seeks to change minds by a firm and calm expression of one’s own conscience –is a far better strategy.

To this end, the perpetrators of ObamaCare must be defeated in November and 2012. But right now it is entirely appropriate for Senate Republicans to stall the reconciliation process as much as possible. They are right in calling every point of order that they can–if only to call attention to the bill’s manifest corruption. Likewise, the 30-plus states that are issuing sovereignty resolutions and exploring ballot initiatives that would protect their residents from Uncle Sam’s coverage diktat are on the right track. Even if these efforts are ultimately thrown out in court because federal law trumps state law, they will make a powerful statement against the coercive nature of ObamaCare.

But the lawsuits that have a shot at sticking in court are the ones that various attorney generals around the country are preparing under the Constitution’s commerce clause. This clause gives the federal government expansive powers to regulate interstate commercial activity. But it has never before been invoked to force Americans to purchase a product as a condition of lawful residence in this country. This crosses a line that might well make five Supreme Court justices balk.

Any strategy of nonviolent civil resistance has to first make a good faith effort to achieve its end through the available political and legal means. But there comes a time when changing the law requires acts of conscience.

For opponents of ObamaCare that time is Dec. 31, 2013. That’s when the individual mandate will go into effect. If ObamaCare hasn’t been repealed by Congress or nullified in court by then, its opponents would be justified in urging Americans to refuse to buy coverage or pay fines and dare authorities to come after them.

By some estimates, Uncle Sam will need to hire an additional 17,000 IRS agents or so just to enforce the coverage mandate. But even if a few million Americans simultaneously refuse to abide by it, they could easily overwhelm the system. Self-rule or swaraj, Gandhi said, requires a collective understanding of the immense capacity of citizens to “regulate and control” the coercive apparatus of the state through mass nonviolent resistance.

President Obama and his fellow Democrats are counting on this resistance petering out. That could happen. But it will be a lot easier for opponents to maintain this zeal in the age of social networking. Facebook already has numerous groups with millions of members demanding the repeal of ObamaCare. It won’t be impossible to mobilize enough of them when the denouement arrives.

After all, this issue is not just about the fate of an industry. It is about maintaining control over basic decisions about one’s own life and health. The stakes are too high to let ObamaCare stand.

Shikha Dalmia is a senior analyst at Reason Foundation and a biweekly Forbes columnist.