Veggie mandates? Justices ask how far gov't can go

CONNIE CASS Associated Press Published:






And so it went.

-- How about mandatory burial insurance, ventured conservative Justice Samuel Alito. "Everybody is going to be buried or cremated at some point. What's the difference?"

-- Chief Justice John Roberts wanted to know if people could be forced to buy cellphones for 911 calls.

-- Attorney Paul Clement, representing 26 states challenging the law, tried wheat. When Congress wants to help farmers, he said, it doesn't "just make everybody in America buy 10 loaves of bread."

But Roberts, seeming to tire of the parade of products, cut him off by saying that doesn't address the government's argument -- that everybody needs health care "and all they're regulating is how you pay for it."