Reasons for Reason-Giving: The Obamacare Debates

The demanding and giving of reasons for their actions are core business for public policy makers in a democracy. But there are many different reasons for asking why questions, and correspondingly many different responses that might count as adequate answers. Seven different reasons for reason-giving are here distinguished and categorized along two dimensions: political moralism versus political realism, and high versus low politics. All of those were in play in the enactment and adjudication of the Affordable Care Act. The attempts at repealing it were characterized by low-politics and political-realist modes of reason-giving more exclusively.