Democratic Sen. Ted Kennedy ( left) and Republican Sen. Orrin Hatch teamed up on a sequence of landmark legislative well being care achievements, such because the Ryan White program on AIDS remedy, the People with Disabilities Act, and the primary main federal baby care legislation.
John Duricka/AP
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John Duricka/AP
Democratic Sen. Ted Kennedy ( left) and Republican Sen. Orrin Hatch teamed up on a sequence of landmark legislative well being care achievements, such because the Ryan White program on AIDS remedy, the People with Disabilities Act, and the primary main federal baby care legislation.
John Duricka/AP
With regards to well being coverage, former Utah Republican Sen. Orrin Hatch, who died Saturday at age 88, leaves a posh legacy of main legislative achievements, altering positions, compromises and fierce opposition. In some ways, although, Hatch’s evolution and management on well being coverage throughout his 4 a long time within the U.S. Senate mirror that of the Republican Celebration.
When he got here to Washington as a neophyte politician after an upset victory in 1976, Hatch was a conservative firebrand, one of many early leaders of the “New Proper” bent on dismantling the federal welfare state and banning abortion. A former trial lawyer, the brand new senator had by no means earlier than held public workplace.
However the election of Ronald Reagan in 1980 and the Republican takeover of the Senate that made Hatch chairman of the highly effective Labor and Human Assets Committee (now the Well being, Schooling, Labor and Pensions Committee) turned him into one thing of a pragmatist. That pragmatism, it ought to be famous, was considerably pressured: Despite the fact that Hatch was technically the chair, there have been sufficient average Republicans on the panel to provide the rating Democrat, Massachusetts’ Edward Kennedy, efficient management over what may very well be handed by the committee.
So Hatch discovered to compromise — and to legislate. In 1984, he negotiated with liberal Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., what continues to be known as the “Hatch-Waxman Act.” It is higher often known as the legislation that allowed, for the primary time, approval of generic copies of brand-name medication. Though removed from a panacea, it’s nonetheless the single-biggest advance within the struggle to rein in excessive drug costs.
When the Democrats took again the Senate after the 1986 elections, Kennedy turned chairman of the committee and Hatch, the rating Republican. The 2 teamed up on a sequence of landmark legislative achievements, from the Ryan White program on AIDS remedy and the People with Disabilities Act to the primary main federal baby care legislation. And whereas Hatch was a robust foe of nationwide medical health insurance, he and Kennedy finally pushed by means of Congress in 1997 the invoice to create the Kids’s Well being Insurance coverage Program, which offers low-cost medical health insurance for low-income households who do not qualify for Medicaid.
The stridently anti-abortion Hatch was outspoken about his help for federal funding for analysis on embryonic stem cells derived from aborted fetuses. “I feel it is the final word pro-life place, as a result of I consider being pro-life is not only caring for the unborn however caring for many who live,” he instructed NPR in 2007.
However like a lot of the Republican Celebration in Congress, Hatch returned to his conservative roots after the election of President Barack Obama in 2008. A supporter of the so-called particular person mandate requiring folks to have medical health insurance when it was the quasi-official GOP place within the early Nineteen Nineties, Hatch turned an outspoken foe. “Congress has by no means crossed the road between regulating what folks select to do and ordering them to do it,” he mentioned in 2010.
After average Utah Republican Sen. Robert Bennett was ousted in a main in 2010 and changed by conservative favourite Mike Lee, Hatch grew extra conservative to win reelection in 2012. His last time period within the Senate was marked by efforts to overturn the Reasonably priced Care Act and additional limit abortion entry. The religious Mormon, who in his spare time wrote lyrics for best-selling Christian music, even referred to as the ACA “the stupidest, dumb-a** invoice that I’ve ever seen. Now a few of you could have beloved it; when you do, you might be one of many stupidest dumb-a** folks I’ve ever met.” He later apologized for the assertion.
A former Kennedy aide, Jim Manley, instructed The Salt Lake Tribune that “nobody epitomizes the rightward lurch of the Republican Celebration greater than Sen. Hatch.”
In a single last twist, nevertheless, Hatch pushed as his successor the 2012 GOP presidential nominee, Mitt Romney. In simply his first few years, Romney has change into some of the average Republicans within the chamber. That will show to be Orrin Hatch’s last legacy.
KHN (Kaiser Well being Information) is a nationwide newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about well being points. It’s an editorially impartial working program of KFF (Kaiser Household Basis).
