The Supreme Court handed President Obama a major political victory on his signature health-care issue Thursday, but the justices also provided Republicans with a sharper campaign issue by defining the laws individual mandate as a tax.
The ruling allows Mr. Obama to engage in a four-month-long victory lap as he campaigns for reelection. And it validates the presidents decision to devote so much time and energy to passing the law in 2009 while the economy was in free fall, a divisive vote that contributed to Democrats losing the House in 2010.