ObamaCare, the Prequel.

• Author: Suderman, Peter
• Position: Follow-Up - Bill Clinton's Health Security Act and a single-payer medical system

Before ObamaCare, there was HillaryCare, the universal coverage overhaul proposed under Bill Clinton in 1993 and overseen by his wife, Hillary. Unlike President Barack Obama, our last Democratic president never managed to pass a health care law. Indeed, HillaryCare never even came to a floor vote in Congress. One reason the proposal failed was its sheer complexity: Republican critics famously created a chart showing the impenetrable maze of bureaucratic administration the law would require.

In the wake of the bill's failure, supporters looked for ways to streamline the system. As Rick Henderson wrote in "Canadian Club," an article in the January 1994 issue of reason, "The mind-numbing complexity of Bill Clinton's Health Security Act has revived interest in simpler alternatives." The most popular option? "A government-run, single-payer medical system," according to Henderson. Advocates for universal government insurance, he wrote, "maintain that such plans will cut bureaucracy, enhance choice, and preserve quality."

But on issues of cost, quality, choice, and simplicity, Henderson argued, those advocates were wrong. In a Canadian-style single-payer system, lines are longer, cost controls delay adoption of new technologies, and heart patients report lower satisfaction. As for the alleged simplicity of a federal single-payer system, Henderson argued that it was a myth. "It's ludicrous to assume that any government-run system, no matter how...