Obama reaps victory as judges uphold health law

CINCINNATI — In the first rul­ing by a fed­eral appeals court on Pres­i­dent Barack Obama’s health care over­haul, a panel in Cincin­nati handed the admin­is­tra­tion a vic­tory Wednes­day by agree­ing that the gov­ern­ment can require a min­i­mum amount of insur­ance for Amer­i­cans. A Republican-appointed judge joined with a Demo­c­ra­tic appointee for the 2–1 major­ity in another mile­stone for Obama’s hotly debated sig­na­ture domes­tic ini­tia­tive — the first time a Repub­li­can fed­eral court appointee has affirmed the mer­its of the law.