On health-care hearing's last day, court weighs severability, Medicaid expansion The Supreme Court ended an extraordinary three-day review of President Obama's health-care law Wednesday, seemingly deeply divided over whether such a sweeping overhaul exceeds the federal government's powers. During final oral arguments, the court considered whether the entire law should be junked if the individual mandate - the requirement that almost all Americans either buy health insurance or pay a penalty - is judged unconstitutional. And conservatives on the court seemed to take seriously the complaint from 26 states that the government's plan to expand Medicaid violates basic tenets of federalism. Supreme Court Justices and H. Bartow Farr discuss what will happen if the court removes the "heart" of the Affordable Care Act in a heated discussion at March 28th's Supreme Court hearings. Even among supporters, opinions vary widely about the practical impact of a decision to strike down the mandate but leave everything else intact. Take a look at potential outcomes. If the individual mandate is struck down, should the entire law go with it? Tell us what you think, then vote for the best arguments of your peers. The overall impression is that the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act activates the ideological differences that define the current Supreme Court, and the court's decision, expected to come just before its session ends in June, will be close. During their questioning on the third and final day of the court's historic review of Obama's landmark domestic initiative, the justices indicated some acceptance of the government's argument that at least two key insurance provisions would have to be scrapped if the individual mandate were found unconstitutional. But it was far from clear whether the court would opt to strike the entire law. Paul Clement, a former solicitor general representing the 26 states that are challenging the law, argued that if the individual mandate is declared unconstitutional, the rest of the health-care law must be rejected as well. Congress would never have adopted the law's other major structural reforms to the health-care system without the individual mandate, he told the justices. But the justices questioned that logic. Justice Antonin Scalia brought up one of the last-minute deal sweeteners that drafters of the law threw in to win the crucial vote of Sen. Ben Nelson (D.Neb.) - a concession dubbed "the Cornhusker Kickback." If the court were to declare the kickback unconstitutional due to a constitutional prescription against "venality," Scalia posited, to titters in the courtroom, would the justices really have to strike the entire law on the grounds that the law could not have made it through Congress without it? "That can't be right," he said. The questions came a day after Scalia and other conservative justices expressed deep skepticism about the constitutionality of the individual mandate as they grilled the government's top lawyer, Solicitor General Donald B. Verrilli Jr., on the provision. On Wednesday, the third and final day of oral arguments in a case that has drawn demonstrators from both sides of the issue, it was the challengers" lawyer who was put on the defensive . Clement repeatedly tried to make the case that key insurance regulations, which even the administration agrees would have to be struck along with the mandate, are central to the functioning of the law's other major features - including the state-run "exchanges," or marketplaces , that the law establishes so individuals without employer-sponsored insurance can buy plans with government subsidies. Unless such people can be guaranteed acceptance by plans on the exchanges regardless of their health status, the law will fail in its goal of expanding coverage to them, said Clement.