As long as were tossing around the opinions of the founders to support our views on the constitutionality of the individual mandate, I’ll go ahead and add this:
The founding fathers, it turns out, passed several mandates of their own. In 1790, the very first Congress—which incidentally included 20 framers—passed a law that included a mandate: namely, a requirement that ship owners buy medical insurance for their seamen. This law was then signed by another framer: President George Washington. That’s right, the father of our country had no difficulty imposing a health insurance mandate.
…
Six years later, in 1798, Congress addressed the problem that the employer mandate to buy medical insurance for seamen covered drugs and physician services but not hospital stays. And you know what this Congress, with five framers serving in it, did? It enacted a federal law requiring the seamen to buy hospital insurance for themselves. That’s right, Congress enacted an individual mandate requiring the purchase of health insurance. And this act was signed by another founder, President John Adams.
Not only did most framers support these federal mandates to buy firearms and health insurance, but there is no evidence that any of the few framers who voted against these mandates ever objected on constitutional grounds. Presumably one would have done so if there was some unstated original understanding that such federal mandates were unconstitutional. Moreover, no one thought these past purchase mandates were problematic enough to challenge legally.
We can spend all day reading the Federalist papers trying to elucidate some understanding of what the founders thought about purchase mandates, but it seems far more effective to simply look at their record on the issue. And that record is clear. The founders saw no problem with the government mandating the purchase of things, indeed they themselves enacted such mandates, as they deemed necessary and proper in order for congress to achieve it’s goals.
(via The Dish)
520 Chestnut 
It is silly to presume that all framers thought alike. Also, the Constitution was not an agreement between members of Congress, it was an agreement between the States. What is important is what the States signed on to when they formed the Union. The framers were politicians, complete with liars, cheaters, and power-hungry zealots. I would not expect them to take every inch of power they could be afforded. During the Constitutional convention, though, the Congress had little power, all the power was in the several States, so they ones selling the idea of the Union would have to make a convinving sale, not taking too much power from the States.
In general, just because our framers passed a law and our President signed it, doesn’t mean it’s unconstitutional. Take for instance the “Sedition Act” which wrote into law in 1798 (signed by John Adams): (pardon my “…” it is long)
“If any person shal write, print, utter, or publish … any false, scandalous and malicious writing or writings against the government … with intent to defame the said government… or to excite against them … the hatred of the good people of the United States … then such person … shall be punished by a fine not exceeding two thousand dollars, and by imprisonment not exceeding two years.”
Was that Constitutional because the founders passed it and a founding President signed it? No.
So, yes, our framers arued and did not agree among themselves about the proper role of the federal government. They even passed unconstitutional laws, many of which never made it to the Supreme Court. In fact, no law of Congress was overturned until 1803 where judicial review was established. Until then it wasn’t even established that the Supreme Court could overturn a law from Congress.
Let’s ask the Court about health care…. the first court to establish judicial review… (Justice Marshall, Gibbons v. Odgen, 1824)
“… They form a portion of that immense mass of legislation which embraces everything within the territory of a State not surrendered to the General Government; all which can be most advantageously exercised by the States themselves. Inspection laws, quarantine laws, health laws of every description, as well as laws for regulating the internal commerce of a State, and those which respect turnpike roads, ferries, &c., are component parts of this mass.”
Quarantine laws and health laws of every description are within the territory of a State? That would be news to me.
If you want to get picky, laws pertaining to seamen are special because Congress has a seperate authority to regulate navigation. Congress would also not get its authority to compel people to purchase firearms from its power to regulate commerce. Nor would it get its authority to compel people into military service during a war from its Commerce power.
Correction: I meant to say “In general, just because our framers passed a law and our President signed it, doesn’t mean it’s constitutional.”