The Supreme Court upheld most of the Affordable Care Act, the Obama administration's health care reform law, on June 28, 2012. The decision could determine how hundreds of millions of Americans receive health care in the future. Here's a look at other landmark Supreme Court cases. 
Activists rally in February 2012 to urge the Supreme Court to overturn its decision that fundamentally changed campaign finance law by allowing corporations and unions to contribute unlimited funds to political action committees not affiliated with a candidate. 
Gregory Lee Johnson lights a flag on fire to protest the Reagan administration and some Dallas-based corporations. Johnson was convicted of desecrating a venerated object but the court overturned the verdict on First Amendment grounds. 
Wanda McCorvey, identified as "Jane Roe" sued the Dallas County, Texas, District Attorney Henry Wade over a law that made it a felony for her to have an abortion unless her life was in danger, citing her personal liberty. The court agreed with Roe and overruled any laws that made abortion illegal in the first trimester. 
Ernesto Miranda confessed to a crime without the police informing him of his right to an attorney or right against self-incrimination. His attorney argued in court that the confession should have been inadmissible because police did not properly inform him of that right. The court agreed and the "Miranda Rights" got their name. 
In 1961, Clarence Earl Gideon was convicted of burglary after he was denied the right to an attorney by a Florida court. Convinced that Constitution guaranteed him the right to an attorney, he wrote a note from his prison cell to the Supreme Court, which unanimously overturned the verdict. 
Dollree Mapp was arrested under an Ohio law for possession of obscene materials after police entered her home waving a piece of paper and calling it a warrant. The Court ruled that states could not violate the Fourth Amendment right to reasonable search and seizure, which rendered evidence gained that way inadmissible. 
Nathaniel Steward, 17, recites his lesson surrounded by white classmates at the Saint-Dominique School, in Washington, the first school in which the Supreme Court ruling banning school segregation was applied. 
Fred Korematsu, a Japanese-American man, was arrested after authorities found out he claimed to be a Mexican-American to avoid being imprisoned in an interment camp during World War II. The court ruled that the rights of individuals were not as important as the need to protect the country during wartime. 
Homer Plessy, who was of mixed descent, said because he was 7/8 white and 1/8 black, he should be alowed to ride the whites-only car on a segregated railway in Louisiana. The court upheld a 1890 state statute requiring railway cars provide separate but equal accomodations. 
The front page of 'Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper' reports the Dred Scott case, in which the court ruled that a slave could not gain his freedom by entering a state in which slavery was outlawed. The decision inflamed anti-slavery sentiment in the North. 
- Tax provisions in health care law are no surprise, author says
- GOP seizes on Supreme Court ruling to attack Obama for raising taxes
- In 2009, President Obama had denied the individual mandate was a tax
(CNN) -- Taxes took center stage in renewed Republican attacks on the Obama administration's sweeping health care legislation Thursday after the Supreme Court rebuffed attempts to derail it based on its constitutionality.
Using the court's finding that the centerpiece of the law -- the individual mandate -- amounted to a legal exercise of congressional tax power became Plan B for the GOP.
"That's not what the president said when he introduced the bill, but what the court said was that it's OK because it's a tax," U.S. Rep. Tom Price, R-Georgia, told CNN. "The debate that we're happy to have is that our friends on the other side of the aisle [not only] want to tax what you do, they want to tax even what you don't do."
Ruling, tax fears play into campaign narrative for both sides
And Florida Republican Sen. Marco Rubio said, "Millions of Americans may now have a IRS problem as a result of the ruling."
Republicans vow to repeal ObamaCare 
Romney's health care response 
Obama: This is a victory for the people But Lawrence Jacobs, a leading chronicler of the battle over health care, says that shouldn't be a surprise.
The requirement that all adults have health coverage is the linchpin of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, the health care legislation President Barack Obama signed in 2010 after an epic brawl in Congress. That rule survived its last legal challenge Thursday when the Supreme Court ruled it was constitutional under the legislative branch's power to impose taxes.
Obama had denied the mandate was a tax during a 2009 interview with ABC, comparing it to state requirements that motorists carry auto insurance.
"Nobody considers that a tax increase. People say to themselves, 'that is a fair way to make sure that if you hit my car, that I'm not covering all the costs.' "
What health reform could cost you
At least four million people are expected to pay a tax penalty when the rule takes full effect in 2016, bringing in about $54 billion to help offset the $1.7 trillion, 10-year cost of the act, according to the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office. But it's only one of several revenue-raising provisions that help pay for the costs of the act, commonly dubbed "Obamacare."
"This was the Democratic tax bill," said Jacobs, a University of Minnesota political scientist and co-author of a 2010 book on the health care battle.
In addition to the mandate, there is a higher Medicare tax rate on taxpayers making more than $200,000 a year or $250,000 for married couples, and it added a tax on investment income to fund the federal health program for seniors.
Opinion: Court's ruling a 'Frankenstein's Monster'
"It's one of those invisible things, and it's very important," Jacobs said.
There's also an excise tax on so-called "Cadillac" health plans, which had been hotly debated at the time; a higher threshold on medical deductions; and a 10% excise tax on indoor tanning services. But while Republicans have long opposed higher taxes, Jacobs said they concentrated their fire on the mandate instead.
"Rather than getting into a convoluted conversation about taxes that were pretty obscure to most people, they latched onto the individual mandate," he said. "Now that the Supreme Court has up held the mandate, it's really kind of taken the wind out of their sails."
Jacobs said most Americans will be covered by employee health plans, a head of household's employer or by existing government programs such as Medicare, Medicaid or veterans' benefits. Of the roughly 6% of the population remaining, a large portion of those will be exempted from the mandate either because of poverty, religious belief or other reasons, he said.
By the numbers: Health insurance
Supreme Court on health care law: How they voted, what they wrote
CNN's Matt Smith contributed to this report.
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