According to recent media reports, the US Supreme Court "has agreed to hear on Oct. 3 the case of Douglas v. Independent Living Center of Southern California, in which the question is whether patients and providers can challenge state cutbacks in Medicaid reimbursement rates".  The federal courts have a long history of facing difficult issues as to whether individuals or providers can challenge federal and/or state Medicaid statutes and/or regulations, since the Medicaid statutory scheme is founded upon a relationship between the federal government and the states.  As a matter of history, the courts tended to block suits by private citizens or other parties against government entities on the basis of sovereign immunity.  But, in 1966, enterprising legal aid attorneys succeeded in bringing and winning a "welfare" case, King v. Smith, before the US Supreme Court, by making the successful argument that a policy that denied individuals' constitutional rights could be considered and resolved by a court.  Since then, courts have given mixed signals about when such individual challenges would be allowed in Medicaid situations.