Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) on Monday said the Republican Congress should replace Obamacare with a system he said the United States enjoyed for years, even though it has slipped into disuse.

"We could try freedom for a while," Paul said on Fox News Monday night. "We had it for a long time. That's where you sell something and I agree to buy it because I like it. That's how we operate in most of the rest of the marketplace, other than healthcare."

Paul simple reply was in response to a question from Fox host Greta Van Susteren, who asked him "what would happen to the American people" if Obamacare went away.

"We could try freedom," he said. "I think it might work. It works everywhere else."

Paul predicted that the Republican House and Senate would pass another bill to fully repeal Obamacare and send it to President Barack Obama. Even if that bill were vetoed, as is widely expected, Paul said Congress would likely try to repeal smaller parts of the law.

House Republicans have already said they would call up two bills in the coming days that would repeal parts of Obamacare that the GOP says are bad for American workers.

Paul said a full or partial repeal of Obamacare wouldn't mean the government completely stops helping Americans cover their health care costs. But he said it would stop an expensive expansion of that government assistance, which he said would have ruinous effect on the nation's finances.

"What Obamacare did was take some of the things we did for the poor, and then they expanded government to basically the whole marketplace," Paul said. "That, I think, will ultimately bankrupt the country and then nobody will have good healthcare."