Commerce Clause

=<div>mta analysis below</div><div>
</div><div>also </div><div><a href="https://assets.nationbuilder.com/movetoamend/pages/752/attachments/original/1585135382/Corporate_Hijacking_of_the_Contracts_Clause.pdf?1585135382">
</a></div><div><a href="https://assets.nationbuilder.com/movetoamend/pages/752/attachments/original/1585135382/Corporate_Hijacking_of_the_Contracts_Clause.pdf?1585135382">https://assets.nationbuilder.com/movetoamend/pages/752/attachments/original/1585135382/Corporate_Hijacking_of_theContracts_Clause.pdf?1585135382</a></div><div>=
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</div><div><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause</a></div><div>
</div><div> Commerce Clause describes an <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enumerated_power" class="mw-redirect" title="Enumerated power" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">enumerated power</a> listed in the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Constitution" class="mw-redirect" title="United States Constitution" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">United States Constitution</a> (<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_One_of_the_United_States_Constitution#Section_8:Powers_of_Congress" title="Article One of the United States Constitution" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Article I, Section 8, Clause 3</a>). The clause states that the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Congress" title="United States Congress" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">United States Congress</a> shall have power "to regulate <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce" title="Commerce" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Commerce</a> with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes". Courts and commentators have tended to discuss each of these three areas of commerce as a separate power granted to Congress.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-1" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[1]</a> It is common to see the individual components of the Commerce Clause referred to under specific terms: the Foreign Commerce Clause, the Interstate Commerce Clause,<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-2" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[2]</a> and the Indian Commerce Clause.Dispute exists within the courts as to the range of powers granted to Congress by the Commerce Clause. As noted below, it is often paired with the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Necessary_and_Proper_Clause" title="Necessary and Proper Clause" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Necessary and Proper Clause</a>, and the combination used to take a more broad, expansive perspective of these powers. However, the effect of the Commerce Clause has varied significantly depending on the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S.Supreme_Court" class="mw-redirect" title="U.S. Supreme Court" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">U.S. Supreme Court</a>'s interpretation.[<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Citation_needed" title="Wikipedia:Citation needed" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">citation needed</a>]During the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marshall_Court" title="Marshall Court" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Marshall Court</a> era (1801–1835), interpretation of the Commerce Clause gave Congress jurisdiction over numerous aspects of intrastate and interstate commerce as well as activity that had traditionally been regarded not to be commerce. Starting in 1937, following the end of the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lochner_era" title="Lochner era" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Lochner era</a>, the use of the Commerce Clause by Congress to authorize federal control of economic matters became effectively unlimited. Since <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v.Lopez" title="United States v. Lopez" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">United States v. Lopez</a> (1995), congressional use of the Commerce Clause has become slightly restricted again to be limited to matters of trade or any other form of restricted area (whether interstate or not) and production (whether commercial or not).[<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Citation_needed" title="Wikipedia:Citation needed" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">citation needed</a>]The Commerce Clause is the source of federal <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drug_prohibition_in_the_United_States" class="mw-redirect" title="Drug prohibition in the United States" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">drug prohibition</a> laws under the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Controlled_Substances_Act" title="Controlled Substances Act" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Controlled Substances Act</a>. In a 2005 medical marijuana case, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gonzales_v.Raich" title="Gonzales v. Raich" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Gonzales v. Raich</a>, the U.S. Supreme Court rejected the argument that the ban on growing medical marijuana for personal use exceeded the powers of Congress under the Commerce Clause. Even if no goods were sold or transported across state lines, the Court found that there could be an indirect effect on interstate commerce and relied heavily on a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Deal" title="New Deal" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">New Deal</a> case, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wickard_v.Filburn" title="Wickard v. Filburn" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Wickard v. Filburn</a>, which held that the government may regulate personal cultivation and consumption of crops because the aggregate effect of individual consumption could have an indirect effect on interstate commerce.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-3" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[3]</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-4" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[4]</a><div id="toc" class="toc" role="navigation" aria-labelledby="mw-toc-heading" style="border: 1px solid rgb(162, 169, 177); background-color: rgb(248, 249, 250); padding: 7px; display: table;"><input type="checkbox" role="button" id="toctogglecheckbox" class="toctogglecheckbox" style="margin: 0px; position: absolute; opacity: 0; z-index: -1; display: none;" /><div class="toctitle" lang="en" dir="ltr" style="text-align: center; direction: ltr;">
</div><ul style="list-style: none; margin: 0.3em 0px; padding: 0px;"><li class="toclevel-1 tocsection-1" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#Text_and_pairing" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">1Text and pairing</a><ul style="list-style: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 2em; padding: 0px;"><li class="toclevel-2 tocsection-2" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#Significance_in_federal_rights_in_navigable_waters" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">1.1Significance in federal rights in navigable waters</a></li><li class="toclevel-2 tocsection-3" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#Early_years(1800s%E2%80%931830s)" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">1.2Early years (1800s–1830s)</a></li><li class="toclevel-2 tocsection-4" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#Dormant_Commerce_Clause_jurisprudence" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">1.3Dormant Commerce Clause jurisprudence</a></li><li class="toclevel-2 tocsection-5" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#New_Deal" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">1.4New Deal</a></li><li class="toclevel-2 tocsection-6" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#Civil_rights" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">1.5Civil rights</a></li></ul></li><li class="toclevel-1 tocsection-7" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#United_States_v.Lopez" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">2United States v. Lopez</a><ul style="list-style: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 2em; padding: 0px;"><li class="toclevel-2 tocsection-8" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#Change_in_jurisprudence" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">2.1Change in jurisprudence</a></li><li class="toclevel-2 tocsection-9" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#Application_of_the_Lopez_rule" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">2.2Application of the Lopez rule</a><ul style="list-style: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 2em; padding: 0px;"><li class="toclevel-3 tocsection-10" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#Channels_of_Commerce_and_the_Instrumentalities_of_Interstate_Commerce" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">2.2.1Channels of Commerce and the Instrumentalities of Interstate Commerce</a></li><li class="toclevel-3 tocsection-11" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#Substantial_Impact_on_Interstate_Commerce" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">2.2.2Substantial Impact on Interstate Commerce</a></li></ul></li></ul></li><li class="toclevel-1 tocsection-12" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#Other_Rehnquist_Court_decisions" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">3Other Rehnquist Court decisions</a><ul style="list-style: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 2em; padding: 0px;"><li class="toclevel-2 tocsection-13" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#United_States_v.Morrison" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">3.1United States v. Morrison</a></li><li class="toclevel-2 tocsection-14" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#New_Federalism_and_Gonzales_v.Raich" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">3.2New Federalism and Gonzales v. Raich</a></li><li class="toclevel-2 tocsection-15" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#Indian_affairs" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">3.3Indian affairs</a></li></ul></li><li class="toclevel-1 tocsection-16" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#Themes" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">4Themes</a><ul style="list-style: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 2em; padding: 0px;"><li class="toclevel-2 tocsection-17" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#Rational_basis_review" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">4.1Rational basis review</a></li><li class="toclevel-2 tocsection-18" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#Role_of_the_political_process" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">4.2Role of the political process</a></li><li class="toclevel-2 tocsection-19" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#Debate_over_applicability_to_Patient_Protection_and_Affordable_Care_Act" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">4.3Debate over applicability to Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act</a></li></ul></li><li class="toclevel-1 tocsection-20" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#See_also" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">5See also</a></li><li class="toclevel-1 tocsection-21" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#References" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">6References</a></li><li class="toclevel-1 tocsection-22" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#Further_reading" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">7Further reading</a></li><li class="toclevel-1 tocsection-23" style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#External_links" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">8External links</a></li></ul></div><h2 style="margin: 1em 0px 0.25em; padding: 0px; overflow: hidden; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(162, 169, 177); font-weight: normal; line-height: 1.3; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Text and pairing[<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Commerce_Clause&action=edit&section=1" title="Edit section: Text and pairing" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none; white-space: nowrap;">edit</a>]</h2>Article I, Section 8, Clause 3:<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-5" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[5]</a><blockquote class="templatequote" style="overflow: hidden; margin: 1em 0px; padding: 0px 40px; border-left: none; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">[The Congress shall have Power] To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes;</blockquote>The significance of the Commerce Clause is described in the Supreme Court's opinion in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gonzales_v.Raich" title="Gonzales v. Raich" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Gonzales v. Raich</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_Supreme_Court_cases,volume_545" title="List of United States Supreme Court cases, volume 545" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">545</a> <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Reports" title="United States Reports" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">U.S.</a> <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/545/1/" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: url(" w="w" skins="skins" vector="Vector" resources="resources" common="common" images="images" link-external-small-ltr-progressive.svg="link-external-small-ltr-progressive.svg" cd31="cd31" right="right" center="center" em="em" no-repeat="no-repeat" padding-right="padding-right">1</a> (2005):<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-6" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[6]</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-7" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[7]</a><blockquote class="templatequote" style="overflow: hidden; margin: 1em 0px; padding: 0px 40px; border-left: none; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">The Commerce Clause emerged as the Framers' response to the central problem giving rise to the Constitution itself: the absence of any federal commerce power under the Articles of Confederation. For the first century of our history, the primary use of the Clause was to preclude the kind of discriminatory state legislation that had once been permissible. Then, in response to rapid industrial development and an increasingly interdependent national economy, Congress "ushered in a new era of federal regulation under the commerce power," beginning with the enactment of the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interstate_Commerce_Commission" title="Interstate Commerce Commission" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Interstate Commerce Act</a> in 1887 and the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sherman_Antitrust_Act" title="Sherman Antitrust Act" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Sherman Antitrust Act</a> in 1890.</blockquote>The Commerce Clause represents one of the most fundamental powers delegated to the Congress by the founders. The outer limits of the Interstate Commerce Clause power have been the subject of long, intense political controversy. Interpretation of the sixteen words of the Commerce Clause has helped define the balance of power between the federal government and the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S.state" title="U.S. state" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">states</a> and the balance of power between the two elected branches of the federal government and the Judiciary. As such, it directly affects the lives of American citizens.<h3 style="margin: 0.3em 0px 0px; padding-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 1.6; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Significance in federal rights in navigable waters[<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Commerce_Clause&action=edit&section=2" title="Edit section: Significance in federal rights in navigable waters" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none; white-space: nowrap;">edit</a>]</h3>The commerce clause provides comprehensive powers to the United States over navigable waters. The powers are critical to understand the rights of landowners adjoining or exercising what would otherwise be <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Riparian_water_rights" title="Riparian water rights" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">riparian rights</a> under the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_law" title="Common law" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">common law</a>. The Commerce Clause confers a unique position upon the federal government in connection with navigable waters: "The power to regulate commerce comprehends the control for that purpose, and to the extent necessary, of all the navigable waters of the United States.... For this purpose they are the public property of the nation, and subject to all the requisite legislation by Congress." United States v. Rands, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_Supreme_Court_cases,volume_389" title="List of United States Supreme Court cases, volume 389" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">389</a> <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Reports" title="United States Reports" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">U.S.</a> <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/389/121/" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: url(" w="w" skins="skins" vector="Vector" resources="resources" common="common" images="images" link-external-small-ltr-progressive.svg="link-external-small-ltr-progressive.svg" cd31="cd31" right="right" center="center" em="em" no-repeat="no-repeat" padding-right="padding-right">121</a> (1967). The Rands decision continues:<blockquote style="overflow: hidden; margin: 1em 0px; padding: 8px 32px; border-left: none; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">This power to regulate navigation confers upon the United States a <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Navigable_servitude" title="Navigable servitude" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">dominant servitude</a>, FPC v. Niagara Mohawk Power Corp., 347 U.S. 239, 249 (1954), which extends to the entire stream and the stream bed below ordinary high-water mark. The proper exercise of this power is not an invasion of any private property rights in the stream or the lands underlying it, for the damage sustained does not result from taking property from riparian owners within the meaning of the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fifth_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution" title="Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Fifth Amendment</a> but from the lawful exercise of a power to which the interests of riparian owners have always been subject. United States v. Chicago, M., St. P. & P. R. Co., 312 U.S. 592, 596–597 (1941); Gibson v. United States, 166 U.S. 269, 275–276 (1897). Thus, without being constitutionally obligated to pay compensation, the United States may change the course of a navigable stream, South Carolina v. Georgia, 93 U.S. 4 (1876), or otherwise impair or destroy a riparian owner's access to navigable waters, Gibson v. United States, 166 U.S. 269 (1897); Scranton v. Wheeler, 179 U.S. 141 (1900); United States v. Commodore Park, Inc., 324 U.S. 386 (1945), even though the market value of the riparian owner's land is substantially diminished.</blockquote>Other scholars, such as <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_H.Bork" class="mw-redirect" title="Robert H. Bork" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Robert H. Bork</a> and Daniel E. Troy, argue that prior to 1887, the Commerce Clause was rarely invoked by Congress and so a broad interpretation of the word "commerce" was clearly never intended by the Founding Fathers. In support of that claim, they argue that the word "commerce," as used in the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philadelphia_Convention" class="mw-redirect" title="Philadelphia Convention" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Constitutional Convention</a> and the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federalist_Papers" class="mw-redirect" title="Federalist Papers" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Federalist Papers</a>, can be substituted with either "trade" or "exchange" interchangeably and still preserve the meaning of those statements. They also point to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Madison" title="James Madison" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">James Madison</a>'s statement in an 1828 letter that the "Constitution vests in Congress expressly... 'the power to regulate trade'."<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-8" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[8]</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-9" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[9]</a>Examining contemporaneous dictionaries does not neatly resolve the matter. For instance, the 1792 edition of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_Johnson" title="Samuel Johnson" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Samuel Johnson</a>'s <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Dictionary_of_the_English_Language" title="A Dictionary of the English Language" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">A Dictionary of the English Language</a> defines the noun "commerce" narrowly as "[e]xchange of one thing for another; interchange of any thing; trade; traffick," but it defines the corresponding verb "to commerce" more broadly as "[t]o hold intercourse."<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-10" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[10]</a> The word "intercourse" also had a different and wider meaning back in 1792, compared to today.<h3 style="margin: 0.3em 0px 0px; padding-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 1.6; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Early years (1800s–1830s)[<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Commerce_Clause&action=edit&section=3" title="Edit section: Early years (1800s–1830s)" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none; white-space: nowrap;">edit</a>]</h3>Chief Justice <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Marshall" title="John Marshall" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">John Marshall</a> ruled in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gibbons_v.Ogden" title="Gibbons v. Ogden" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Gibbons v. Ogden</a> (1824) that the power to regulate interstate commerce also included the power to regulate interstate navigation: "Commerce, undoubtedly is traffic, but it is something more—it is intercourse.... [A] power to regulate navigation is as expressly granted, as if that term had been added to the word 'commerce'.... [T]he power of Congress does not stop at the jurisdictional lines of the several <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S.state" title="U.S. state" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">states</a>. It would be a very useless power if it could not pass those lines." The Court's decision contains language supporting one important line of Commerce Clause jurisprudence, the idea that the electoral process of representative government represents the primary limitation on the exercise of the Commerce Clause powers:<blockquote style="overflow: hidden; margin: 1em 0px; padding: 8px 32px; border-left: none; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">The wisdom and the discretion of Congress, their identity with the people, and the influence which their constituents possess at elections, are, in this, as in many other instances, as that, for example, of declaring war, the sole restraints on which they have relied, to secure them from its abuse. They are the restraints on which the people must often rely solely, in all representative governments....</blockquote>In Gibbons, the Court struck down <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_State" class="mw-redirect" title="New York State" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">New York State</a>'s attempt to grant a steamboat monopoly to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Fulton" title="Robert Fulton" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Robert Fulton</a>, which he had then ultimately franchised to Ogden, who claimed river traffic was not "commerce" under the Commerce Clause and that Congress could not interfere with New York State's grant of an exclusive monopoly within its own borders. Ogden's assertion was untenable: he contended that New York could control river traffic within New York all the way to the border with <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Jersey" title="New Jersey" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">New Jersey</a> and that New Jersey could control river traffic within New Jersey all the way to the border with New York, leaving Congress with the power to control the traffic as it crossed the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S.state" title="U.S. state" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">state</a> line.Thus, Ogden contended, Congress could not invalidate his monopoly if transported passengers only within New York. The Supreme Court, however, found that Congress could invalidate his monopoly since it was operational on an interstate channel of navigation.In its decision, the Court assumed interstate commerce required movement of the subject of regulation across state borders. The decision contains the following principles, some of which have since been altered by subsequent decisions:<ul style="list-style-image: url(" w="w" skins="skins" vector="Vector" resources="resources" common="common" images="images" bullet-icon.svg="bullet-icon.svg" d4515="d4515" margin="margin" em="em" px="px" padding="padding" background-color="background-color" rgb="rgb"><li style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Commerce is "intercourse, all its branches, and is regulated by prescribing rules for carrying on that intercourse."</li><li style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Commerce among the states cannot stop at the external boundary of each state, but may be introduced into the interior.</li><li style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Congress can regulate, that is "to prescribe the rule by which commerce is to be governed" that "may be exercised to its utmost extent, and acknowledges no limitations other than are prescribed in the Constitution."</li></ul>Additionally, the Marshall Court limited the extent of federal maritime and admiralty jurisdiction to tidewaters in The Steamboat Thomas Jefferson.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-11" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[11]</a>In <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cherokee_Nation_v.Georgia" title="Cherokee Nation v. Georgia" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Cherokee Nation v. Georgia</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_Supreme_Court_cases,volume_30" title="List of United States Supreme Court cases, volume 30" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">30</a> <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Reports" title="United States Reports" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">U.S.</a> <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/30/1/" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: url(" w="w" skins="skins" vector="Vector" resources="resources" common="common" images="images" link-external-small-ltr-progressive.svg="link-external-small-ltr-progressive.svg" cd31="cd31" right="right" center="center" em="em" no-repeat="no-repeat" padding-right="padding-right">1</a> (1831), the Supreme Court addressed whether the Cherokee nation is a foreign state in the sense in which that term is used in the U.S. constitution. The Court provided a definition of Indian tribe that clearly made the rights of tribes far inferior to those of foreign states:<blockquote style="overflow: hidden; margin: 1em 0px; padding: 8px 32px; border-left: none; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Though the Indians are acknowledged to have an unquestionable, and, heretofore, unquestioned right to the lands they occupy, until that right shall be extinguished by a voluntary cession to our government; yet it may well be doubted whether those tribes which reside within the acknowledged boundaries of the United States can, with strict accuracy, be denominated foreign nations. They may, more correctly be denominated domestic dependent nations. They occupy a territory to which we assert a title independent of their will, which must take effect in point of possession when their right of possession ceases. Meanwhile, they are in a state of pupilage. Their relation to the United States resembles that of a ward to his guardian.</blockquote><h3 style="margin: 0.3em 0px 0px; padding-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 1.6; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Dormant Commerce Clause jurisprudence[<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Commerce_Clause&action=edit&section=4" title="Edit section: Dormant Commerce Clause jurisprudence" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none; white-space: nowrap;">edit</a>]</h3><div role="note" class="hatnote navigation-not-searchable" style="font-style: italic; padding-left: 1.6em; margin-bottom: 0.5em; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Main article: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dormant_Commerce_Clause" title="Dormant Commerce Clause" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Dormant Commerce Clause</a></div>As explained in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v.Lopez" title="United States v. Lopez" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">United States v. Lopez</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_Supreme_Court_cases,volume_514" title="List of United States Supreme Court cases, volume 514" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">514</a> <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Reports" title="United States Reports" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">U.S.</a> <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/514/549/" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: url(" w="w" skins="skins" vector="Vector" resources="resources" common="common" images="images" link-external-small-ltr-progressive.svg="link-external-small-ltr-progressive.svg" cd31="cd31" right="right" center="center" em="em" no-repeat="no-repeat" padding-right="padding-right">549</a> (1995), "For nearly a century thereafter (that is, after Gibbons), the Court's Commerce Clause decisions dealt but rarely with the extent of Congress' power, and almost entirely with the Commerce Clause as a limit on state legislation that discriminated against interstate commerce.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-12" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[12]</a> Under this line of precedent, the Court held that certain categories of activity such as "exhibitions", "production", "manufacturing", and "mining" were within the province of state governments, and thus were beyond the power of Congress under the Commerce Clause. When Congress began to engage in economic regulation on a national scale, the Court's dormant Commerce Clause decisions influenced its approach to Congressional regulation.In this context, the Court took a formalistic approach, which distinguished between services and commerce, manufacturing and commerce, direct and indirect effects on commerce, and local and national activities. See concurring opinion of Justice Kennedy in United States v. Lopez. ("One approach the Court used to inquire into the lawfulness of state authority was to draw content-based or subject-matter distinctions, thus defining by semantic or formalistic categories those activities that were commerce and those that were not.") The Dormant Commerce Clause formalisms spilled over into its <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_One_of_the_United_States_Constitution" title="Article One of the United States Constitution" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Article I</a> jurisprudence. While Congress had the power to regulate commerce, it could not regulate manufacturing, which was seen as being entirely local. In <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kidd_v.Pearson" title="Kidd v. Pearson" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Kidd v. Pearson</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_Supreme_Court_cases,volume_128" title="List of United States Supreme Court cases, volume 128" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">128</a> <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Reports" title="United States Reports" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">U.S.</a> <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/128/1/" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: url(" w="w" skins="skins" vector="Vector" resources="resources" common="common" images="images" link-external-small-ltr-progressive.svg="link-external-small-ltr-progressive.svg" cd31="cd31" right="right" center="center" em="em" no-repeat="no-repeat" padding-right="padding-right">1</a> (1888), the Court struck a federal law which prohibited the manufacture of liquor for shipment across state lines. Similar decisions were issued with regard to agriculture, mining, oil production, and generation of electricity. In <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swift_v.United_States" class="mw-redirect" title="Swift v. United States" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Swift v. United States</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_Supreme_Court_cases,volume_196" title="List of United States Supreme Court cases, volume 196" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">196</a> <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Reports" title="United States Reports" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">U.S.</a> <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/196/375/" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: url(" w="w" skins="skins" vector="Vector" resources="resources" common="common" images="images" link-external-small-ltr-progressive.svg="link-external-small-ltr-progressive.svg" cd31="cd31" right="right" center="center" em="em" no-repeat="no-repeat" padding-right="padding-right">375</a> (1905), the Court ruled that the clause covered meatpackers; although their activity was geographically "local", they had an important effect on the "current of commerce", and thus could be regulated under the Commerce Clause. The Court's decision halted price fixing. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Stafford_v.Wallace&action=edit&redlink=1" class="new" title="Stafford v. Wallace (page does not exist)" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Stafford v. Wallace</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_Supreme_Court_cases,volume_258" title="List of United States Supreme Court cases, volume 258" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">258</a> <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Reports" title="United States Reports" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">U.S.</a> <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/258/495/" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: url(" w="w" skins="skins" vector="Vector" resources="resources" common="common" images="images" link-external-small-ltr-progressive.svg="link-external-small-ltr-progressive.svg" cd31="cd31" right="right" center="center" em="em" no-repeat="no-repeat" padding-right="padding-right">495</a> (1922), upheld a federal law (the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Packers_and_Stockyards_Act" title="Packers and Stockyards Act" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Packers and Stockyards Act</a>) regulating the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicago,Illinois" class="mw-redirect" title="Chicago, Illinois" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Chicago</a> meatpacking industry, because the industry was part of the interstate commerce of beef from ranchers to dinner tables. The stockyards "are but a throat through which the current [of commerce] flows," <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Howard_Taft" title="William Howard Taft" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Chief Justice Taft</a> wrote, referring to the stockyards as "great national public utilities." As Justice Kennedy wrote: (in a concurring opinion to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v.Lopez" title="United States v. Lopez" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">United States v. Lopez</a>), "Though that [formalistic] approach likely would not have survived even if confined to the question of a State's authority to enact legislation, it was not at all propitious when applied to the quite different question of what subjects were within the reach of the national power when Congress chose to exercise it."Similarly, the court excluded most services by distinguishing them from commerce. In <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_Baseball_Club_v.National_League" title="Federal Baseball Club v. National League" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Federal Baseball Club v. National League</a>, 259 U.S. 200 (1922), which was later upheld in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toolson_v.New_York_Yankees" class="mw-redirect" title="Toolson v. New York Yankees" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Toolson v. New York Yankees</a> (1953) and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flood_v.Kuhn" title="Flood v. Kuhn" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Flood v. Kuhn</a> (1973), the court excluded services not related to production, such as live entertainment, from the definition of commerce:<blockquote class="templatequote" style="overflow: hidden; margin: 1em 0px; padding: 0px 40px; border-left: none; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">That to which it is incident, the exhibition, although made for money, would not be called trade of commerce in the commonly accepted use of those words. As it is put by defendant, personal effort not related to production is not a subject of commerce.</blockquote><h3 style="margin: 0.3em 0px 0px; padding-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 1.6; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">New Deal[<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Commerce_Clause&action=edit&section=5" title="Edit section: New Deal" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none; white-space: nowrap;">edit</a>]</h3>In 1935, the Supreme Court decision in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schecter_Poultry_Corporation_v.United_States" class="mw-redirect" title="Schecter Poultry Corporation v. United States" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Schecter Poultry Corporation v. United States</a> invalidated regulations of the poultry industry according to the nondelegation doctrine and as an invalid use of Congress's power under the commerce clause. The unanimous decision rendered unconstitutional the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Industrial_Recovery_Act" class="mw-redirect" title="National Industrial Recovery Act" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">National Industrial Recovery Act</a>, a main component of President <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franklin_Roosevelt" class="mw-redirect" title="Franklin Roosevelt" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Franklin Roosevelt</a>'s <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Deal" title="New Deal" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">New Deal</a>. Again in 1936, in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carter_v.Carter_Coal_Company" class="mw-redirect" title="Carter v. Carter Coal Company" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Carter v. Carter Coal Company</a>,<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-13" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[13]</a> the Supreme Court struck down a key element of the New Deal's regulation of the mining industry on the grounds that mining was not "commerce." In the preceding decades, the Court had struck down a laundry list of progressive legislation: minimum-wage laws, child labor laws, agricultural relief laws, and virtually every other element of the New Deal legislation that had come before it. After winning <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1936_United_States_presidential_election" title="1936 United States presidential election" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">re-election in 1936</a>, Roosevelt proposed the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judicial_Procedures_Reform_Bill_of_1937" title="Judicial Procedures Reform Bill of 1937" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Judicial Procedures Reform Bill of 1937</a> to allow the President to appoint an additional Justice for each sitting Justice over age 70. Given the age of the current justices, that would allow a Supreme Court of up to 15 Justices. Roosevelt claimed that to be intended to lessen the load on the older Justices, rather than an attempt to achieve a majority that would cease to strike his New Deal acts.Ultimately, there was widespread opposition to the "court packing" plan, and in the end, Roosevelt abandoned it. However, in what became known as "<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_switch_in_time_that_saved_nine" title="The switch in time that saved nine" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">the switch in time that saved nine</a>," Justice <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Owen_Roberts" title="Owen Roberts" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Owen Roberts</a>, shortly after the "court packing" plan was proposed, joined the 5-4 majority opinion in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_Coast_Hotel_Co.v.Parrish" title="West Coast Hotel Co. v. Parrish" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">West Coast Hotel Co. v. Parrish</a> (1937). It narrowly upheld a Washington state minimum wage law, abandoning prior jurisprudence, and ended the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lochner_era" title="Lochner era" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Lochner era</a>. That essentially marked the beginning of the end of Supreme Court's opposition to the New Deal, which also obviated the "court packing" scheme.In <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v.Darby_Lumber_Co." title="United States v. Darby Lumber Co." style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">United States v. Darby Lumber Co.</a> (1941), the Court upheld the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fair_Labor_Standards_Act" class="mw-redirect" title="Fair Labor Standards Act" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Fair Labor Standards Act</a>, which regulated the production of goods shipped across state lines. It stated that the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenth_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution" title="Tenth Amendment to the United States Constitution" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Tenth Amendment</a> "is but a truism" and was not considered to be an independent limitation on congressional power.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-14" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[14]</a>In <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=United_States_v.Wrightwood_Dairy_Co.&action=edit&redlink=1" class="new" title="United States v. Wrightwood Dairy Co. (page does not exist)" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">United States v. Wrightwood Dairy Co.</a> (1942), the Court upheld federal price regulation of intrastate milk commerce:<blockquote style="overflow: hidden; margin: 1em 0px; padding: 8px 32px; border-left: none; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">The commerce power is not confined in its exercise to the regulation of commerce among the states. It extends to those activities intrastate which so affect interstate commerce, or the exertion of the power of Congress over it, as to make regulation of them appropriate means to the attainment of a legitimate end, the effective execution of the granted power to regulate interstate commerce.... The power of Congress over interstate commerce is plenary and complete in itself, may be exercised to its utmost extent, and acknowledges no limitations other than are prescribed in the Constitution.... It follows that no form of state activity can constitutionally thwart the regulatory power granted by the commerce clause to Congress. Hence, the reach of that power extends to those intrastate activities which in a substantial way interfere with or obstruct the exercise of the granted power.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-15" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[15]</a></blockquote>In <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wickard_v.Filburn" title="Wickard v. Filburn" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Wickard v. Filburn</a> (1942), the Court upheld the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agricultural_Adjustment_Act_of_1938" title="Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1938" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1938</a>, which sought to stabilize wide fluctuations in the market price for wheat. The Court found that Congress could apply national quotas to wheat grown on one's own land for one's own consumption because the total of such local production and consumption could potentially be sufficiently large as to affect the overall national goal of stabilizing prices. The Court cited its recent Wrightwood decision and decided, "Whether the subject of the regulation in question was 'production,' 'consumption,' or 'marketing' is, therefore, not material for purposes of deciding the question of federal power before us." The Court reiterated Chief Justice Marshall's decision in Gibbons: "He made emphatic the embracing and penetrating nature of this power by warning that effective restraints on its exercise must proceed from political, rather than from judicial, processes." The Court also stated, "The conflicts of economic interest between the regulated and those who advantage by it are wisely left under our system to resolution by the Congress under its more flexible and responsible legislative process. Such conflicts rarely lend themselves to judicial determination. And with the wisdom, workability, or fairness, of the plan of regulation, we have nothing to do."<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-16" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[16]</a>Thereafter, the Court began to defer to the Congress on the theory that determining whether legislation affected commerce appropriately was a decision that was political and legislative, not judicial. That overall change in the Court's jurisprudence, beginning with Parrish, is often referred to as the Constitutional Revolution of 1937,<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-17" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[17]</a> in which the Court shifted from exercising <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judicial_review" title="Judicial review" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">judicial review</a> of legislative acts to protect economic rights to a paradigm that focused most strongly on protecting civil liberties.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-18" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[18]</a>It was not until <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v.Lopez" title="United States v. Lopez" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">United States v. Lopez</a> (1995) decision, after nearly 60 years of leaving any restraint on the use of the Commerce Clause to political means, that the Court again ruled that a regulation enacted under the Commerce Clause was unconstitutional.<h3 style="margin: 0.3em 0px 0px; padding-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 1.6; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Civil rights[<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Commerce_Clause&action=edit&section=6" title="Edit section: Civil rights" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none; white-space: nowrap;">edit</a>]</h3>The wide interpretation of the scope of the Commerce Clause continued following the passing of the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_Rights_Act_of_1964" title="Civil Rights Act of 1964" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Civil Rights Act of 1964</a>, which aimed to prevent business from discriminating against black customers. The Supreme Court issued several opinions supporting that use of the Commerce Clause. <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heart_of_Atlanta_Motel_v.United_States" class="mw-redirect" title="Heart of Atlanta Motel v. United States" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Heart of Atlanta Motel v. United States</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_Supreme_Court_cases,volume_379" title="List of United States Supreme Court cases, volume 379" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">379</a> <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Reports" title="United States Reports" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">U.S.</a> <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/379/241/" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: url(" w="w" skins="skins" vector="Vector" resources="resources" common="common" images="images" link-external-small-ltr-progressive.svg="link-external-small-ltr-progressive.svg" cd31="cd31" right="right" center="center" em="em" no-repeat="no-repeat" padding-right="padding-right">241</a> (1964), ruled that Congress could regulate a business that served mostly interstate travelers. Daniel v. Paul, 395 U.S. 298 (1969), ruled that the federal government could regulate a recreational facility because three of the four items sold at its snack bar were purchased from outside the state.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-19" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[19]</a><h2 style="margin: 1em 0px 0.25em; padding: 0px; overflow: hidden; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(162, 169, 177); font-weight: normal; line-height: 1.3; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">United States v. Lopez[<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Commerce_Clause&action=edit&section=7" title="Edit section: United States v. Lopez" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none; white-space: nowrap;">edit</a>]</h2><div role="note" class="hatnote navigation-not-searchable" style="font-style: italic; padding-left: 1.6em; margin-bottom: 0.5em; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Main article: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v.Lopez" title="United States v. Lopez" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">United States v. Lopez</a></div><h3 style="margin: 0.3em 0px 0px; padding-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 1.6; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Change in jurisprudence[<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Commerce_Clause&action=edit&section=8" title="Edit section: Change in jurisprudence" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none; white-space: nowrap;">edit</a>]</h3>Starting in 1995, the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rehnquist_Court" title="Rehnquist Court" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Rehnquist Court</a>'s <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Federalism" title="New Federalism" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">revived federalism</a>, as evident in its 5–4 decision in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v.Lopez" title="United States v. Lopez" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">United States v. Lopez</a>, enforced strict limits to congressional power under the Commerce Clause.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-:0-20" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[20]</a> In Lopez, the Court struck down the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun-Free_School_Zones_Act_of_1990" title="Gun-Free School Zones Act of 1990" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Gun-Free School Zones Act of 1990</a>. It was the first time in almost 60 years that the Court had struck down a federal law for exceeding the limits of the Commerce Clause.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-:0-20" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[20]</a> In the case, the Court was confronted with the conviction of a high school student for carrying a concealed handgun into school in violation of the act.In striking down the federal law, the majority opinion explained:<blockquote style="overflow: hidden; margin: 1em 0px; padding: 8px 32px; border-left: none; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">[The Gun-Free School Zones Act] is a criminal statute that by its terms has nothing to do with "commerce" or any sort of economic enterprise, however broadly one might define those terms. [The act] is not an essential part of a larger regulation of economic activity, in which the regulatory scheme could be undercut unless the intrastate activity were regulated. It cannot, therefore, be sustained under our cases upholding regulations of activities that arise out of or are connected with a commercial transaction, which viewed in the aggregate, substantially affects interstate commerce.</blockquote>The opinion set a new rule for what was an acceptable use of congressional power under the Commerce Clause:<ul style="list-style-image: url(" w="w" skins="skins" vector="Vector" resources="resources" common="common" images="images" bullet-icon.svg="bullet-icon.svg" d4515="d4515" margin="margin" em="em" px="px" padding="padding" background-color="background-color" rgb="rgb"><li style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Congress may regulate the use of the channels of interstate commerce;<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-21" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[21]</a></li><li style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Congress is empowered to regulate and protect the instrumentalities of interstate commerce, or persons or things in Interstate Commerce, even though the threat may come only from intrastate activities;<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-22" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[22]</a></li><li style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;">Congress's commerce authority includes the power to regulate those activities having a substantial relation to interstate commerce (activities that substantially affect interstate commerce).<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-23" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[23]</a></li></ul><h3 style="margin: 0.3em 0px 0px; padding-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 1.6; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Application of the Lopez rule[<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Commerce_Clause&action=edit&section=9" title="Edit section: Application of the Lopez rule" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none; white-space: nowrap;">edit</a>]</h3><h4 style="margin: 0.3em 0px 0px; padding-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 1.6; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Channels of Commerce and the Instrumentalities of Interstate Commerce[<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Commerce_Clause&action=edit&section=10" title="Edit section: Channels of Commerce and the Instrumentalities of Interstate Commerce" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none; white-space: nowrap;">edit</a>]</h4>Channels of commerce represent a broad congressional power which directly regulates the movement of goods and people across state lines.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-:2-24" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[24]</a> Importantly, the Court has never required a nexus (causal link) between a state border crossing and the engagement of an activity prohibited by Congress.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-:2-24" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[24]</a> In United States v. Sullivan (1948), the Court held that Section 301k of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act, which prohibited the misbranding of pharmaceutical drugs which had been transported in interstate commerce, did not exceed the congressional commerce power because Congress has the power to “keep the channels of such commerce free from the transportation of illicit or harmful articles.”<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-25" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[25]</a> Topics in this category include mailing or shipping in interstate commerce, prohibiting crimes where the individual crossed a state line to commit the act, and explosives.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-:2-24" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[24]</a>The instrumentalities category allows Congress to make regulations in regards to "the safety, efficiency, and accessibility of the nationwide transportation and communications networks."<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-:2-24" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[24]</a> It is a significant basis for congressional authority however it has not been fully occupied by Congress.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-:2-24" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[24]</a><h4 style="margin: 0.3em 0px 0px; padding-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 1.6; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Substantial Impact on Interstate Commerce[<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Commerce_Clause&action=edit&section=11" title="Edit section: Substantial Impact on Interstate Commerce" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none; white-space: nowrap;">edit</a>]</h4>The substantial impact (or substantial affect) category relates to the power discussed in the Court's 1942 decision in Wickard v. Filburn. It is arguably the strongest categorical power in the Lopez rule.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-:2-24" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[24]</a> In essence, it relates to economic activities which, in the aggregate, have a substantial impact on interstate commerce.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-:2-24" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[24]</a> The Court has stopped short of establishing a rule prohibiting the aggregation of all non-economic activity.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-:2-24" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[24]</a>In determining whether the activity Congress is attempting to regulate has a substantial effect on interstate commerce, reviewing courts typically consider the following factors:<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-26" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[26]</a><blockquote style="overflow: hidden; margin: 1em 0px; padding: 8px 32px; border-left: none; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">(1) whether the regulated activity is commercial or economic in nature; (2) whether an express jurisdictional element is provided in the statute to limit its reach; (3) whether Congress made express findings about the effects of the proscribed activity on interstate commerce; and (4) whether the link between the prohibited activity and the effect on interstate commerce is attenuated.</blockquote><h2 style="margin: 1em 0px 0.25em; padding: 0px; overflow: hidden; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(162, 169, 177); font-weight: normal; line-height: 1.3; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Other Rehnquist Court decisions[<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Commerce_Clause&action=edit&section=12" title="Edit section: Other Rehnquist Court decisions" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none; white-space: nowrap;">edit</a>]</h2><h3 style="margin: 0.3em 0px 0px; padding-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 1.6; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">United States v. Morrison[<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Commerce_Clause&action=edit&section=13" title="Edit section: United States v. Morrison" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none; white-space: nowrap;">edit</a>]</h3>Lopez was clarified by the Rehnquist Court in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v.Morrison" title="United States v. Morrison" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">United States v. Morrison</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_Supreme_Court_cases,volume_529" title="List of United States Supreme Court cases, volume 529" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">529</a> <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Reports" title="United States Reports" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">U.S.</a> <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/529/598/" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: url(" w="w" skins="skins" vector="Vector" resources="resources" common="common" images="images" link-external-small-ltr-progressive.svg="link-external-small-ltr-progressive.svg" cd31="cd31" right="right" center="center" em="em" no-repeat="no-repeat" padding-right="padding-right">598</a> (2000). In Morrison, the Court invalidated § 40302 of the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Violence_Against_Women_Act" title="Violence Against Women Act" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Violence Against Women Act</a> ("VAWA"), which created civil liability for the commission of a gender-based violent crime but without any jurisdictional requirement of a connection to interstate commerce or to commercial activity.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-27" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[27]</a> Once again, the Court stated it was presented with a congressional attempt to criminalize traditional local criminal conduct. As in Lopez, it could not be argued that state regulation alone would be ineffective to protect the aggregate effects of local violence. The Court explained that in both Lopez and Morrison, "the noneconomic, criminal nature of the conduct at issue was central to our decision." Furthermore, the Court pointed out that neither case had "'express jurisdictional element which might limit its reach (to those instances that) have an explicit connection with or effect on interstate commerce.'"<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-28" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[28]</a> In both cases, Congress criminalized activity that was not commercial in nature without including a jurisdictional element establishing the necessary connection between the criminalized activity and interstate commerce.<h3 style="margin: 0.3em 0px 0px; padding-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 1.6; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">New Federalism and Gonzales v. Raich[<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Commerce_Clause&action=edit&section=14" title="Edit section: New Federalism and Gonzales v. Raich" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none; white-space: nowrap;">edit</a>]</h3>The Rehnquist Court's Commerce Clause cases helped establish the doctrine of "<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Federalism" title="New Federalism" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">New Federalism</a>."<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-:0-20" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[20]</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-:1-29" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[29]</a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-30" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[30]</a> The Court's New Federalism doctrine was focused on reining in congressional powers in order to re-strengthen the powers of the individual states which had been weakened during the New Deal era.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-:1-29" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[29]</a> Members on the Rehnquist Court theorized that by re-apportioning power back to the states, individual liberty was strengthened.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-:0-20" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[20]</a> In contrast, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Erwin_Chemerinsky" title="Erwin Chemerinsky" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Erwin Chemerinsky</a> believes that limiting the commerce power as the Rehnquist Court did can only lead to the weakening of individual liberties.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-:0-20" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[20]</a>The outer limits of the New Federalism doctrine were delineated by <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gonzales_v.Raich" title="Gonzales v. Raich" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Gonzales v. Raich</a> in which Justices <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antonin_Scalia" title="Antonin Scalia" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Antonin Scalia</a> and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthony_Kennedy" title="Anthony Kennedy" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Anthony Kennedy</a> departed from their previous positions in the Lopez and Morrison to uphold a federal law regarding <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marijuana" class="mw-redirect" title="Marijuana" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">marijuana</a>. The Court found the federal law valid although the marijuana in question had been grown and consumed within a single state and had never entered interstate commerce. The court held Congress may regulate an intrastate economic good as part of a complete scheme of legislation designed to regulate interstate commerce.Since the Rehnquist Court, the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tenth_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution" title="Tenth Amendment to the United States Constitution" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Tenth Amendment to the Constitution</a> has once again played an integral part in the Court's view of the Commerce Clause. The Tenth Amendment states that the federal government has the powers specifically delegated to it by the Constitution and that other powers are reserved to the states or to the people. The Commerce Clause is an important source of those powers delegated to Congress and so its interpretation is very important in determining the scope of federal power in controlling innumerable aspects of American life. The Commerce Clause has been the most broadly-interpreted clause in the Constitution, making way for many laws that some argue, contradict the original intended meaning of the Constitution. Justice Thomas has gone so far as to state in his dissent to Gonzales,<blockquote class="templatequote" style="overflow: hidden; margin: 1em 0px; padding: 0px 40px; border-left: none; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Respondents Diane Monson and Angel Raich use marijuana that has never been bought or sold, that has never crossed state lines, and that has had no demonstrable effect on the national market for marijuana. If Congress can regulate this under the Commerce Clause, then it can regulate virtually anything – and the federal Government is no longer one of limited and enumerated powers.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-31" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[31]</a></blockquote><h3 style="margin: 0.3em 0px 0px; padding-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 1.6; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Indian affairs[<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Commerce_Clause&action=edit&section=15" title="Edit section: Indian affairs" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none; white-space: nowrap;">edit</a>]</h3>The Rehnquist court upheld Congress's plenary authority to legislate in Indian affairs that was derived from Worcester's interpretation of the Indian Commerce Clause, but it modified Worcester by giving the states some jurisdiction over Indian affairs beyond what had been granted to them by Congress. Another view is that the Court was compelled to define limits to address congressional legislation that sought to use the Commerce Clause power in new and unprecedented ways.The Court found in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seminole_Tribe_v.Florida" class="mw-redirect" title="Seminole Tribe v. Florida" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Seminole Tribe v. Florida</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_Supreme_Court_cases,volume_517" title="List of United States Supreme Court cases, volume 517" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">517</a> <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Reports" title="United States Reports" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">U.S.</a> <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/517/44/" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: url(" w="w" skins="skins" vector="Vector" resources="resources" common="common" images="images" link-external-small-ltr-progressive.svg="link-external-small-ltr-progressive.svg" cd31="cd31" right="right" center="center" em="em" no-repeat="no-repeat" padding-right="padding-right">44</a> (1996) that unlike the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fourteenth_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution" title="Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Fourteenth Amendment</a>, the Commerce Clause does not give the federal government the power to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abrogation_doctrine" title="Abrogation doctrine" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">abrogate</a> the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sovereign_immunity" title="Sovereign immunity" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">sovereign immunity</a> of the states.<h2 style="margin: 1em 0px 0.25em; padding: 0px; overflow: hidden; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(162, 169, 177); font-weight: normal; line-height: 1.3; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Themes[<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Commerce_Clause&action=edit&section=16" title="Edit section: Themes" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none; white-space: nowrap;">edit</a>]</h2><h3 style="margin: 0.3em 0px 0px; padding-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 1.6; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Rational basis review[<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Commerce_Clause&action=edit&section=17" title="Edit section: Rational basis review" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none; white-space: nowrap;">edit</a>]</h3>The evolving level of scrutiny applied by federal courts to cases involving the Commerce Clause should be considered in the context of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rational_basis" class="mw-redirect" title="Rational basis" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">rational basis</a> review. The idea behind rational basis review is that the judiciary must show deference to the elected representatives of the people. A respect for the democratic process requires courts to uphold legislation if there are rational facts and reasons that could support congressional judgment, even if the justices would have come to different conclusions. Throughout the 20th century, in a variety of contexts, courts sought to avoid second guessing the legislative branch, and Commerce Clause jurisprudence can be seen as a part of that trend, as <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laurence_Tribe" title="Laurence Tribe" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Laurence Tribe</a> stated:<blockquote style="overflow: hidden; margin: 1em 0px; padding: 8px 32px; border-left: none; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Since 1937, in applying the factual test in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Labor_Relations_Board_v.Jones%26_Laughlin_Steel_Corporation" class="mw-redirect" title="National Labor Relations Board v. Jones & Laughlin Steel Corporation" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Jones & Laughlin</a> to hold a broad range of activities sufficiently related to interstate commerce, the Supreme Court has exercised little independent judgment, choosing instead to defer to the expressed or implied findings of Congress to the effect that regulated activities have the requisite "economic effect". Such findings have been upheld whenever they could be said to rest upon some <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rational_basis" class="mw-redirect" title="Rational basis" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">rational basis</a>.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-32" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[32]</a> (Citing Heart of Atlanta Motel, Inc. v United States (1964).)</blockquote>Justice Rehnquist echoed that point in his opinion in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_v.Lopez" title="United States v. Lopez" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">United States v. Lopez</a> by stating: "Since [Wickard], the Court has... undertaken to decide whether a rational basis existed for concluding that a regulated activity sufficiently affected interstate commerce. See, e.g., <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Hodel_v.Virginia_Surface_Mining%26_Reclamation_Association&action=edit&redlink=1" class="new" title="Hodel v. Virginia Surface Mining & Reclamation Association (page does not exist)" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Hodel v. Virginia Surface Mining & Reclamation Association</a>, 452 U.S. 264, 276–280 (1981);<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-33" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[33]</a> <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Perez_v.United_States&action=edit&redlink=1" class="new" title="Perez v. United States (page does not exist)" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Perez v. United States</a>, 402 U.S. 146, 155–156 (1971);<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-34" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[34]</a> <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heart_of_Atlanta_Motel,Inc.v.United_States" title="Heart of Atlanta Motel, Inc. v. United States" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Heart of Atlanta Motel, Inc. v. United States</a>, 379 U.S. 241, 252–253 (1964)."<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-35" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[35]</a>Rational basis review begins with establishing the factual predicate upon which the exercise of congressional power is based. Thar factual basis might come from a variety of sources. It might come from factual determinations made by Congress, passed in the legislation itself, or found in the congressional reports that are issued to accompany the legislation. It might come from the record of testimony compiled in committee hearings. It might come from facts posited by proponents in their briefs in support of the legislation. For example, the Court referenced extensive testimony presented in hearings in support of the conclusion that discrimination in public accommodations reduces interstate commerce. The Court wrote:<blockquote style="overflow: hidden; margin: 1em 0px; padding: 8px 32px; border-left: none; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Of course, the mere fact that Congress has said when particular activity shall be deemed to affect commerce does not preclude further examination by this Court. But where we find that the legislators, in light of the facts and testimony before them, have a rational basis for finding a chosen regulatory scheme necessary to the protection of commerce, our investigation is at an end.</blockquote>Similarly, in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gonzales_v.Raich" title="Gonzales v. Raich" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Gonzales v. Raich</a> the Court upheld a ban on growing marijuana intended for medical use on the grounds that Congress could rationally conclude that such cultivation might make enforcement of drug laws more difficult by creating an otherwise-lawful source of marijuana that could be diverted into the illicit market:<blockquote style="overflow: hidden; margin: 1em 0px; padding: 8px 32px; border-left: none; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">In assessing the scope of Congress' authority under the Commerce Clause, we stress that the task before us is a modest one. We need not determine whether respondents' activities, taken in the aggregate, substantially affect interstate commerce in fact, but only whether a "rational basis" exists for so concluding. Given the enforcement difficulties that attend distinguishing between marijuana cultivated locally and marijuana grown elsewhere, 21 U.S.C. § 801(5), and concerns about diversion into illicit channels, we have no difficulty concluding that Congress had a rational basis for believing that failure to regulate the intrastate manufacture and possession of marijuana would leave a gaping hole in the CSA.</blockquote><h3 style="margin: 0.3em 0px 0px; padding-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 1.6; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Role of the political process[<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Commerce_Clause&action=edit&section=18" title="Edit section: Role of the political process" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none; white-space: nowrap;">edit</a>]</h3>Since its decision in Gibbons, the Supreme Court has held that Congress may regulate only those activities within a state that arise out of or are connected with a commercial transaction and that, viewed in the aggregate, substantially affect interstate commerce. Since judicial interpretations of constitutional limitations on Congressional exercise of its Commerce Clause powers represent an invasion of the democratic process which may not be overturned through ordinary democratic means, the Court has continued to assert that the primary limitation on the unwise exercise of Congressional Commerce Clause power by Congress must be found at the ballot box. Thus in <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Garcia_v.San_Antonio_Metropolitan_Transit_Authority" title="Garcia v. San Antonio Metropolitan Transit Authority" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Garcia v. San Antonio Metropolitan Transit Authority</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_Supreme_Court_cases,volume_469" title="List of United States Supreme Court cases, volume 469" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">469</a> <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Reports" title="United States Reports" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">U.S.</a> <a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/469/528/" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: url(" w="w" skins="skins" vector="Vector" resources="resources" common="common" images="images" link-external-small-ltr-progressive.svg="link-external-small-ltr-progressive.svg" cd31="cd31" right="right" center="center" em="em" no-repeat="no-repeat" padding-right="padding-right">528</a> (1985), the Court stated:<blockquote style="overflow: hidden; margin: 1em 0px; padding: 8px 32px; border-left: none; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Of course, we continue to recognize that the States occupy a special and specific position in our constitutional system and that the scope of Congress' authority under the Commerce Clause must reflect that position. But the principal and basic limit on the federal commerce power is that inherent in all congressional action—the built-in restraints that our system provides through state participation in federal governmental action. The political process ensures that laws that unduly burden the States will not be promulgated.</blockquote><h3 style="margin: 0.3em 0px 0px; padding-top: 0.5em; padding-bottom: 0px; overflow: hidden; line-height: 1.6; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Debate over applicability to Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act[<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Commerce_Clause&action=edit&section=19" title="Edit section: Debate over applicability to Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none; white-space: nowrap;">edit</a>]</h3>Questions over the range and applicability of the Commerce Clause have arisen in debate over the constitutionality of the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patient_Protection_and_Affordable_Care_Act" class="mw-redirect" title="Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act</a> ("PPACA"). The debate centers on whether Congress is authorized to require citizens to purchase health insurance from the private market, known as the individual mandate. Although Congress claims authority from the Commerce Clause many opponents of the PPACA claim that the individual mandate exceeds Congress's authority, primarily on the position that the law attempts to define the nonpurchase of insurance as "commerce."Twenty-six state attorneys general filed a lawsuit against the federal government and claimed that the insurance mandate is unconstitutional. On June 8, 2011, a panel of three judges from the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/11th_Circuit_Court_of_Appeals" class="mw-redirect" title="11th Circuit Court of Appeals" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">11th Circuit Court of Appeals</a> in Atlanta held hearings on that issue.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-36" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[36]</a> On August 12, 2011. The 11th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled the individual mandate to be unconstitutional and stated that Congress had exceeded its authority by requiring Americans to buy coverage.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-37" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[37]</a>Differing court opinions have clashed over the question of whether failure to purchase insurance can be considered an economic activity that affects interstate commerce. In <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commonwealth_of_Virginia_v.Sebelius" class="mw-redirect" title="Commonwealth of Virginia v. Sebelius" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Virginia v. Sebelius</a>, Judge Henry Hudson overturned the law and claimed that failure to purchase health insurance coverage could not be considered economic activity but was economic "inactivity." In Liberty University v. Geithner, Judge Norman Moon upheld the law, countering:<blockquote style="overflow: hidden; margin: 1em 0px; padding: 8px 32px; border-left: none; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Far from 'inactivity,' by choosing to forgo insurance, Plaintiffs are making an economic decision to try to pay for health care services later, out of pocket, rather than now, through the purchase of insurance. Similarly, in Thomas More Law Center v. Obama, judge George Steeh ruled that such decisions have "a documented impact on interstate commerce."<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-38" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[38]</a></blockquote>In response to the Virginia decision, Virginia Attorney General <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ken_Cuccinelli" title="Ken Cuccinelli" style="background-image: none; background-position: initial; background-size: initial; background-repeat: initial; background-attachment: initial; background-origin: initial; background-clip: initial; text-decoration-line: none;">Ken Cuccinelli</a> petitioned the Supreme Court to hear the appeal immediately, rather than going through the Fourth Circuit. On November 14, 2011, the Supreme Court announced that it would hear the case in the spring of 2012.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-39" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[39]</a> The Supreme Court heard arguments on March 26–28, 2012. Its majority opinion agreed that upholding the PPACA under the commerce clause "would open a new and potentially vast domain to congressional authority" and that "the power to regulate commerce presupposes the existence of commercial activity to be regulated."<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-40" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[40]</a> The Court held that Congress did not have authority under the Commerce Clause to require citizens to purchase health insurance but still upheld the law's "individual mandate" provision under Congress's taxing authority.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commerce_Clause#cite_note-41" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">[41]</a><h2 style="margin: 1em 0px 0.25em; padding: 0px; overflow: hidden; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(162, 169, 177); font-weight: normal; line-height: 1.3; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">See also[<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Commerce_Clause&action=edit&section=20" title="Edit section: See also" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none; white-space: nowrap;">edit</a>]</h2><ul style="list-style-image: url(" w="w" skins="skins" vector="Vector" resources="resources" common="common" images="images" bullet-icon.svg="bullet-icon.svg" d4515="d4515" margin="margin" em="em" px="px" padding="padding" background-color="background-color" rgb="rgb"><li style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australian_commerce_clause" class="mw-redirect" title="Australian commerce clause" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Australian commerce clause</a></li><li style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dual_federalism" title="Dual federalism" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Dual federalism</a></li><li style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Home_Port_Doctrine" title="Home Port Doctrine" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Home Port Doctrine</a></li><li style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Recovery_Administration" title="National Recovery Administration" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">National Recovery Administration</a></li><li style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Section_51(i)of_the_Constitution_of_Australia" title="Section 51(i) of the Constitution of Australia" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Section 51(i) of the Constitution of Australia</a></li><li style="margin-bottom: 0.1em;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Section_91(2)of_the_Constitution_Act,_1867" title="Section 91(2) of the Constitution Act, 1867" style="text-decoration-line: none; background: none;">Section 91(2) of the Constitution Act, 1867</a> (Canadian Constitution)</li></ul><h2 style="margin: 1em 0px 0.25em; padding: 0px; overflow: hidden; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(162, 169, 177); font-weight: normal; line-height: 1.3; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">References</h2></div><div>...</div><div>===</div><div><a href="https://assets.nationbuilder.com/movetoamend/pages/752/attachments/original/1585063354/Corporate_Hijacking_of_the_Commerce_Clause.pdf?1585063354">https://assets.nationbuilder.com/movetoamend/pages/752/attachments/original/1585063354/Corporate_Hijacking_of_the_Commerce_Clause.pdf?1585063354</a></div><div>
</div><div>Corporate Hijacking of the Commerce Clause</div><div> One in a series of briefs on how corporate constitutional rights harms you,

your family, your community, your environment and your democracy </div><div>
</div><div>Why this series?

Many believe corporate hijacking of the constitution begins and ends with money in elections (i.e. First

Amendment “free speech” rights permitting corporations to spend money to influence elections). But the threat to

people, communities, the environment and democracy itself is much greater and includes additional parts of the

First Amendment, as well as other amendments of our constitution.

Corporations and the U.S. Constitution

Corporations are not mentioned in the U.S. Constitution. They are legal creations of governments, intended to

provide useful goods and services. No voter, citizen, social movement or elected official has ever granted

corporations constitutional rights – intended exclusively for human beings. Corporate entities have gained

constitutional rights solely from rulings by activist Supreme Court Justices. </div><div>
</div><div>What is the Commerce Clause of the U.S. Constitution? (Article I, Section 8, Clause 3)

The Congress shall have power "To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and

with the Indian Tribes."

When did corporations first win or hijack this constitutional right or provision?

1875 - Welton v. State of Missouri, 91 U.S. 275

An agent for the I.M. Singer Company sold a machine in Missouri without a license. The state imposed licenses,

taxes, and other legal devices as protections against fraudulent and dangerous products and against harms to the

local economy. The corporation wanted to set up its own sales system, so it sued the state. The state defended its

sovereign right to establish its own laws to protect its residents, including its local merchants. The U.S. Supreme

Court ruled that the state law was an unconstitutional burden on commerce under the Commerce Clause. </div><div>
</div><div>Notable cases where this constitutional right or provision was hijacked by corporations:

1898 - Schollenberger v. Pennsylvania, 171 U.S. 1

Pennsylvania was one of several states that passed a law prohibiting the sale or manufacturing of oleomargarine,

which at the time was often made from slaughterhouse by-products containing dangerous ingredients, but was

manufactured to look like butter. After the Pennsylvania Supreme Court upheld the state’s ban, the Oleomargarine

corporations sued. During this time, the federal government passed a law defining butter and oleomargarine and

taxed the latter. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor of Pennsylvania’s legislative right to pass necessary and

appropriate laws to protect the health, safety and welfare (called “police power” rights) of its citizens. The

corporations didn’t give up.</div><div>
</div><div> Ten years later, the Oleo corporations sued again. This time, the Supreme Court ruled

in favor of the corporations. Corporate attorneys trumped the state’s claimed right to pass laws protecting public

health by asserting the law was an “illegal trade barrier” based on the Commerce Clause’s provision allowing

interstate commerce. Oleomargarine was an item of “commerce” traded between the states. Interstate commerce

could be regulated (i.e. taxed -- at that time a tax was a form of regulation), but couldn’t be prohibited by states.

1967 - Short v. Ness Produce Co., 385 U.S. 537 </div><div>
</div><div>An Oregon law required meat produced from out of the country to have a label in the interests of protecting the

health of its residents. The Supreme Court declared the law unconstitutional on Commerce Clause grounds.

1982 - Sporhase v. Nebraska ex rel. Douglas, 458 U.S. 941</div><div>
</div><div>Nebraska passed a stringent law on the sale and transfer of its ground water outside of the state. The Supreme

Court ruled that the water was an article of commerce and, therefore, the law was invalid under the Commerce

Clause.

1990 - National Solid Wastes Management Assn. v. Alabama Dept of Envir., 910 Fed. 2d 713 </div><div>
</div><div>In an effort to avoid becoming the waste dump of the nation, Alabama passed a law banning out-of state

hazardous waste unless certain requirements were met. A federal court decided that the law was unconstitutional

under the Commerce Clause. Hazardous waste was “commerce.” The Supreme Court chose not to hear the case,

which meant the lower court decision in support of corporate interests stood.

How corporate hijacking of this amendment or provision harms you, your family, communities and

the environment

The Supreme Court has consistently preempted the role of states and Congress from making public policy to serve

the interests and protect the rights and health, safety, welfare and morals of municipalities, states, residents,

workers, consumers and the environment. Judicial decisions have locked in corporate rights by hijacking the

Commerce Clause. </div><div>
</div><div>For example, by labeling the manufacturing and sale of dangerous products and importation of

toxic waste as “commerce,” the Court has prevented the right to a republican form of self-government that serves

the interest of people, communities and the environment.

Time and again the following sequence has played out:</div><div>
</div><div> √ A local community or state democratically passes a law

to protect the health, safety, welfare and morals of people, community and/or the environment. </div><div>
</div><div>√ One or more

corporations and/or corporate trade group challenges the law in court.</div><div>
</div><div> √ Corporate agents testify that the law

claiming to protect the health, safety, welfare and morals is a “trade barrier” that places an “excessive burden on

interstate commerce” and is thus unconstitutional. </div><div>
</div><div>√ The Court agrees. √ </div><div>
</div><div>The law is overturned.</div><div>
</div><div> √ Corporations

gain greater political and economic power.</div><div>
</div><div> √ The ability of the public and their democratically-elected

representatives to protect their health, safety and welfare is diminished. </div><div>
</div><div>Prominent opposition to the corporate hijacking of the Commerce Clause

“Supreme Court Justices used trade barrier language based on the Constitution’s Commerce Clause to promote the

corporate agenda by invalidating state and local laws that threatened corporate power.”

- Jane Anne Morris, corporate anthropologist, author of Gaveling Down the Rabble </div><div>===</div></div>

Commerce Clause

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