Supreme Blunders

I am going to start a series on Supreme Court decision I disagree with. And first up is:

Wickard v. Filburn

This case is perhaps the worst single case decided by the court. It has allowed the monstrous expansion of federal power into all aspect of our lives.

“The Government's concern lest the Act be held to be a regulation of production or consumption rather than of marketing is attributable to a few dicta and decisions of this Court which might be understood to lay it down that activities such as 'production,' 'manufacturing,' and 'mining' are strictly 'local' and, except in special circumstances which are not present here, cannot be regulated under the commerce power because their effects upon interstate commerce are, as matter of law, only 'indirect.' Even today, when this power has been held to have great latitude, there is no decision of this Court that such activities may be regulated where no part of the product is intended for interstate commerce or intermingled with the subjects thereof. We believe that a review of the course of decision under the Commerce Clause will make plain, however, that questions of the power of Congress are not to be decided by reference to any formula which would give controlling force to nomenclature such as 'production' and 'indirect' and foreclose consideration of the actual effects of the activity in question upon interstate commerce.”

Here the court make a clear distinction between actual interstate commerce and local activities but states its intention to ignore that clear distinction.

“Not long after the decision of United States v. E. C. Knight Co., supra, Mr. Justice Holmes, in sustaining the exercise of national power over intrastate activity, stated for the Court that 'commerce among the states is not a technical legal conception, but a practical one, drawn from the course of business.' Swift & Co. v. United States, 196 U.S. 375, 398 , 25 S.Ct. 276, 280. It was soon demonstrated that the effects of many kinds of intrastate activity upon interstate commerce were such as to make them a proper subject of federal regulation. 22 In some cases sustaining the exercise of federal power over intrastate matters the term 'direct' [317 U.S. 111, 123]   was used for the purpose of stating, rather than of reaching, a result;23 in others it was treated as synonymous with 'substantial' or 'material;'24 and in others it was not used at all. 25 Of late its use has been abandoned in cases dealing with questions of federal power under the Commerce Clause."

Here is an attempt to justify the expansion of federal control by claiming that the meaning of a specific phrase not only doesn't mean its literal meaning but that it may be interpreted to mean anything convenient to the government.

“The Court's recognition of the relevance of the economic effects in the application of the Commerce Clause ex- [317 U.S. 111, 124]   emplified by this statement has made the mechanical application of legal formulas no longer feasible. Once an economic measure of the reach of the power granted to Congress in the Commerce Clause is accepted, questions of federal power cannot be decided simply by finding the activity in question to be 'production' nor can consideration of its economic effects be foreclosed by calling them 'indirect.' The present Chief Justice has said in summary of the present state of the law: '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.' United States v. Wrightwood Dairy Co., 315 U.S. 110, 119 , 62 S.Ct. 523, 526"

Here the effect of accepting the construction of the commerce clause where congress has the power the regulate those things which affect interstate commerce by virtue of the power to regulate interstate commerce is stated. Since the power as presented is without limit other than those imposed by the constitution it is in fact without limit since it is itself a circumvention of limitations imposed by the constitution

“But even if appellee's activity be local and though it may not be regarded as commerce, it may still, whatever its nature, be reached by Congress if it exerts a substantial economic effect on interstate commerce and this irrespective of whether such effect is what might at some earlier time have been defined as 'direct' or 'indirect.'”

Here it is shown that the expanded commerce powers require only the most tenuous connection to actual interstate commerce. The court proceeds to make the connection between private wheat production and consumption and the interstate price of wheat.

It then contends with the allegation that the Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1938 deprived the appealee of property without due process of law and that the law is retroactive in effect. Here the court concludes that since the actual penalty is incurred and becomes due on threshing that a change in the liability created the 24 amendment is technically not retroactive even though its effect could easily be found so if it was held to the same reasoning as the commerce clause. It then rejects any fifth amendment claims on the basis that the government may regulate what it subsidizes further expanding federal regulatory control to any area which it decides to fund.

It is anathema to me that the government can use the limits placed on it as a means of circumventing those limits and granting itself unlimited power over the lives of its citizens.