Kasz216 on 28 March 2012
| SamuelRSmith said: Does the original intention of the constitution not matter when deciding these things? Because, you guys are debating by whether this is covered by the commerce clause... but the commerce clause is clearly used way more (and, arguable, very differently) to the way the founders intended (or, so it would seem, from the rest of the constitution, and the writings of (most of) the founders). Question: would such a law have been considered fair game 50, 100, 150 years ago? If not, why is it today? Has the commerce clause changed in anyway? One can argue that the reading of it has changed, but that seems to take away all intention, and effectively turns to Constitutionality into who's the best at arguing semantics... and then, really, the Constitution doesn't exist at all. |
50 possibly, 100 no. In 1936 the Supreme Court ruled that it was uncosnitutional for the US government to regulate Agriculture. It was said that the tax meant to regulate agriculture was illegal because regulating agriculture was a job for the states.
This eventually, got changed, partially thanks to FDR who kept pushing for an ammenment that made the Supreme Court limitless in position. In otherwords, the President could basically just keep appointing presidents till he got the ruling he wanted.
This didn't pass, but afterwords the SC became more receptive to the New Deal.
