cases: commerce clause

Question 1

Gibbons v. Ogden (1824)

Answer 1

NY water/steamboat monopoly (violates CC and NPC)

conflict preemption

majority (Marshall): Commerce includes interstate navigation/water; does not include production; dormant CC introduced

Question 2

E.C. Knight (1895)

Answer 2

(restrictive) Manufacture ≠ commerce

Question 3

The Lottery Case (1903)

Answer 3

(expansive)

(1) Can regulate channels as well as anything moving “in” commerce
(2) Can prohibit commerce of noxious goods

Question 4

Shreveport Rate Case (1914)

Answer 4

(expansive) can regulate instrumentalities

Question 5

Hammer v. Dagenhart (1918)

Answer 5

Congressional act to prevent goods created by child laborers from entering interstate commerce = not okay

Majority (5-4) (Day): child labor = production (not commerce). should be 10A state right. Goods themselves are “harmless”

Dissent (Holmes): If the Act affects state conduct this should be fine

Question 6

Bailey v. Drexel Furniture (1922)

Answer 6

cannot attempt to ban child labor through a tax

Question 7

Schechter Poultry (1935)

Answer 7

cannot regulate intrastate activity if only “indirectly” related to interstate commerce (direct vs indirect)

Question 8

Carter v. Carter Coal (1936)

Answer 8

production = purely local activity

Question 9

Jones & Laughlin Steel (1937)

Answer 9

(expansive) dormant commerce clause

Question 10

U.S. v. Darby (1941)

Answer 10

overrules Hammer; reaffirms Jones & Laughlin Steel

Majority (Stone): Congress can regulate intrastate activities if the means are “reasonably adapted” to a legitimate end (McCulloch vibes); Bedford Resolution

Question 11

Wickard v. Filburn (1942)

Answer 11

(most expansive) wheat quotas

Aggregation principle: Single individual may be trivial but in aggregate is “far from trivial” and can be regulated

Avoid formulas (production vs commerce; direct vs indirect)

Majority (9-0) (Jackson): Can regulate if it has a “substantial economic effect” in the aggregate

Question 12

U.S. v. Lopez (1995)

Answer 12

(restrictive) gun-free school zones

majority (Rehnquist): cannot “pile inference upon inference”; expressio unius; three-part test (channels/instrumentalities/substantial relation)

concurrence (Kennedy): stare decisis; actors nor conduct have “commercial character”

concurrence (Thomas): substantial effects and aggregation principle both need to go away

dissent (Breyer): too formulaic; Congress had “rational basis” to find it N&P under CC

Question 13

Three-part test (Lopez) (CC)

Answer 13

Channels (Lottery Case)
Instrumentalities (Shreveport Rate)
Substantial Relation (Wickard)

Question 14

McCulloch v. Maryland (1819)

Answer 14

(NPC) “appropriate means to the attainment of a legitimate end”

Question 15

Bedford Resolution

Answer 15

Precursor to Art. I § 8

National govt should have the power to regulate/legislate in all cases where the states are “separately incompetent” to act

Question 16

Preemption

Question 17

Preemption

Answer 17

Where federal power ends and state power begins (not always clear-cut)

Express: Where a federal statute expressly asserts fed govt power

Implied: Field or conflict

[Implied] Conflict: State law conflicts with federal law so fed law preempts. Where you cannot comply w both at the same time. Seen in Gibbons. (Actual conflict or obstacle to accomplishing a congressional objective)

[Implied] Field: When federal law is “so pervasive” as to occupy the field, then courts infer Congress doesn’t want states to regulate in this area