Supreme Court decision in Gonzalez v Raich

The Supreme Court has issued a decision in Gonzalez (formerly Ashcroft) v Raich. This is the medical marijuana case that was argued in part by Randy Barnett of the Volokh Conspiracy; the Conspiracy has better commentary on the decision than I could hope to produce.

The Heartless Libertarian briefly comments that this case doesn't bode well for the outcome of US v Stewart, a pending case dealing with the intrastate construction of machine guns in which the 9th Circuit struck down federal regulations barring such activity because the interstate commerce clause only grants authority over, well, interstate commerce.

The Libertarian Party doesn't much like the outcome in Raich either, and it is pledging to work towards introducing federal legislation on the issue. It's worth a try, I guess, but I can't be optimistic about their chances.

Xlrq at damnum absque injuria has links to the full text of the decision, as well as her own commentary. To sum up, the statists have four solid votes in favor of federal power, and the remaining justices don't have a clear unifying philosophy to draw them together in a single opinion. In this case, Justice Scalia defected from his usual federalist position to support federal prohibitions on marijuana -- as xlrq characterizes it, "No, you dummies, we shouldn?t be upholding this unnecessary, improper and blatantly unconstitutional law under a tortured reading of the commerce clause, we should uphold it under an equally tortured reading of the ?necessary and proper? clause, instead."

David Hardy at Of Arms & the Law has good comments, as does Kevin at The Smallest Minority.

The only note I will add is that this case follows clear, if aging, Supreme Court precedent in Wickard v Filburn. That case involved a farmer growing wheat on his own farm for his own use (animal fodder); the Court held that the Federal Government could regulate his growth and use of that crop despite the lack of an interstate commerce nexus because the market for crops was interstate. That's the decision that gutted the legal underpinning for federalism. The present Court has issued some rulings (eg, Lopez) limiting federal power, but apparantly is not yet ready to fully endorse a return to federalism.

Overall, a very disappointing decision, but not at all unexpected. This is why getting strong federalists on the Court and through the Senate while Bush is in office is vital.

Posted on 2005-06-06 23:23:42.0 by matthew@triggerfinger.org

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