...it grew out of the abuse of the power by the importing States in taxing the non-importing, and was intended as a negative and preventive provision against injustice among the States themselves, rather than as a power to be used for the positive purposes of the General Government, in which alone, however, the remedial power could be lodged.
http://press-pubs.uchicago.edu/founders/documents/a1_8_3_commerces19.html
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Here is Madison explaining the power to regulate commerce with foreign nations:
http://press-pubs.uchicago.edu/founders/documents/a1_8_3_commerces18.html
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Taken together, the above two letters clearly lay out the purpose of each power and how they are different.
Jones & Laughlin Steel, Darby, and Wickard ushered in an era of Commerce Clause jurisprudence that greatly expanded the previously defined authority of Congress under that Clause. In part, this was a recognition of the great changes that had occurred in the way business was carried on in this country. Enterprises that had once been local or at most regional in nature had become national in scope. But the doctrinal change also reflected a view that earlier Commerce Clause cases artificially had constrained the authority of Congress to regulate interstate commerce.
It is patently obvious that Rehnquist is wrong, utterly wrong in his analysis and conflicted in his conclusions.
If "Jones & Laughlin Steel, Darby, and Wickard ushered in an era of Commerce Clause jurisprudence that greatly expanded the previously defined authority of Congress under that Clause" is true then what follows?:
1. The Court expanded the defined authority of Congress.
2. What was the previously defined authority of Congress as regards the Commerce Clause? The Constitution itself which prior jurisprudence simply and strictly followed.
3. That document itself contains the only method of expanding the defined authority of Congress or any branch of the United States Government - Constitutional Amendment.
4. The SCOTUS has no authority to expand the Constitution per that selfsame American Contract.
Taking the second part of Rehnquists statement we find that "earlier Commerce Clause cases artificially had constrained the authority of Congress to regulate interstate commerce". What was the means of this 'artificial' constraint? By what source was Congress constrained?
The legal definition of 'artificial' is
1 a : made by humans —compare NATURAL b : caused or produced by a human and esp. social or political agency artificial price advantage>
2 : arising through operation of law —ar·ti·fi·cial·ly adverb
Definition 1. is a truism for all human laws, but if our Constitution is God-made clearly false and if our Constitution is based on Natural Law clearly false again. Definition 2. makes a joke of Rehnquist's statement. So Rehnquist doesn't mean artificial in the legal sense, but in the colloquial sense of 'not genuine; pretended; or assumed'.
If that is the case, then Rehnquist's statement is a direct attack against the Constitution itself. It cannot be anything else as prior jurisprudence held to the limited government interpretation of the Constitution itself. Rehnquist's statement is a bold admission that the expansion of the Commerce Clause by the SCOTUS is a repudiation of the Constitution of the United States of America.