Posted on 12/04/2004 9:42:04 AM PST by jonestown
On Tuesday, this battle comes to a head when the U.S. Supreme Court hears two cases involving states that ban direct shipments of wine. Advocates on both sides paint the dispute as an epic struggle over states' rights, free markets, cultural values and underage drinking.
The Supreme Court will hear appeals of both cases as it weighs two seemingly competing parts of the U.S. Constitution.
The so-called ``commerce clause´´ in Article I grants Congress the authority ``to regulate commerce. . . among the several states.´´ But the 21st Amendment, ratified in 1933, repealed the nationwide prohibition on alcohol and gave states the right to regulate alcohol sales.
(Excerpt) Read more at mercurynews.com ...
Could be, seeing that big brother uses the commerce clause to ban most anything, including guns, it wants to prohibit.
Those aren't competing parts of the Constitution. The fact that Congress is given the power to regulate interstate commerce doesn't mean states can't regulate it.
Umm, if this isn't "commerce", I don't know what is.
Don't get me wrong, I am anti-regulation, but again, this seems entirely within the bounds of our Constitution (with the possible exception of the language in the 21st Amendmnent).
So given that, I'm rooting for the feds on this one because it will have the effect of lessening overall regulation. I mean how silly is it that I can't send my folks in Texas a gift package from Napa Valley?
mcg1969 wrote:
I'm rooting for the feds on this one because it will have the effect of lessening overall regulation. I mean how silly is it that I can't send my folks in Texas a gift package from Napa Valley?
No. The State of Texas has a ban on shipments into the state of alcohol, except to licensed distributors. So in order to send gift packages you have to make some arrangement with a local liquor distributor.
This case is about two complementary provisions of the U.S. Constitution.
The core value of the commerce clause was that the federal government shall prohibit individual states from discriminating against residents of other states who were attempting to do interstate business. Thus, this prohibits states from doing tariffs or discriminatory taxes on out of state vendors who seek to do business in state.
The 21st Amendment, in contrast, reserves to states the exclusive right to regulate the sale of alcohol within their borders. The purpose of this reservation arises from pre-prohibition commerce clause jurisprudence: states that wanted to ban the sale of alcohol within their borders found that they could not regulate out of state sellers shipping alcohol into their borders. The only thing they could do was ban instate manufacturers. The 21st Amendment, paragraph 3, rectifies this problem by permitting states to ban or regulate all alcohol sales and distribution within their borders, so long as they do not treat out of state sellers differently than in state sellers.
The problem in Michigan and New York is that both states permit in-state wineries to ship direct to consumers, but require out of state wineries to ship only to distributors within the alcohol control board system. That automatically adds 2 middlemen between out of state wineries and their customers, giving in staters a competitive edge.
If it was the intent of the commerce clause to require that it be prohibited, then it would have prohibited it directly.
mcg1969 wrote:
I'm rooting for the feds on this one because it will have the effect of lessening overall regulation. I mean how silly is it that I can't send my folks in Texas a gift package from Napa Valley?
I'm not sure what you're talking about, jonestown. The State of Texas is quite capable of enforcing its own alcohol commerce regulations without federal help. People from within the state have been fighting to have that law overturned.
It's pretty well accepted that states ceded all power over economic discrimination against interstate commerce with the ratification of the constitution. In essence, the commerce clause acts directly to preempt all state discriminatory regulations of commerce.
Furthermore, the Constitution (in Article I, Section 10) explicitly contemplates "inspection laws" that states might enact with regards to imports or exports.
Now you're taking something that was regarded as within the purview of the states (public health, safety, morals and welfare) and attempting to create economic discrimination out of it.
Every state can impose whatever inspection and health safety laws it wants. They can't, however, impose stricter standards on out of state goods and services than on their instate goods and services. The actions by Nebraska and Wyoming appear to be reasonable health and safety precautions. On the other hand, if they required every beeve brought in from out of state to be able to count to 10 but did not impose similar requirements on instate products, then they would likely fail on commerce clause grounds.
At any rate, inspection is not even an issue in the wine cases.
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