[tacticalogic]

No. Read my lips. Congress has the power to legislate anything that "substantially affects" their ability to regulate interstate commerce, provided that the legislation is both necessary and proper.

And in order for them to regulate interstate commerce, it will automatically become "necessary and proper" to legislate anything that might affect their ability to do that. Nice. The "necessary and proper" test is appied to the act of enforcing the regulation, and removed from the regulation itself.

[robertpaulsen]

Ah. You thought the Necessary and Proper Clause limits Congress' power simply to buying desks and pencils and hiring bureaucrats to regulate the commerce.

So, according to the way you read it, the states and individuals could undermine and subvert the regulations all they want, and Congress is powerless to do anything about it. Yeah, that makes perfect sense. I'm positive that's what Madison had in mind when he wrote it.

I bet he had a good chuckle with his friends -- "Boy, wait until Congress tries to regulate interstate commerce! The way I wrote this, they'll regret it!"