I too have enjoyed the discussions.
The hard nut of what we're talking about here is the vagueness of language.
Looking back at 1787, what were the issues? The big problem was that the Confederation was falling apart, not discharging its debts, not able to get the British out of the Northwest nor the Spanish to open the Mississippi. The states were erecting tolls between themselves and vexing commerce. Massachussetts had just experienced a nasty rebellion (Shays).
There was a lot on the politicians' minds, and the new Constitution was aimed, especially, at fixing the instant wrongs. So, the war making and treaty making power: these were concentrated in the Federal government, and the states were stripped of these powers. Why? So that the US could make treaties (Britain wouldn't even bother to treat with the US in the late 1780s, because any particular state could simply derogate from the treaty), and that the US could take full possession of its territories, and get the Mississippi mouth open to navigation.
Likewise, the commerce power: this was concentrated in the federal government.
But what does "commerce" mean? It's not defined. It was an amorphous grant of amorphous power. Back then, it meant "The Federal government has the power to override anything that the states are doing that's messing with internal and external trade of goods", which is a pretty plenary power. It's still that way today, really. Of course, absolutely anything can be defined in economic terms, and legislated under the commerce power. That has been the trend of the 20th Century, but this was not a radical departure from the ideas of 1787. The trick is that when slavery emerged as THE issue between the states, nec plus ultra, in the 1800s, everything was washed through that prism, and "states' rights" meant: "The right to protect slavery forever", while federal rights meant the opposite.
Slavery was not the issue in 1787. Oh, it was there, and on people's minds too. It was a sectional interest of some importance, but it was not THE issue about which states' rights alarms were sounded by the anti-federalists.
When one reads the Constitution and really thinks about it, the grants of power are very broad and general, and the limits are not spelled out. That's always been a strength and a weakness of the document: a strength because the advocates of needful change can find the power there in the implications of the grants - a weakness because the opponents of any change can always claim that the Constitution is being violated, and therefore that the whole enterprise of change is politically ILLEGITIMATE.
There is no good solution at all to the conflict, and most people find themselves on opposite sides of it depending on the issue. As an example, on another thread of FR, someone is yelling his head off at me that the Second Amendment does NOT grant the states the power to regulate guns, that it is NOT a restriction on the Federal government, but is a restriction on ALL government in America. This is argued very passionately. I don't want to debate the merits or demerits of that position here (which is why I have not mentioned the poster by named nor cc'd him). My point is that conservatives can be very, very selective in their view of original intent. Most conservatives believe in a very broad, even plenary grant of a right in the 2nd Amendment, which even the states cannot pare back upon, but believe that the power to regulated commerce, granted in the First Article, is much more limited.
There is no textual basis at all on which to make this distinction. They simply do it because of their political beliefs.
That's what everybody does with the Constitution, and indeed, you practically have to, because the document is so short, and so vague on specifics, that absolutely every issue can be contested as being within, or outside of, its grip.
We started the discussion here talking about the Supreme Court. On the one hand, Article III says that Congress can limit jurisdiction. On the other, the Constitution says that it's the Supreme Law of the Land. Functionally, nothing can impose that rule on Congress other than the other branches of government.
And so it goes.
There are hundreds of volumes of Supreme Court jurisprudence that attempt to spell out what those words mean, and certainly some of the Founders expected that's what the Court would do. Others didn't care about that issue. Limiting the courts was not a big concern in 1787.
On any issue, the language is vague. Freedom of the press: Congress shall pass NO law abridging it. Ergo, laws against child pornography are unconstitutional, right? And if we want to outlaw child pornography, we have to AMEND THE CONSTITUTION, right?
Funny how that argument looks altogether less appealing when the thing that wants regulation is something we really hate.
For the record, I would say that, to regulate child pornography, a strict constructionist would have to say "Yes, you have to amend the constitution for CONGRESS to pass such a law, and if incorporation by the 14th Amendment inheres, then for the states too." An originalist would have to say "No! Nobody intended the Constitution to be an authorization for moral license." A "living textualist" would say that there were no photographs in 1789, so the Bill of Rights doesn't directly address pornography. BUT, states could and did regulate morals in 1789, and by extension, they can still do so today. And with incorporation via the 14th Amendment, the Federal Government can too.
Which answer is right?