Supreme Court Medical Marijuana

[lehighguy]

The issue at hand is the congress SHOULDN'T have been able to enact the stupid law in the first place.

[Felix_Nietsche]

.....Over INTRA-State Commerce (medical marijuana grown in Cali, prescribed in Cali, and used in Cali).

The Govenor of California needs to arrest federal law enoforcement agents who 'arrest medical marijuana users. All the charges would be charges under the laws of the STATE OF CALIFORNIA. The charges could include:
1. Armed Kidnapping
2. Illegal detainment
3. Theft (of the doctor prescribe weed)
4. Battery (if the victim is forcefully 'arrested')
This should be good for 15-30 years in a California state prison. Put a few federal agents in California State prisons and Federal agents won't be so gung ho to arrest medical marijuana users.

The 10th amendment of the Constitution clearly gives STATES the sovereignty over INTRA-state commerce. The legislatures of the states can not sit by with their hat-in-hand saying. 'Please federal govt, lets us have our rights under the US Constitution, pretty please'. You don't beg people for your rights, you take them...

Of course if marijuana crosses state lines then the federal govt could claim jurisdiction. Then the INTER-State commerce clause could be legally invoked.

[QuadsOverQuads]

And here we have the real (political) motivation underlying this particular decision (which also explains the way the specific justices came down on the question) : the Activist Right hates the federal authority that arises under the Commerce Clause. They hate it SPECIFICALLY because it allows for federal-level labor regulation. The Activist Right intends to gut that authority, via radically activist SCOTUS rulings (THIS is what they are after with their next SCOTUS appointee -- Roe v. Wade is little more than a means for keeping the useful idiots of the Religious Right in line while the real damage to the Constitution is done elsewhere).

Bottom line: they're already setting up their line of attack on Commerce Clause authority, and this case is just another example of that larger game-plan. It isn't the first case in this line, and it won't be the last. By the time it's done (if the wingnuts get their way), you can kiss federal labor standards goodbye. That is their intent and their ultimate goal, plain and simple. The point being, to truly understand why the so-called "conservatives" ruled as they did on this case, you need to keep this broader context in mind.


q/q

[JackWhite]

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The point being, to truly understand why the so-called "conservatives" ruled as they did on this case, you need to keep this broader context in mind.


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Sure..could be this massive plot..or maybe people like Clarence Thomas actually believe in what the Constitution says. Maybe he has this crazy notion that Interstate Commerce actually means commence taking place between people in difference states. That radical.

[elwoodblues]

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or maybe people like Clarence Thomas actually believe in what the Constitution says. Maybe he has this crazy notion that Interstate Commerce actually means commence taking place between people in difference states. That radical.

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Or maybe that left wing radical Antonin Scalia was right when he essentially said that because regulating drug sales is generally a permissible activity under the Commerce Clause, that regulation of activities that fall within that category that are intrastate activities are proper due to the necessary and proper clause.

[vulturesrow]

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or maybe people like Clarence Thomas actually believe in what the Constitution says. Maybe he has this crazy notion that Interstate Commerce actually means commence taking place between people in difference states. That radical.

[/ QUOTE ]

Or maybe that left wing radical Antonin Scalia was right when he essentially said that because regulating drug sales is generally a permissible activity under the Commerce Clause, that regulation of activities that fall within that category that are intrastate activities are proper due to the necessary and proper clause.

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Elwood,

Just curious, given your background in law, whether you agree with my assertion that this decision was essentially a a "conservative" one in that the Court elected to uphold precedent?

[elwoodblues]

[ QUOTE ]
Just curious, given your background in law, whether you agree with my assertion that this decision was essentially a a "conservative" one in that the Court elected to uphold precedent?

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Adherence to precedent isn't a liberal or conservative position (in my opinion.) Liberals want to adhere to precedent when they like the precedent and overrule precedent when they don't. The same is true of conservatives.

Ask conservatives if they want to overrule Roe v. Wade and I highly doubt you'll hear much in the way of "we should keep it because it has precedential value."

[vulturesrow]

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Adherence to precedent isn't a liberal or conservative position (in my opinion.) Liberals want to adhere to precedent when they like the precedent and overrule precedent when they don't. The same is true of conservatives.

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Understood. I actually agree with that more or less.

However I noticed that you mentioned Scalia concurring opinion and this is one I find most interesting. Some conservatives have portrayed Scalia as some sort of a traitor for his concurring decision but I think he was pretty true to what I understand his particular form of legal thinking. Would you say this was just an expression of the form of jurisprudence that Scalia believes in or does it mirror "conservative" political thinking?


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Ask conservatives if they want to overrule Roe v. Wade and I highly doubt you'll hear much in the way of "we should keep it because it has precedential value."

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I think Scalia has said on this point that abortion should a legislative decision and that the Court has no business deciding what the law of the land should be regarding abortion.

[JackWhite]

Here is an interesting George Will article from this week on the question at hand: what is a conservative or liberal decision or judge.

http://jewishworldreview.com/cols/will1.asp

[MMMMMM]

Elwood,

From just my layman's take, it does strike me as quite strange that the Commerce Clause should have been interpreted so broadly (not in this case, but originally).

Care to shed any light on that?

And do you agree that the interpretation of the Commerce Clause should have been so very broad (again, initially or originally)? And what about its seeming conflict with that Amendment which delegates respective powers? Why should a clause to carry more weight than an Amendment?