Why is the Controlled Substances Act constitutional?

[Sisyphus]

Judicial review is not explicit in the Constitution, but I think it is a necessary consequence of what is explicit. Are there people who still dispute it?

[Mr Skeptic]

Judicial review is not explicit in the Constitution, but I think it is a necessary consequence of what is explicit. Are there people who still dispute it?

 

I certainly do. Sure, it may be necessary for someone to be the interpreters of it, but that could just as well be the public. The real trouble is, how can we ensure that the interpreters don't twist what is said and so change our most important laws on a whim? I suppose that is where our right to bear arms comes in ... unless they interpret it to mean something else and have the power to enforce it.

 

Well, at least we can try to elect presidents that we don't think likely to appoint fuzzy interpreters to the Supreme Court.

[Sisyphus]

What do you mean, "the public?" A law that anyone can interpret for their own purposes is not a law.

 

What a judiciary does is decide whether a law has been broken in cases that come before it. This by necessity requires interpreting what that law means, i.e. who if anyone between the two opposing interpretations before the court is right. The Constitution supersedes all other laws, by explicit design. Therefore a law can itself be illegal, by being in contradiction with the higher law. If this is a defense for someone accused of breaking the supposedly illegal law, then a court has to decide if it is a valid defense. And the Supreme Court is the highest appeal, and so by necessity has the final say in how that highest law is to be interpretted.

[The Bear's Key]

Feeding livestock that will be used for trade means the feed qualifies for regulation? What about building the structure that houses the livestock? How about the land the livestock lives on?

No, the structure and land doesn't eat the food or get traded continuously, as livestock does. Also I'm merely offering possibilities for their reasoning, not defenses for it.

 

It is telling that the court totally changed its collective mind during the New Deal expansion - that's Judicial activism. They changed their mind because they ruled on matters of "wisdom" rather than matters of "power".

Now are you saying that if Congress implemented a law, the Supreme Court must deny it at exactly the moment such law's about to be implemented by Congress....and if they somehow missed doing so, then we're forever stuck with the unconstitutional law?

 

Anyway, is there much difference in challenging by wisdom that a law's interpretation would be unconstitutional, and in challenging a law that's not in Congress's power to implement as it's unconstitutional?

 

 

The supreme court is not to judge the wisdom of a law and its constitutionality, it is to judge the authoritative power of the congress to implement a given law per the constitution.

1873, Dred Scott v. Sandford

...ruled that people of African descent imported into the United States and held as slaves, or their descendants—whether or not they were slaves—were not protected by the Constitution and could never be citizens of the United States. It also held that the United States Congress had no authority to prohibit slavery in federal territories. The Court also ruled that because slaves were not citizens, they could not sue in court. Lastly, the Court ruled that slaves—as chattel or private property—could not be taken away from their owners without due process.

 

1905, Lochner v. New York

...held a "liberty of contract" was implicit in the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The case involved a New York law that limited the number of hours that a baker could work each day to ten, and limited the number of hours that a baker could work each week to 60. By a 5-4 vote, the Supreme Court rejected the argument that the law was necessary to protect the health of bakers, deciding it was a labor law attempting to regulate the terms of employment, and calling it an "unreasonable, unnecessary and arbitrary interference with the right and liberty of the individual to contract.

 

1908, Adair v. United States

...upheld "yellow-dog" contracts that forbade workers from joining trade unions.

 

Maybe it's yet another practice "conservatives" began and later tried to shift blame on liberals?

 

 

 

Government always uses crises to increase their power. War and economics are the most popular of those excuses. The people always shit their pants and give it to them - fear is a great motivator to subordinate groups.

And while I agree that emergencies are when the powers like to exert their abuse, it's mostly a concern when everything's done in secrecy and no expiration date. Also, what steps have you taken to ensure the critics of regulation aren't making stories up for their benefit to screw you? It goes both ways, and so...could it be possible that it's you who -- from reading their hysteria -- shat your pants?

 

 

Is it a loophole to take advantage of tax breaks in the code? Don't we try to walk the lines of the code to our best benefit?

If everyone did it, avoiding 100% taxes, we'd have a big problem. Could be the farmer was a scapegoat for a wider problem. I'd like to see the other variables first. Do we even know the related factors to that case?

 

I don't think the federal government was given the right to regulate growing wheat for myself that I may use to bake bread for sale, or bread for my own consumption.

And did your wheat get paid for by tax money? It's the key here. Not something I'd approve of government doing, but they can play the dirty game of luring farmers into taking money for crops, so government has them sign over a bit of control. Didn't you notice it happen with the bailouts? Moral of the story: watch for the lure.

 

Otherwise, please show me when the government's tried anything like forbidding wheat grown for your own use, minus emergency cases? (i.e. any relatively harmless stuff)

 

 

 

The federal government has the power to ban gardens, home workshops, sewing, every example of production of a good, not intended for sale at all, for every american - including the hermit that lives in the woods in isolation. That they haven't exercised this power, is not an argument, but rather a report on current discretion. The federal government has the power to force you into the market. If you can't grow your own food to eat, or sew your own clothes, or build your own furniture, and any number of other things to sustain yourself - then you're forced into the market in order to live. That 99% of us do this by choice, is not an excuse to dismiss it.

Sounds like your name

 

Also, why hasn't it occured to you that maybe government doesn't have such power, and the ones telling you otherwise have the agenda?

 

 

This is not an issue for you, because you have a collective, communal mindset and this logic is very comfortable for you. You seem to admire government intervention to engineer proper behaviors, and regulate fairness. This is not a disparagement, as it may sound, I'm basing this off of previous conversations in the past and seems a valid point.

Utterly wrong.

 

I said it'd be asanine for the justices to decide it's bad if a farmer on private land grows their own.

 

However, you simply haven't considered what regulation is, at least not to a full/mature extent.

 

Do you think the forefathers were masters of future-telling and innovation who took into account the slew of technological breakthroughs and changes in business operations, the great migrations from countryside to city, and mass production?

 

No, the Constitution and Bill of Rights evolved from past works. And to the present day, things have continued to evolve.

 

The idea is to keep the spirit of what the Constitution intended alive, in a manner that practically guarantees the new changes from abuse. Without overriding the Constitution, i.e. staying to the tradition of what the Forefathers did.

 

Engineering society? It's been done since before the Forefathers, and during. Patents, copyright, trademark. The mere existence of corporations, which I highlighted for you a while back. The structure of government, the commerce clause, everything.

 

Now about regulations -- they're in essence a check vs hurting other people. The forefathers' only restriction on liberty probably was for cases where the activities by a citizen would hurt another, yet technology has since evolved so one person today can do the hurting of thousands or millions worth of 1776-era people.

 

Do you support if a citizen builds a massive nuclear device in their home, even though the Constitution never highlights the methods taken by government to regulate plutonium and the enterprises that handle it, mine it, store it? What about counterfeit money -- do you support people keeping a counterfeiting machine if they're not using the fake cash outside their home? What about space exploration -- do you think government should no nothing even if all the world's other governments made it to space and left us in the dust with the resulting advances?

 

Future scenario: if one day it happens that aliens visit the world, and suddenly the Earth is but a pebble in a vast galactic system, do you think it'd be wise for the U.S. to remain isolated from our world's decisions if every nation decided to join up and pool resources? So that the newcomers supply the rest of Earth with superior advances gained by trade, and the U.S. gets ignored because they said F.U.? Or do you think it'd be wiser for the U.S to take the initiative, agree to joining forces of military and government, therefore having an early influence on the type of government the world is to have? That's part of engineering society, my good friend.

 

Let's not keep stagnant, change is made by advances. The kinds of changes are often unforeseen when they happen quickly, so it's then we need to be most vigilant: the scoundrels are likely to wanna pass their selfish deeds into law while things are changing quickly.

 

And because such changes often involve big players, one variable's more important than ever before in history: the individual. Each person's worth is more than any company, institution, or group. The only exception might be government, as it's a representation of us all -- plus so long as it remains that way.

 

But it also means the individual has limits. If you build a company, that's not considered part of your individualism. Let's highlight the problem with a scifi-ish -- thus a little overblown -- example. Say you construct an eight foot tall mech body suit and walk around, no problem -- the government shouldn't get involved unless you armed it as well (so potentially it can blast the neighborhood to ashes in a few tries). Now say you, a multi-billionaire, had the resources and capability to build a colossal-size mech that nearly reached outer space, so it leaves footprints the size of large towns. Also if the mech falls... Yet what right does the government have in forbidding you to construct -- or even walk in -- such a thing? Or does it have the right to say that such a device -- or articifial extension of yourself -- is not viewed by government as being an individual part of you?

 

Or how about if your neighbor crafts weaponized deadly virsuses just for observation, no intention to use?

 

 

Tyranny of the majority is another usual fear being spread. However if you believe in people overall, the root of the problem isn't a majority. It's the small group who orhestrates that majority's panic, likely in secrecy. So instead, today, we distrust a majority with handling our important decisions -- yet so easily trust a minority of people we'll never see and/or know for sure how they're working out the important decisions.

 

Unravel that contradiction, and perhaps I'll believe tyranny of the majority is the worse.

 

But until then, to me the real culprit is the secrecy in handling those decisions. At least with the majority, we're able to directly keep an eye on their actions.

 

Not so with the minority in power.

 

 

The ideologies of liberals and conservatives to squirm their value systems into law, skirting the principle of a broad based ethical system that accomodates all moral codes limited only by harm to others and their stuff, as originally codified in our founding language, has always left me chafed.

Good, that's a healthy sign for us to work more readily towards solutions.

 

 

The real trouble is, how can we ensure that the interpreters don't twist what is said and so change our most important laws on a whim? I suppose that is where our right to bear arms comes in ...

Elaborate on that?

Edited January 30, 2010 by The Bear's Key
proofread errors/fixes

[Mr Skeptic]

Elaborate on that?

 

We the people are the ones who are supposed to be in charge. We elect people to represent us, to pass laws for us, even to modify the Constitution. And if they don't behave, we shoot them in the face and get a new government, just as the forefathers intended. And the military should not interfere with that, either.

[The Bear's Key]

And the military should not interfere with that, either.

Wow, I'd like to see that actually happen. Regardless, it's a good qualifier you threw in

[ParanoiA]

Now are you saying that if Congress implemented a law' date=' the Supreme Court must deny it at exactly the moment such law's about to be implemented by Congress....and if they somehow missed doing so, then we're forever stuck with the unconstitutional law?

 

Anyway, is there much difference in challenging by wisdom that a law's interpretation would be unconstitutional, and in challenging a law that's not in Congress's power to implement as it's unconstitutional? [/quote']

 

No, the court rejected interpretive expansion, for the first 150 years - until there was a crisis. Then, they interpreted it differently. I see that as a piece of supporting evidence for judicial activism.

 

Also, I don't understand where your second question is coming from. Let me frame my statement this way: The court is not to judge whether they think a law is a good idea, but rather if the law is in conflict with the powers afforded in the constitution. This means they have to first consider what the law proposes to do - what does the law say and what are its boundaries, and then reconcile that with the constitutional authority. Nowhere in this process are they to consider if it's a good law for america or not.

 

Maybe it's yet another practice "conservatives" began and later tried to shift blame on liberals?

 

I don't know if they're blaming liberals or not. I know I am blaming them for using the depression crisis to expand federal power by judicial activism. The unintended consequences being that the word "commerce" becomes any thing that humans adore, and the operative "interstate" becomes any thing that humans do. Well, american humans that is.

 

All of your examples are correct interpretations of the document. Take Dred Scott for instance:

 

The Court held that Scott was not a "citizen of a state" within the meaning of the United States Constitution, as that term was understood at the time the Constitution was adopted, and therefore not able to bring suit in federal court. Furthermore, whether a person is a citizen of a state, for Article III purposes, was question to be decided by the federal courts irrespective of any state's definition of "citizen" under its own law.

 

Representatives and direct Taxes shall be apportioned among the several States which may be included within this Union, according to their respective Numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole Number of free Persons, including those bound to Service for a Term of Years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three fifths of all other Persons[/i'].

 

Disgusting and shameful as it is, slaves were labeled as "other persons", not citizens. So the ruling was correct. They were never protected by the document. This is an example of the court ruling on authority, as it should, not on whether it was fair or not, or a good idea.

 

That's why we had amendments passed to correct it. That's how you change the constitution, with amendments, not "hey, let's just read it different".

 

This is also how you protect the static advantage, the whole purpose of a constitution in the first place. You freeze principles into place, that can only be overridden when a society has evolved to the point that a super majority has changed its collective mind. That way, a simple majority cannot be tyrannical and violate basic human rights and decency afforded in those principles.

 

This is also why I don't like subjective, whimsical applications of law that don't rely on any formula of rights negotiation - to keep from "freezing" intended or unintended bigotry into law like we did with slavery.

 

And while I agree that emergencies are when the powers like to exert their abuse, it's mostly a concern when everything's done in secrecy and no expiration date. Also, what steps have you taken to ensure the critics of regulation aren't making stories up for their benefit to screw you? It goes both ways, and so...could it be possible that it's you who -- from reading their hysteria -- shat your pants?

 

I disagree that secrecy and no expiration date is to be most concerning - GWB didn't hide anything and look how the right romanticized the whole thing. Without secrecy, using propaganda and overt fear mongering, you can actually generate a greater momentum for even more sweeping expansion that you otherwise could in secret. Look at how Obama just picked up the rolling ball and ran with it. GWB established the fear necessary for war and economics, both, and then Obama ran with the economic one. We stole from the people and saved failing enterprises. We have established unprecedented federal intervention due to the fear of economic apocolypse, right out in the open.

 

If everyone did it, avoiding 100% taxes, we'd have a big problem. Could be the farmer was a scapegoat for a wider problem. I'd like to see the other variables first. Do we even know the related factors to that case?

 

They don't matter to the scope of what "commerce" meant, by the framers. It doesn't matter if the farmer was completely ripping off the american public for millions of dollars. It matters what "commerce" is to mean. The details matter for other downstream consequences, but not for this insulative parameter of "commerce".

 

You're doing what they were doing. You think that interpretation of a document depends on 3rd party behavior. That's activism.

 

And did your wheat get paid for by tax money? It's the key here. Not something I'd approve of government doing' date=' but they can play the dirty game of luring farmers into taking money for crops, so government has them sign over a bit of control. Didn't you notice it happen with the bailouts? Moral of the story: watch for the lure.

 

Otherwise, please show me when the government's tried anything like forbidding wheat grown for your own use, minus emergency cases? (i.e. any relatively harmless stuff)[/quote']

 

It doesn't matter. I don't accept the idea that one can create the imperative with their own voluntary actions, and then hold that my rights are now trimmed because of their gesture.

 

That's like passing law that says I must be rewarded tomatoes by the government, and then concluding that because I'm now dependent on government for tomatoes, I can no longer grow my own. If the farmer was subsidized by the government, then the only correct application would be that only those farmers who accept the subsidy should be judged for circumventing their intents. The Agricultural Adjustement Act was not limited to some qualifying parameter other than agriculture, it was a blanket authority.

 

Sounds like your name

 

Also' date=' why hasn't it occured to you that maybe government doesn't have such power, and the ones telling you otherwise have the agenda? [/quote']

 

Uh...because I can read? This is a matter of record - not a matter of voices in my head telling me uncle sam wants to regulate my toilet paper.

 

The historical record is unambiguous. NLRB v Jones and Laughlin Steel expanded the meaning of "commerce", and Wickard v Filburn expanded the meaning of "interstate". Commerce includes anything produced or grown, regardless of intent for sale or personal consumption, and "interstate" includes those things within the borders of the US. That's fact, not opinion.

 

Also, do you characterize the framer's reasons for distribution of power in the design of our government as paranoia? It's the same philosophical foundation. If Madison and Hamilton are paranoid, then yes, so am I.

 

However' date=' you simply haven't considered what regulation is, at least not to a full/mature extent.

 

Do you think the forefathers were masters of future-telling and innovation who took into account the slew of technological breakthroughs and changes in business operations, the great migrations from countryside to city, and mass production?

 

No, the Constitution and Bill of Rights evolved from past works. And to the present day, things have continued to evolve.

 

The idea is to keep the spirit of what the Constitution intended alive, in a manner that practically guarantees the new changes from abuse. Without overriding the Constitution, i.e. staying to the tradition of what the Forefathers did.[/quote']

 

Our technological advances have not changed what a product is. Nothing we've evolved to has changed the nature of trade between people. This is a common argument and is based on some outlandish notion that because we make really cool gadgets and infrastructure that our framers would be surprised to see, that somehow the balance of power between the fed and the states needs to be tilted entirely to the fed.

 

Your argument above carries a strange ignorance to state governments. It's almost as if you've forgotten we have them, which only reinforces my point about overly expanded federal power. It's to the point that the only government we seem to realize is the federal one.

 

States are perfectly situated to regulate business, and they do, for what little power they have left. Nothing I've said implies regulation is bad. I like regulation. I think the federal government should regulate commerce between the states and with foreign nations, like the framers intended (and not because they intended it, but rather I think it's the right boundary), and the states should be free to regulate commerce, production, manufacturing - all that - within their borders.

 

I don't think the state, nor the federal government should regulate production not intended for sale, though. I would need an amendment to stop states from doing that, if I wanted the feds to override them. I doubt I could have my way there, but then, I'm ok with that. Unlike conservatives and liberals, I actually respect the document and its purpose.

 

Future scenario: if one day it happens that aliens visit the world, and suddenly the Earth is but a pebble in a vast galactic system, do you think it'd be wise for the U.S. to remain isolated from our world's decisions if every nation decided to join up and pool resources? So that the newcomers supply the rest of Earth with superior advances gained by trade, and the U.S. gets ignored because they said F.U.? Or do you think it'd be wiser for the U.S to take the initiative, agree to joining forces of military and government, therefore having an early influence on the type of government the world is to have? That's part of engineering society, my good friend.

 

No, it's not. That's a pragmatic international maneuver in the interest of national security that doesn't, in itself, imply any social engineering. Maybe that's where I screwed up - I should have said social engineering. Does that make more sense now? That's what I meant.

 

Let's not keep stagnant' date=' change is made by advances. The kinds of changes are often unforeseen when they happen quickly, so it's then we need to be most vigilant: the scoundrels are likely to wanna pass their selfish deeds into law while things are changing quickly.

 

And because such changes often involve big players, one variable's more important than ever before in history: the individual. Each person's worth is more than any company, institution, or group. The only exception might be government, as it's a representation of us all -- plus so long as it remains that way.

 

But it also means the individual has limits. If you build a company, that's not considered part of your individualism. Let's highlight the problem with a scifi-ish -- thus a little overblown -- example. Say you construct an eight foot tall mech body suit and walk around, no problem -- the government shouldn't get involved unless you armed it as well (so potentially it can blast the neighborhood to ashes in a few tries). Now say you, a multi-billionaire, had the resources and capability to build a colossal-size mech that nearly reached outer space, so it leaves footprints the size of large towns. Also if the mech falls... Yet what right does the government have in forbidding you to construct -- or even walk in -- such a thing? Or does it have the right to say that such a device -- or articifial extension of yourself -- is not viewed by government as being an individual part of you?

 

Or how about if your neighbor crafts weaponized deadly virsuses just for observation, no intention to use?

 

 

Tyranny of the majority is another usual fear being spread. However if you believe in people overall, the root of the problem isn't a majority. It's the small group who orhestrates that majority's panic, likely in secrecy. So instead, today, we distrust a majority with handling our important decisions -- yet so easily trust a minority of people we'll never see and/or know for sure how they're working out the important decisions.

 

Unravel that contradiction, and perhaps I'll believe tyranny of the majority is the worse.

 

But until then, to me the real culprit is the secrecy in handling those decisions. At least with the majority, we're able to directly keep an eye on their actions.

 

Not so with the minority in power. [/quote']

 

Another argument that appears to be ignorant of the amendment process. There is nothing unchangable about the constitution. The framers were well aware that the future is unpredictable and that's why the machinations are there for update.

 

I don't share your reverance for democracy. I used to. But tyrannical majorities have a historical record. Again, look at slavery when judging the value of majority opinion. I don't believe in the people overall, it's merely our only option. I think it was Jefferson, not sure, that said something to the effect that majority rule is not good, it's only better than the alternative. I have come to respect that sentiment.

 

Our framers understood that. So the majority rule concept was synthesized with distributed applications and hierarchies of power and authority so at the very least, simple majorities couldn't enslave major minorities, and cancel the rules of decency and ethics we determined were humane.

 

The constitution is a crucial part of that hierarchy. For one, it establishes all of it, and then includes the process to even make exceptions to itself. So that, at least, a super majority, with a consistent balance across the nation, will be required to change our princples. There is nothing written in stone, rather it's written in ice.

 

You forget that our government was designed in the context of the historical record of the governments in the world up to that time. They were not ignorant to the abuses of majorities and despots - that's why they didn't copy and paste the Roman Republic, but rather overhauled that idea with the lessons learned from their demise. It's worked brilliantly. It's only threatened by not following the design, which is what I believe we have been, and are, incrementally doing.

Edited January 30, 2010 by ParanoiA

[Sisyphus]

We the people are the ones who are supposed to be in charge. We elect people to represent us, to pass laws for us, even to modify the Constitution. And if they don't behave, we shoot them in the face and get a new government, just as the forefathers intended. And the military should not interfere with that, either.

 

What do you mean by "the military should not interfere with that?" The military is sworn to uphold the Constitution (which doesn't provide for violent overthrow of itself, whatever the founders might have intended). And who is the "we" that's shooting them in the face? At what point does the will of one assassin or group of assassins become the will of "we the people?"

[ParanoiA]

What do you mean by "the military should not interfere with that?" The military is sworn to uphold the Constitution (which doesn't provide for violent overthrow of itself, whatever the founders might have intended). And who is the "we" that's shooting them in the face? At what point does the will of one assassin or group of assassins become the will of "we the people?"

 

If a republic gets its power from the people, which is part of definition of a republic, then he's merely pointing out the reality of that consequence. The points you bring up, the questions you are asking, are the dilemma of the breakdown of a government.

 

Otherwise, they're not a republic, they are subjects ruled by aristrocracy (which, to some, is the de facto arrangement in the first place).

 

The military should not interfere, on principle, because the "boss" has spoken in that case. They should not turn on their own people. Obviously, this may conflict with their constitutional charge.

 

I guess what I'm saying is, there is no qualifying prerequisite formula for navigating this dilemma. But to subordinate yourself without condition is no solution to the dilemma either.

[Mr Skeptic]

What do you mean by "the military should not interfere with that?" The military is sworn to uphold the Constitution (which doesn't provide for violent overthrow of itself, whatever the founders might have intended).

 

The Constitution is not the government. If defending the Constitution requires the violent overthrow of our government, that is what the military is sworn to do. In theory anyways.

I, (NAME), do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. So help me God.

 

Their first priority is to defend the Constitution; obeying their superiors is only secondary.

 

And who is the "we" that's shooting them in the face? At what point does the will of one assassin or group of assassins become the will of "we the people?"

 

If they are the majority? Which is actually rather practical.

---

Merged post follows:

Consecutive posts merged

That's how you change the constitution, with amendments, not "hey, let's just read it different".

 

qft

Edited January 30, 2010 by Mr Skeptic
Consecutive posts merged.