Commerce clause

In my post about gun laws that are ignored by criminals, the comments included a discussion of Federal law, specifically 18 USC 922(n), which reads:

It shall be unlawful for any person who is under indictment for a crime punishable by imprisonment for a term exceeding one year to ship or transport in interstate or foreign commerce any firearm or ammunition or receive any firearm or ammunition which has been shipped or transported in interstate or foreign commerce.

Reader Differ asks what the law means when they say "has been shipped or transported in interstate commerce." As with most things involving the government, the phrase has been folded, spindled, and mutilated beyond its common meaning so that power that the government shouldn't have can be usurped by the powers that be. Let's see how that works:

The Constitution grants the Federal government the power to regulate commerce through the "commerce clause." The Commerce Clause refers to Article 1, Section 8, Clause 3 of the U.S. Constitution, which gives Congress the power “to regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several states, and with the Indian Tribes.

As with many things, they use this particular clause to get their hands on powers they otherwise wouldn't have. In this case, they use the Supreme Court case Wickard v. Filburn. That case concerned a farmer that was growing wheat for use on his own farm. He contended that he was not subject to the limits that the Federal Government had placed on wheat production, because his wheat was not sold, so it could not be regulated as commerce, let alone "interstate" commerce (described in the Constitution as "Commerce... among the several states"). The Supreme Court disagreed. They held that because he was growing his own wheat, this meant that he did not buy wheat from someone else. Since he did not buy someone else's wheat, this affected interstate commerce, and made his wheat subject to the regulations.

This court case basically says that the Feds can rule over anyone they please, without worrying about enumerated powers. All they have to do is play "six degrees of separation" to show that the behavior they wish to dictate affected interstate commerce in some way, no matter how tenuous.

THAT is yet another way that the Constitution has been turned into toilet paper by the court system.