They finally admitted it! Yesterday’s ruling from the Federal Appeals Court in DC states: “The Government concedes the novelty of the [individual] mandate and the lack of any doctrinal limiting principles; indeed, at oral argument, the Government could not identify any mandate to purchase a product or service in interstate commerce that would be unconstitutional, at least under the Commerce Clause.” The Court concluded that the Federal government has the authority to force any American to purchase any product or service that Congress requires them to purchase. It explains, “It is certainly an encroachment on individual liberty, but it is no more so than a command that a farmer cannot grow enough wheat to support his own family.” This concluding statement is referring to and cites Wickard v. Filburn, of course.
This is the argument that Liberty Legal Foundation has been making all along. Wickard IS THE PROBLEM!! Finally we have a Court that doesn’t talk around the issue. The court simply points to Wickard and explains that the individual mandate is just like Wickard. They also explain that they don’t like this outcome:
“We acknowledge some discomfort with the Government’s failure to advance any clear doctrinal principles limiting congressional mandates that any American purchase any product or service in interstate commerce. But to tell the truth, those limits are not apparent to us either, because the power to require the entry into commerce is symmetrical with the power to prohibit or condition commercial behavior, or because we have not yet perceived a qualitative limitation. That difficulty is troubling...”
The court then cites Wickard and upholds the individual mandate.
At risk of being a broken record, we will keep repeating the problem until Americans understand how we got here. Wickard destroyed the Constitution and the concept of Federalism because it eliminated the limitations on Congressional authority. Those limitations were the centerpiece of the Constitution. They were absolutely essential to the proper functioning of our Constitutional Republic. Without those limitations we end up with a despotic Federal tyrant: AS HAS JUST BEEN PROVEN BY THE OPINION IN THIS CASE!
But you don’t have to take my word for it. Just a few years after the Constitution was ratified, everyone knew what the Commerce Clause meant and what it didn’t mean: President James Madison, the “Father of the Constitution”, vetoed a bill passed by Congress that would have authorized Federal spending on highways. President Madison explained:
“But seeing that such a power is not expressly given by the Constitution, and believing that it can not be deduced from any part of it without an inadmissible latitude of construction and reliance on insufficient precedents; believing also that the permanent success of the Constitution depends on a definite partition of powers between the General and the State Governments, and that no adequate landmarks would be left by the constructive extension of the powers of Congress as proposed in the bill, I have no option but to withhold my signature from it”
President Madison understood that the powers granted to the Federal government were intentionally very limited. This was understood for 150 years. The Wickard Court destroyed our system of government and left us defenseless against a despotic Federal tyrant. We must Revive our Constitutional Republic.
Liberty Legal Foundation is preparing an amicus brief that will be filed with the Supreme Court. We will point out the facts set forth here. We will be citing the opinion from the DC Circuit Court, among the other opinions which all illustrate that the source of the problem is Wickard. More importantly, we will be citing and quoting the Founding Fathers themselves. We must overturn Wickard.
Please continue to help us in our cause. Please continue to spread the word. Imagine the impact if our amicus brief to the Supreme Court represents hundreds of thousands of Americans asking for Wickard to be overturned.
In Liberty,
Van Irion
Co-Founder, Lead Counsel
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