The Volokh Conspiracy
Mostly law professors | Sometimes contrarian | Often libertarian | Always independent
Today in Supreme Court History: June 6, 2005
6/6/2005: Gonzales v. Raich is decided.
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By now the court might have shifted enough to have a 5-4 majority for the “Congress is not omnipotent” side.
But it was about marijuana. Congress is indeed omnipotent when they’re on the justices’ side on a culture war issue.
That’s just it. Scalia spent his entire career blasting an expansive reading of the Commerce Clause, then passed up an opportunity to curtail it when he had the chance because doing so would have legalized pot. What a phony.
And he didn’t even have to: the majority had 5 votes, even without Scalia’s “drug exception to the constitution” concurrence. When push came to shove, he ditched on the constitution :/
One time Thomas’s dissent was dead-on. He also dissented in Kelo about the same time and was dead-on there, too. I usually don’t agree with him, but sometimes he’s very right.