Tuesday, January 11, 2011

Interesting question: Can Congress make you buy broccoli?

Instapundit had a link to an article titled: Can Congress Make You Buy broccoli?

The article starts with:

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Is it constitutional for Congress to make you buy broccoli for your own good, ask three professors of health law at Boston University in the New England Journal of Medicine for December 22nd. The ringing answer that they give to this question is “We don’t know.” They have decided to sit on the fence until others, in the shape of the Supreme Court, decide for them.
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My answer is Congress don't have the authority, but then I don't get to make the final decision.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

The answer has got to be this easy (at the risk of sounding like one of those recent schizo syllogisms so much in the news these days):

IF Congress can make you buy broccoli, THEN the 10th Amendment is meaningless. Since the 10th Amendment is NOT meaningless, Congress can't make you buy broccoli.

The text of the 10th Amendment is:
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

The Commerce Clause was already in the Constitution at the time the 10th Amendment was put in, so if the authors of the Constitution intended for the Commerce Clause to give Congress a blank check to do anything, they would not have bothered to put in the 10th Amendment.

Henry Cate said...

One of the sad aspects of the current level of education in America is only a few could/would follow your reasoning and agree with you.

I wonder how many even recognize what is the 10th ammendment?