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Supreme Court Allows Direct Shipment of Wine
jrrl writes "For a while now, ordering wine (of the alcoholic variety, not the almost 0.9 variety) online has been a somewhat dicey proposition in some states. But today, the Supreme Court overturned state laws that disallowed direct shipment of wine from out of state. Their reasoning is that the states' 'authority to regulate the sale of alcohol within their borders' under the 21st Amendment does not supersede 'the Constitution's ban on state discrimination against interstate commerce.' States could still disallow all direct shipments, but at least they have to be evenhanded now."
Anyone else glance at the title and think: What the hell would a state have to do with non-emulation?
"...Well, there's egg and bacon; egg sausage and bacon; egg and spam; egg bacon and spam; egg bacon sausage and spam..."
States never, ever had the right to regulate interstate commerce. That power is reserved for congress.
The reason why is when we had the Articles of Confederation, every state regulated commerce, and it was a clusterfuck. It was like dealing with foriegn nations, all with their own tarrifs and trade policies.
This law has nothing to do with state rights, because it was never a state rights issue.
Rosco: "If brains were gunpowder, Enos couldn't blow his nose."
I don't get why it even matters. I mean, why should wine be any different than computer equipment, condoms, flowers or pepperidge farms gift baskets? Why should any of them be restricted (or for that matter, why shouldn't ALL of them be restricted).
It doesn't matter, and that's the point that the Supreme Court just hammered home. The real essence of this is that a state can do a lot of things to regulate what (and how) things can be sold in their state, but they can't do so in a way that discriminates against people in other states (people, in this case, being winemakers selling across the border). So, you can let everyone sell wine, or no one. But the patchwork of crazy regulations was definately restricting commerce in an asymmetrical (and unconstitutional) way.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
This is still a very usual split, but overall, the political nature of the court is exaggerated. When I last saw stats (several years ago), any pairwise comparison of the justices found them in agreement at least 60% of the time.
... I will, on stare decisis grounds, enforce a self executing "negative" Commerce Clause in two situations: (1) against a state law that facially discriminates against interstate commerce, and (2) against a state law that is indistinguishable from a type of law previously held unconstitutional by this Court.
m e_court_s.html)
That said, this particular 5-4 split has not happened in the past ten years
However, within 5-4 decisions, Stevens and Thomas agree about 16 percent of the time.
Scalia was clearly the swing-vote on this case
"Although Scalia is no fan of the dormant commerce clause, he has written that:
Since the state laws in question here demonstrably fell into the former category, and we can infer that Scalia was not persuaded by Thomas' account of the 21st amendment, stare decisis required him to vote to strike down these laws." (http://www.professorbainbridge.com/2005/05/supre
It's fundamental to the way the US economic system was set up that the States are prohibited from acting in a protective manner over their industries with regard to other States. You can't charge a tarriff, for example, when you import cars into California from Detroit. What a State can do is regulate the way something is sold within its borders. It seems to me Section 2 of the 21st Amendment was put there to overcome objections from those States that wanted to remain dry after Prohibition was repealed for everyone else. I think the Supremes are holding them to this. States are still allowed to prohibit mail-order booze -- but they must prohibit all of it, not allow it from in-state producers and not those from out-of-state. Many of these laws (IIRC) were frankly written to protect local wine producers. That ain't allowed.
I agree that Michigan's desired ban seems silly. But if that's what they want, they can have it. The idea that people have the right and responsibility to mostly regulate their own local affairs as they see fit is basic to our federal system. That's why we have a federal government and not a national government. (It's been acting more like the latter than the former lately. That's no reason to wish it could when we want it to -- to, say, force Michigan to allow Internet wine sales -- and similtaneously wish it wouldn't when we don't -- in, for example, the way some "homeland security" issues are being handled.)
And the brethren went away edified.
I happen to believe that morality means nothing when not imposed from within.
OK. Agreed.
Why not be able to have both unfettered school prayer AND legal drug use by adults?
We have legal school prayer. The only issue is whether an authority acting in government capacity can lead it or not. But of course, that's not "morality being imposed". That's only the government telling you how to pray. Completely different.
Isn't society better off when the individual is free and the government has a few defined tasks that it specializes on rather than becoming some monstrosity that has 50 bazillion departments that regulate everything from littering to education to the hair cut a toy poodle can have on sunday?
Where's the poodle part? Not aware of that. The government has evolved to be big. How would you know how large it should be? Oh that's right, you're making practical decisions based on idealogical principles! How silly of me! We don't need any evidence that it could work in a modern society! Count me in!
It was the will of most whites for much of our history to keep blacks down.
For the first ones, it really depends on how you define "most". In 1861 (over 100 years ago, thus further than over half our history ago), a man was elected president from a new party founded on the basis of abolishing slavery. He recieved most of the popular vote. Most of the founding fathers were against slavery in principle, but saw no way out of it (many freed their slaves after their death).
It was the will of most Germans to elect Hitler.
Hitler never got the majority of the popular vote so I fail to see how that's most. His high was somewhere around 1/3. In fact, if the laws written in the Weimar constitution were actually followed, Hitler would've never had vast sweeping powers. But Hitler decided he didn't need a big government making laws and abolished the government by fiat He could do it himself! I guess you and he do have something in common!
(As a caveat, disolving the representitive body in England caused a civil war a few hundred years ago. The Germans had no such response in the 1930's, so maybe I'll give you popular acquiescence, but no doubt caused by popular fear).
Seriously, I enjoy your principles, but where you go with it and how you derive it are simply ranting. If I want sensationalism, I'll watch Jerry Springer.
-- Political fascism requires a Fuhrer.
"If you go fishing with a Baptist, make sure there is at least 2 of them" (e.g. if there is only one then he will drink all of your beer).
What's the difference between a Baptist and a Catholic?
The Catholic will say "hi" to you in the liquor store.
(I grew up going to a Baptist church...)
S
LOL, this is a health issue. We don't want kids getting drunk and turning into alcoholics.
Yeah, I can just picture it now:
Billy: "Hey Bobby, wanna get drunk?"
Bobby: "Sure, Billy! But where are we going to get some alcohol? Sure we can fight in Iraq and kill people, but we need to be 21 to be allowed permission to drink certain beverages."
Billy: "Well, lucky for me I managed to get a credit card without them knowing I'm underage."
Bobby: "Cool! But won't stores check your ID?"
Billy: "Aha! You forgot about the internet. Tons of shops willing to sell you cases of wine."
Bobby: "Oh man, this is going to be great. Let's google for some wine sites."
Billy: "Okay, here's a good one. Lots of stuff in stock. How about a 2003 Pinot Noir?"
Bobby: "Naw, I heard that's a bad year. Now a 2004 Shiraz is just what the doctor ordered!"
Billy: "You fool! Only sissies drink Shiraz, and 2004 is much too recent to fully develop the subtle hints of oak that a good Shiraz requires. I say we go for a medium-bodied Cabernet Sauvignon, say... 2002 late season."
Bobby: "But all they have from 2002 is the leftover wines. Don't you read Wine Spectator? And those ones are decidedly missing out on the fruity overtones and smooth finish."
Billy: "Good point. Hm... how about something from the Napa Valley, I hear their 2001 Merlots are spectacular."
Bobby: "Excellent choice... so, want a case of it?"
Billy: "Yeah, might as well. We'll have some good leftovers for all those chicks we'll invite over! [chuckle]"
Bobby: "Okay, I'm just checking out... now standard shipping is 5-7 days, but for an extra $21.95, we can have two-day shipping fully insured."
Billy: "Do they do overnight?"
Bobby: "Apparently none of the couriers will take overnight shipments because it's so fragile."
Billy: "Okay, let's do the two-day shipping."
Bobby: "Done. Order has been placed, here's the confirmation number for UPS. Man, Wednesday night is going to be rocking!"
Billy: "Yeah man... I can't wait..."
Bobby: [stares at monitor blankly]
Billy: "So..."
Bobby: "Uh..."
Billy: "Hey, wanna sniff some glue? Then maybe neck a little?"
Bobby: "Sure, I'll go get the stuff!"
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