“For the power given to Congress by the Constitution does not extend to the internal regulation of the commerce of a State, (that is to say of the commerce between citizen and citizen,) which remain exclusively with its own legislature; but to its external commerce only, that is to say, its commerce with another State, or with foreign nations, or with the Indian tribes.” –Thomas Jefferson, Jefferson’s Opinion on the Constitutionality of a National Bank : 1791. http://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/bank-tj.asp

With terms like “does not extend” and “exclusively,” Jefferson made it clear that Congress has no authority to interfere with intrastate commerce.

To my knowledge, the first case that mentioned agriculture where justices had misplaced their Jefferson notes was US v. Butler. But the Butler case at least mentioned the 10th Amendment in conjunction with agriculture.

“From the accepted doctrine that the United States is a government of delegated powers, it follows that those not expressly granted, or reasonably to be implied from such as are conferred, are reserved to the states or to the people. To forestall any suggestion to the contrary, the Tenth Amendment was adopted. 18 The same proposition, otherwise stated, is that powers not granted are prohibited. None to regulate agricultural production is given, and therefore legislation by Congress for that purpose is forbidden.” –United States v. Butler, 1936.

Butler was appropriately decided against Congress.

But based on what justices wrote about the 10th Amendment and agriculture in Butler, by the time that the USSC had decided Wickard, one might think that the states had ratified the Constitution with an amendment giving Congress the power to regulate agriculture. But this was not the case. What happened is the following, IMO.

When Butler was decided, FDR hadn’t yet nominated any justices to the USSC. So “old guard,” Constitution-respecting majority justices were still blocking Congress from trying to destroy the Constitution, particularly state sovereignty, with respect to FDR-inspired socialistic legislation. But by the time Wickard was examined, four-term FDR had had the opportunity to nominate a pro-big federal government, outcome-driven USSC majority. And judging by Jefferson’s clear explanation of the Commerce Clause which majority justices seemingly didn’t want to touch, the mission of FDR’s majority justices in Wickard was evidently to destroy state sovereignty in order to centralize government power.

In fact, comparing the Court’s clarification of the 10th A. in Butler with the pieces of the 10th A. in Wickard, FDR’s corrupt justices were evidently in the process of sweeping the last traces of the 10th A. under the carpet when Wickard was decided.

“In discussion and decision, the point of reference, instead of being what was “necessary and proper” to the exercise by Congress of its granted power, was often some concept of sovereignty thought to be implicit in the status of statehood.” –Justice Jackson(?), Wickard v. Filburn, 1942. http://supreme.justia.com/us/317/111/case.html

So by the time that Wickard was decided, FDR’s puppet justices had reduced 10th A. protected state sovereignty to a wives’ tale, IMO.

The bottom line is that the corrupt USSC was helping corrupt Congress to bypass Article V in order to unconstitutionally create new powers for itself, IMO. After all, given that there is no mention of Article V in Butler or Wickard, Article V was seemingly lost in the same pile of papers containing Jefferson’s writings about the Commerce Clause.

So will somebody please remind me what the USSC is supposed to do for a living?