I Don’t Think We All Understand ‘Enumerated’

Further evidence comes from today’s decision in Gonzales v. Raich. I think Justice Thomas nails it when he says:

Respondents Diane Monson and Angel Raich use marijuana that has never been bought or sold, that has never crossed state lines, and that has had no demonstrable effect on the national market for marijuana. If Congress can regulate this under the Commerce Clause, then it can regulate virtually anything—and the Federal Government is no longer one of limited and enumerated powers.

No, really? The Federal Government is no longer one of limited and enumerated powers? Clarence Thomas is 57 years old. Surely at some point before now he noticed the tendency of the Federal Government to take more and more power under tenuous justifications at best. Maybe not. He might have been napping. For his entire freakin’ life.

Once again, it’s a damn shame the passage above is from the dissenting opinion.

Update: Radley Balko is all over this decision, with seven posts so far. Via e-mail, J informs me the decision is actually very much in line with previous SCOTUS decisions and can be said to be correct in terms of applying existing law to the question. This puts her squarely in with Orin Kerr. So I guess the tagline for the decision is "Correct, but wrong."