These two statements are related. Congress has the Constitutional power to regulate interstate commerce. That one little phrase in the Constitution is mostly responsible for the federal government's power grab over the last 100 years or so.
Unless you have your own fully self-sufficient farm and solar plant, and don't have a telephone, TV or Internet service, you're probably consuming goods and services that are made in other states and interacting with companies based in other states.
Since the federal government has the power to regulate those transactions, it can intrude into the corner of your lives.
Also, the amendment giving the federal government the power to collect income tax was another serious mistake. It was sold to voters as a "temporary" measure to pay the country's debts from either the Civil War or World War I. Spoiler: It wasn't temporary. If the government had never had the revenue to engage in the massive spending of the last century, the current fiscal mess wouldn't be happening.
Not even a self-sufficient farm is immune from the federal government, as was decided in Wickard v. Filburn[1]:
"Filburn argued that since the excess wheat he produced was intended solely for home consumption it could not be regulated through the interstate Commerce Clause. The Supreme Court rejected this argument, reasoning that if Filburn had not used home-grown wheat he would have had to buy wheat on the open market. This effect on interstate commerce, the Court reasoned, may not be substantial from the actions of Filburn alone but through the cumulative actions of thousands of other farmers just like Filburn its effect would certainly become substantial. Therefore Congress could regulate wholly intrastate, non-commercial activity if such activity, viewed in the aggregate, would have a substantial effect on interstate commerce, even if the individual effects are trivial."
Yep, Wickard was where it really went off the rails. And then it got even sillier when the court decided in Raich that if you grow a pot plant in your closet purely for personal consumption Congress has the power to regulate it as interstate commerce. They didn't even have the flimsy fig leaf they had in Wickard.
> things you did wholly inside your state
These two statements are related. Congress has the Constitutional power to regulate interstate commerce. That one little phrase in the Constitution is mostly responsible for the federal government's power grab over the last 100 years or so.
Unless you have your own fully self-sufficient farm and solar plant, and don't have a telephone, TV or Internet service, you're probably consuming goods and services that are made in other states and interacting with companies based in other states.
Since the federal government has the power to regulate those transactions, it can intrude into the corner of your lives.
Also, the amendment giving the federal government the power to collect income tax was another serious mistake. It was sold to voters as a "temporary" measure to pay the country's debts from either the Civil War or World War I. Spoiler: It wasn't temporary. If the government had never had the revenue to engage in the massive spending of the last century, the current fiscal mess wouldn't be happening.