Our Changing ConstitutionPierson, Charles W. (Charles Wheeler)
History
Our Changing Constitution
Pierson, Charles W. (Charles Wheeler)
Constitutional history -- United States; United States -- Politics and government
The makers of the Constitution never intended that the people of one
state should regulate, or pay for supervising, the conduct of citizens
of another state. They made a division of governmental powers between
nation and states along broad and obvious lines. To the Federal
Government were entrusted matters of a strictly national
character--foreign relations, interstate commerce, fiscal and monetary
system, post office, patents and copyrights. Everything else was
reserved, to the states or the people. Here was a scheme at once
explicit and elastic. Explicit as to the nature of the functions to be
performed by the National Government; elastic enough to permit the
exercise of all other powers reasonably incidental to the powers
expressly granted. The Constitution is not, and never was intended to
be, a strait-jacket.
Proofs abound of the adequacy of the constitutional scheme to deal with
changing conditions. For example, when the Constitution was adopted,
railroads, the most powerful economic force in our present civilization,
were unknown. Nevertheless, the Constitution contains adequate provision
for dealing with the railroads. They are instruments of interstate
commerce and may be controlled by the Federal Government under the
express grant of power to regulate such commerce. Similar considerations
apply in the case of those nationwide industrial combinations popularly
known as "trusts." Their activities are largely in the field of
interstate commerce and are subject to control as such by the Federal
Government. Theoretically, only such activities of the railroads and
trusts as are of an interstate character fall within the federal
jurisdiction. Everything else lies within the jurisdiction of the
states. However, a practical people will not long permit matters which
are essentially single and entire in their nature (for example, railroad
classifications and rates) to be split up merely for purposes of legal
jurisdiction and control. In such matters, therefore, some measure of
federal encroachment is inevitable in order that industry and progress
shall not be hampered. The encroachment, however, is more apparent than
real. The industries are national in scope, and all the activities of
each are more or less interwoven and interdependent. Hence state
regulation of the intrastate activities may sometimes be overruled as an
interference with federal regulation of the interstate commerce. There
is nothing in this which involves any real violation of the
Constitution. It is merely an application of Marshall's doctrine of
implied powers.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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