Midknight Review has an opinion on interstate commerce laws and the State of Wyoming's recent gun law.

Wyoming has declared "war" on the Feds -- seriously. They are saying , "Interfere with our gun laws and we will arrest and prosecute you" ------ to the Feds !!!

Read this part of the Wyoming law and know that 7 other states have similar preemptive laws (Wyoming is the most emphatic).

“Any official, agent or employee of the United States government who enforces or attempts to enforce any act, order, law, statute, rule or regulation of the United States government upon a personal firearm, a firearm accessory or ammunition that is manufactured commercially or privately in Wyoming and that remains exclusively within the borders of Wyoming shall be guilty of a felony and, upon conviction, shall be subject to imprisonment for not more than two (2) years, a fine of not more than two thousand dollars ($2,000.00), or both.”

Understand that we are a nation of states. We are the united States of America -- a federation of states. The Progressive agenda has been working against this Foundational Principle from the very beginning of this nation's history. In the early 1800's, just 50 years after the founding of this country, Chief Justice John Marshall stated in Gibbons v. Ogden (1824) that federal legislation was supreme over a state law that might affect interstate or foreign commerce. Initially, this was limited to transportation and commerce - the production and transfer of goods grown or manufactured in one state and sold in another.

Understand that the bane of free market capitalism is greed. Greed is everywhere in matters political. A greedy tyrant is protected by the sheer force of his tyranny while a free market economy can be destroyed by the sheer force (read: "greed") of its own sense of free enterprise.

This very conservative editor is not against regulation when it comes to certain elements of a free-market system -- but the arbiter of such regulation needs to be local and state government agencies, never Federal governance.

What has been lacking in the constituting of this country is legislation that provides for the continuance of a federalist society. In the free enterprise of sovereign states, there is a circumstance that can only be described as "the wild wild West." The Founders envisioned each state as having its own economy and legal pursuits. Civil defense was the primary unifying concern. Progressives have disagreed with this premise from the beginning and have spent nearly 200 years in the co-opting of Foundational/Federalist Principles, seeking to transform this country into, yet, another repressive nationalized governance. In the beginning, the several states in our Union managed their own affairs . . . . . .

But then came the emergence of commercial greed and the first of many Federal laws restricting that greed. You must know that "greed" is intrinsically related to commerical/economic free market enterprise. It cannot be separated, only regulated.

In the end, the "solution" to interstate greed, Federal commerce laws, became the tool of Progressives.

And that brings us back to the legal statement recorded above. Make note of the specificity of the law -- limiting legal consideration to that product manufactured and sold WITHIN the boundaries of the State of Wyoming.

The State is standing on the notion that if commerce is wholly "intrastate" rather than "interstate," the State, alone, holds legal dominion over that commerce. While Midknight Review holds to that view, as well, the fact is this "theory" was tried in court and failed.

This editor does not have the reference, but the matter centered itself in the case of a farmer in the mid-West whose product was regulated by the Feds in spite of the fact the he did not sell outside the state. The Court took the position that his intraSate activity effected interState trade and was, thus, under Federal regulation.

In other words, if I manufacture widgets and sell them exclusively within the State in which I work and live, the sale and production of those widgets limits the number of widgets brought into my State. That circumstance, effecting business outside my State, forces me into Federal commercial regulations.

That is the argument Wyoming will be facing. We see this as an uphill battle but one that needs to be made. In fact, we do not believe the State should surrender its freedom to the Federal government regardless of any Court decision ------------ how's THAT for radical rightism !!!!

If Obama and Company is thinking strategically, it will not challenge this law until it has changed the conservative/liberal make-up of the Supreme Court. If States Rights pundits are thinking, they will figure out a way of having this law challenged in the High Court before Obama can effect a change in that Court -- jds.
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