substantial economic effect

In March 1992, Alfonso Lopez, Jr., a twelfth-grade student at Edison High School in San Antonio, Texas, arrived at school carrying a concealed .38-caliber handgun and five bullets. Acting on an anonymous tip, school authorities confronted Lopez, who admitted possessing the weapon. Local police arrested him and charged him under Texas law with firearm possession on school premises. The following day, state charges were dismissed after federal agents charged Lopez with violating the Gun-Free School Zones Act of 1990. A federal grand jury indicted him on one count of knowing possession of a firearm at a school zone. Lopez moved to dismiss the indictment, arguing that the statute exceeded Congress's power to legislate control over public schools. The district court denied the motion, concluding that the statute was a constitutional exercise of Congress's power to regulate activities affecting commerce because the business of schools affects interstate commerce. After a bench trial, the court found Lopez guilty and sentenced him to six months' imprisonment and two years of supervised release. Lopez appealed to the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit, which reversed the conviction, holding that the statute was beyond Congress's power under the Commerce Clause. The Supreme Court granted certiorari to review the case.

In 1996 California voters enacted the Compassionate Use Act authorizing limited marijuana use for medicinal purposes by seriously ill state residents upon a physician’s recommendation or approval. Angel Raich and Diane Monson, California residents suffering from serious medical conditions, began using marijuana after their licensed physicians determined that conventional medicines failed to provide relief and that marijuana was the only effective treatment available. Raich, unable to cultivate her own supply, relies on two caregivers who grow and provide locally grown marijuana at no charge, which she then processes into oils, balms, and foods. Monson cultivates her own marijuana plants and ingests the drug by smoking or vaporization. On August 15, 2002, county deputy sheriffs and federal Drug Enforcement Administration agents arrived at Monson’s home. County officials concluded after investigation that Monson’s use complied with California law, but after a three-hour standoff the federal agents seized and destroyed all six of her cannabis plants. Raich and Monson filed suit in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California against the Attorney General of the United States and the Administrator of the DEA. They sought injunctive and declaratory relief barring enforcement of the federal Controlled Substances Act to the extent it prevented them from possessing, obtaining, or manufacturing cannabis for personal medical use, and they submitted affidavits describing their medical conditions, failed conventional treatments, and physicians’ recommendations. The district court denied the motion for a preliminary injunction. A divided panel of the Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit reversed and ordered the district court to enter the injunction. The Supreme Court granted certiorari.

In September 1994 Christy Brzonkala enrolled as a student at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University. Within thirty minutes of meeting fellow students Antonio Morrison and James Crawford, both members of the varsity football team, Brzonkala alleges that the two men assaulted and repeatedly raped her. Morrison allegedly told Brzonkala after the attack that she had better not have any diseases. He later announced in a dormitory dining room that he liked to get girls drunk and made other vulgar remarks about women. Brzonkala became severely emotionally disturbed and depressed after the incident. She sought assistance from a university psychiatrist who prescribed antidepressant medication. She stopped attending classes and withdrew from the university. In early 1995 she filed a complaint against Morrison and Crawford under the university's Sexual Assault Policy. Virginia Tech conducted a hearing under its Sexual Assault Policy and a second hearing under its Abusive Conduct Policy. The first found Morrison guilty of sexual assault and suspended him for two semesters. The second hearing again found him guilty but changed the offense description to using abusive language. University officials later set aside the punishment. In December 1995 Brzonkala sued Morrison, Crawford, and Virginia Tech in the United States District Court for the Western District of Virginia. Her complaint alleged that the attack violated 42 U.S.C. §13981, the civil remedy provision of the Violence Against Women Act of 1994, which creates a federal cause of action for compensatory and punitive damages against persons who commit crimes of violence motivated by gender. She also asserted Title IX claims against the university. The district court dismissed the Title IX claims for failure to state a claim. It also dismissed the §13981 claim on the ground that Congress lacked authority to enact the provision under either the Commerce Clause or Section 5 of the Fourteenth Amendment. A divided panel of the Fourth Circuit reversed in part, but the en banc Fourth Circuit affirmed the district court's conclusion that Congress lacked constitutional authority to enact §13981. The Supreme Court granted certiorari to determine the constitutionality of the civil remedy provision.

In 2010 Congress enacted the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act containing hundreds of provisions across ten titles. The Act requires most Americans to maintain minimum essential health insurance coverage beginning in 2014 or else make a shared responsibility payment calculated as a percentage of household income subject to a floor and ceiling. The Act also expands Medicaid by requiring participating states to cover adults with incomes up to 133 percent of the federal poverty level while increasing federal funding but threatening loss of all Medicaid funds for noncompliance. On the day the President signed the Act Florida and twelve other states filed suit in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Florida challenging the individual mandate provisions under Article I. The original plaintiffs were later joined by eighteen additional states several individuals and the National Federation of Independent Business. The District Court held that the individual mandate exceeded congressional power and could not be severed from the remainder of the Act so it struck down the entire statute. The Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit affirmed that the individual mandate exceeded congressional power but held the provision severable from the rest of the Act while unanimously upholding the Medicaid expansion. Other courts of appeals reached conflicting results on the mandate with the Sixth Circuit and the D.C. Circuit upholding it under the commerce power and the Fourth Circuit applying the Anti-Injunction Act to bar review. The Supreme Court granted certiorari to review the Eleventh Circuit judgment on both the individual mandate and the Medicaid expansion and appointed amici curiae to address severability and the Anti-Injunction Act. The penalty for noncompliance with the individual mandate first becomes enforceable in 2014. The present suit seeks to restrain its future collection. The Act describes the payment as a penalty rather than a tax. It directs that the payment be assessed and collected in the same manner as taxes but bars the IRS from using criminal prosecutions or levies to enforce it.

The Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act of 1977 establishes a nationwide program to regulate surface coal mining operations. Title II creates the Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement within the Department of the Interior. The Secretary of the Interior, acting through that office, bears primary responsibility for promulgating regulations and enforcing the Act's provisions. The Act implements a two-stage regulatory scheme consisting of an interim phase and a permanent phase. In the interim phase, which began after the Secretary published regulations on December 13, 1977, mine operators must comply with selected federal performance standards. These standards govern land restoration, topsoil segregation, hydrologic balance, and related matters. States may issue permits subject to those standards, but the federal government retains independent enforcement authority. On October 23, 1978, the Virginia Surface Mining and Reclamation Association, Inc., an association of coal producers operating in Virginia, together with 63 of its member companies and four individual landowners, filed suit in the United States District Court for the Western District of Virginia. The suit sought declaratory and injunctive relief against the interim regulatory program's performance standards and enforcement provisions of the Act. The Commonwealth of Virginia and the town of Wise intervened as plaintiffs. The plaintiffs' challenge focused primarily on the interim regulatory program's performance standards. They alleged that those provisions violated the Commerce Clause, the equal protection and due process guarantees of the Fifth Amendment, the Tenth Amendment, and the Just Compensation Clause of the Fifth Amendment. The District Court conducted a thirteen-day trial on the request for a permanent injunction. In a 1980 opinion and order, the District Court rejected the plaintiffs' Commerce Clause, equal protection, and substantive due process challenges. It held that the steep-slope provisions of the Act violated the Tenth Amendment by displacing the States' freedom to structure integral operations in areas of traditional functions. The court also ruled that various provisions effected an uncompensated taking of private property. It found due process violations in certain enforcement mechanisms and permanently enjoined the Secretary from enforcing the invalidated provisions. In No. 79-1538 the Secretary appealed the portions of the judgment declaring provisions unconstitutional and enjoining their enforcement. In No. 79-1596 the plaintiffs cross-appealed the rejection of their Commerce Clause challenge. The Supreme Court noted probable jurisdiction of both appeals in 1980 and consolidated the cases.