ORIGINAL: Canoerebel
The argument is that Wickard affirmed the power of the government to proscribe conduct - a farmer growing wheat for consumption on his own property - because growing that wheat had an affect on interstate commerce. OC, on the other hand, requires citizens to participate in certain activity (buying insurance). Two completely different propositions (and hence the debate over whether the federal government could thereby order citiziens to, say, eat broccoli).
Well, some anti-mandate arguments pre-USSC argued that. Others, such as the Sixth Circuit decision (
Seven Sky vs. Holder) argued that
Wickard, supported further by
Gonzales v. Raich (2005) (concurred in by Scalia), was core to supporting the mandate. From the decision, paraphrased by Forbes magazine:
"“The lingering intution—shared by most Americans, I suspect—[is] that Congress should not be able to compel citizens to buy products that they do not want.” However, “If, as Wickard shows, Congress could regulate the most self-sufficient of individuals—the American farmer—when he grew wheat destined for no location other than his family farm, the same is true for those who inevitably will seek health care and who must pay for it.”
In the end the USSC did reject the
Wickard argument, or at least sidestep it. Roberts' decision argued that the Commerce Clause didn't apply because OC created commercial activity rather than regulated existing activity. Hard for me to square with what Wickard did since he grew grain which never entered the stream of commerce in any way yet was placed under the CC, but whatever. Scalia's brocolli argument notwithstanding, up until the final Roberts decision
Wickard was core to the arguments, in some cases such as the Sixth Circuit ruling winning arguments, over OC. In the end, as I'm sure you know, it came down to taxation powers, a nice finesse by the Chief Justice.
