Opinion ID: 223249
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: United States v. South-Eastern Underwriters Association

Text: Although not concerning the substantial effects doctrine, the 1944 case United States v. South-Eastern Underwriters Association, 322 U.S. 533, 64 S.Ct. 1162, 88 L.Ed. 1440 (1944), is important to our analysis, as it marked the Supreme Court's first recognition that the insurance business is commerce and where it is conducted across state borders, it constitutes interstate commerce capable of being regulated by Congress. [70] Id. at 553, 64 S.Ct. at 1173. The Supreme Court emphasized the interstate character of insurance business practices, which resulted in a continuous and indivisible stream of intercourse among the states composed of collections of premiums, payments of policy obligations, and the countless documents and communications which are essential to the negotiation and execution of policy contracts. Id. at 541, 64 S.Ct. at 1167. The defendants' insurance policies covered not only all kinds of fixed local properties, but also . . . movable goods of all types carried in interstate and foreign commerce by every media of transportation. Id. at 542, 64 S.Ct. at 1168. The South-Eastern Underwriters Court rejected the notion that, if any components of the insurance business constitute interstate commerce, the states may not exercise regulatory control over the industry. Id. at 548, 64 S.Ct. at 1171. Nevertheless, the Court pronounced that [n]o commercial enterprise of any kind which conducts its activities across state lines has been held to be wholly beyond the regulatory power of Congress under the Commerce Clause. We cannot make an exception of the business of insurance. Id. at 553, 64 S.Ct. at 1173.