Court Opinion

ID: 9493695
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 15:15:38.952345+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:55:58.510695
License: Public Domain

E. GRADY JOLLY, Circuit Judge,
dissenting:
I respectfully dissent. For whatever else it may be cited, United States v. Lopez at least stands for the proposition that purely intrastate, non-commercial possession of a non-fungible good “is in no sense an economic activity that might, through repetition elsewhere, substantially affect any sort of interstate commerce.” 514 U.S. 549, 567, 115 S.Ct. 1624, 131 L.Ed.2d 626 (1995). In the light of this understanding, 18 U.S.C. § 2252(a)(4) cannot constitutionally be applied to this defendant’s conduct — the simple local possession of self-generated child pornography in which there is no suggestion of commercial activity.
The Supreme Court recently reiterated in United States v. Morrison that “Lopez ’s review of Commerce Clause case law demonstrates that in those cases where we have sustained federal regulation of intrastate activity based upon the activity’s sub*232stantial effects on interstate commerce, the activity in question has been some sort of economic endeavor.” 529 U.S. 598, 120 S.Ct. 1740, 1750, 146 L.Ed.2d 658 (2000). Like here, the activity in question there was no “economic endeavor.” The challenged statute in Morrison was the Violence Against Women Act, which criminalized even intrastate, local acts of violence. The Court struck down the statute, stating that “[w]e accordingly reject the argument that Congress may regulate non-economic, violent criminal conduct based solely on that conduct’s aggregate effect on interstate commerce. The Constitution require?: a distinction between what is truly national and what is truly local.” Id. at 1754.
Today, the majority has embraced logic the Morrison Court eschewed. The majority holds that Congress can indeed regulate non-economic, intrastate criminal conduct (possession of child pornography), simply because “this reach into local intrastate conduct was a necessary incident of a congressional effort to regulate a national market.” It so holds, despite the Morrison Court’s observation that “thus far in our Nation’s history our cases have upheld Commerce Clause regulation of intrastate activity only where that activity is economic in nature.” Id. at 1751.
The majority never asserts that simple possession of self-generated child pornography is an economic activity. Indeed, simple possession for personal purposes cannot possibly be so classified. Instead, the majority’s opinion relies on the fallback principle of Wickard v. Filburn to establish that Congress can reach even non-economic intrastate activity. See 317 U.S. 111, 63 S.Ct. 82, 87 L.Ed. 122 (1942). The majority undertakes such an application of Wickard, even though Morrison explicitly reminds us that “in every case where we have sustained federal regulation under Wickard’s aggregation principle, the regulated activity was of an apparent commercial character.” Morrison, 120 S.Ct. at 1750, n. 4. Because I can think of no activity less commercial than the simple local possession of a good produced for personal use only, I believe that section 2252(a)(4) is unconstitutional as applied to Kallestad’s conduct.
Neither does the majority persuade me that the requisite connection to interstate commerce exists in this case because outlawing local possession of visual depictions curbs interstate demand for those pictures, thus, according to the majority, discouraging individuals from entering the interstate market for child pornography. The majority relies in substantial part on Wickard for this conclusion. However, the persuasiveness of Wickard1 in the wake of Lopez and Morrison is questionable in the analysis of the criminal statute we consider today.2 Moreover, the facts before this court are distinguishable from those in Wickard. The Lopez Court noted that Wickard “involved economic activity in a way that the possession of a gun in a school zone does not.” Id. at 560, 115 S.Ct. 1624. In the same way, simple possession of child pornography does not interact with interstate commerce like the possession and consumption of wheat did in Wickard. In Wickard, the act of possessing and consuming wheat directly affected the price of wheat on the national market, and it was Congress’ interest in *233regulating the price on that market that constitutionally justified the regulation of private wheat consumption:
It can hardly be denied that a factor of such volume and variability as home-consumed wheat would have a substantial influence on price and market conditions. This may arise because being in marketable condition such wheat overhangs the market and, if induced by rising prices, tends to flow into the market and check price increases.... Home-grown wheat in this sense competes with wheat in commerce.
817 U.S. Ill, 128,' 63 S.Ct. 82, 87 L.Ed. 122.
Congress’ authority to regulate intrastate possession and consumption of wheat in Wickard derived only from the direct economic interaction between consumption of home-grown wheat and the market price of wheat. However, the local possession of self-generated child pornography does not have such a direct and substantial affect on an interstate market.3 In the facts before us, Kallestad’s non-commercial, local possession of child pornography, where no interstate transportation or commercial transacting occurred, had at most an insubstantial affect on the interstate market for child pornography.
Nevertheless, the majority attempts to connect simple possession of pornography with interstate commerce by asserting that such possession is “never wholly local” because “[l]ocal inventories become the source of trading and selling as familiarity dulls the utility of the pictures.” I do not think the majority can so blithely assume this critical connection to interstate commerce that provides the essential authority for Congress’ regulation of intrastate conduct, especially when the evidence shows that no such connection existed in the facts of this case. Indeed, the evidence shows that Kallestad did not purchase, trade, sell, or barter the pornography he possessed. Nor does the evidence show that he had any intention to ever do so. Whatever weight Wickard should be given after Lopez and Morrison, it cannot be read to authorize congressional regulation of any intrastate possession of pornography on the theory that, in some cases, the possessed material eventually flows in interstate commerce.
Therefore, in accordance with Lopez and Morrison, we should hold that this simple local possession of self-generated pornographic material, where no commercial activity was involved, no interstate transportation took place, and no congressional findings support the necessity of such regulation in the framework of a broader regulatory scheme, is beyond the reach of any reasonable interpretation of Congress’ Commerce Clause power.
I respectfully dissent from the majority’s contrary conclusion.

. We surely do not suggest that Wickard has been overruled by the Supreme Court since only the Supreme Court can overrule its own decisions. It cannot be denied, however, that some cases reach a zenith before fading, sometimes to be reignited at a later date.

. The Lopez Court noted that while the “broad language” in Wickard, which the court called "the most far reaching example of; Commerce Clause authority over intrastate; activity,” may have "suggested the possibility of additional expansion, ... we decline here to proceed any further.” 514 U.S. at 560, 567, 115 S.Ct. 1624. Rather than expressly reaffirming the decision in Wickard, Lopez reconsidered that and other prior decisions to conclude that the regulation of noncommercial intrastate conduct must be "an essential part of a larger regulation of economic activity, in which the regulatory scheme would be undercut unless the intrastate activity were regulated.” Id. at 561, 115 S.Ct. 1624.

. The majority asserts that Wickard stands for the principle that “when a person produces for their own consumption a product that is traded in an interstate market,” Congress can regulate local possession of that product. This expansive interpretation of Congress’ commerce power has no limit. An interstate market exists for virtually any product one might possess. Under this formulation, one would be "hard pressed to posit any activity by an individual that Congress is without power to regulate.” Lopez, 514 U.S. at 564, 115 S.Ct. 1624.