http://federalistblog.us/2006/03/state_ ... ution.html



A proposed Georgia House bill (HB 123 aims to tack a fee onto wire transfers sent home by illegal immigrants that is estimated to generate $41 million in revenue for Georgia State coffers. Not surprising there are some questioning the constitutionality of the proposed law.

A Western Union representative presented the committee a 42-page legal opinion from its lawyers at Sutherland Asbill & Brennan examining the legality of HB 1238. The report essentially contends that the bill violates provisions in the U.S. Constitution by infringing on the federal government's purview over immigration law. A public interest law group called Georgia Appleseed said only the federal government has the authority to regulate commerce with foreign nations.

These usual kind of arguments illustrate a total lack of fundamental understanding of the US Constitution that has been fueled by faulty court interpretations ever since FDR pressured the US Supreme Court to discard the Constitution for the will of the Federal Government. This very discard has been costly to the Nation in more ways then one (Example: current National debt nears a whooping $9 trillion.)

The State of Georgia is perfectly empowered under the US Constitution to exercise its reserved right to regulate its own internal generated commerce. The argument put forward by Sutherland Asbill & Brennan is so weak and inexcusable that it leaves me laughing. The US Constitution never invested any power over immigration laws to Congress -- it invested Congress with the right to create "uniform rules" for naturalization -- but no grant of power to legislate or enforce laws within the States over issues of migration of foreigners. The regulation of aliens within the borders of a State was left to the States as evidenced by the lack of any delegated provisions to the contrary under article 8.

The "commerce clause" was made part of the US Constitution to protect the States from each other and aid Congress in preventing one State from imposing levies against another States imports/exports. This was a big problem under the confederacy because States like NJ, NH, Delaware or NC would impose fee's upon another States commerce as it passed through the State. The commerce clause did not take any power away from the individual States to regulate their own internal commerce, only to impose a negative option upon them by granting Congress the power to regulate the navigation of trade between them.

In the case of imposing fee's on wire transfers, Georgia is simply taxing its own internal generated activity. There is no other foreign country or State commerce involved here, and thus, any State is free to impose fee's just as they are free to collect fee's or taxes from any other internal generated activity.

Posted by P.A. Madison on March 22, 2006 12:48 AM