What is Commerce?

One of the powers of Congress, listed in Art. 1, Sec. 8 of the Constitution, is the power to regulate commerce among the several states. Like a lot of big constitutional issues, the terms of debate for understanding the Commerce Clause were set by Chief Justice John Marshall in a decision from the early nineteenth century. In Gibbon v. Ogden (1824), Marshall argued that we should interpret the power to regulate commerce broadly, in light of the purpose of the Constitution to create a national government independent of the states and with powers adequate to achieve the great objects of national power.