COMMERCE CLAUSE

Commerce Clause. This Case Activity gives you another opportunity to analyze the Commerce Clause as it applies to interstate commerce. Please focus on the court’s reasoning near the end of the case on “Relation to State Services. Please answer two questions:

1. Do you agree that this criterion is an appropriate test in considering the Commerce Clause?

2. Whether you agree with this test or not, was it applied properly in this case?

Regency Transportation, Inc., operates a freight business throughout the eastern United States. Regency maintains its corporate headquarters, four warehouses, and a maintenance facility and terminal location for repairing and storing vehicle in Massachusetts. All of the vehicles in Regency’s fleet were bought in other states. Massachusetts imposes a use tax on all tax payers subject to its jurisdiction, including those that do business in interstate commerce, as Regency does. When Massachusetts imposed the tax on the purchase price of each tractor and trailer in Regency’s fleet, the trucking firm challenged the assessment as discriminatory under the commerce clause. What is the chief consideration under the commerce clause when a state law affects interstate commerce?