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Comment by yieldcrv | Hacker News Reader

Ninth circuit case, second circuit case, and third circuit case are all different outcomes because they are judging state laws in federal courts, different states within their respective circuit

I think Nevada’s and Arkansas was also mentioned - I guess Arkansas is in the fifth circuit - those are more comprehensive and broad than New Jersey’s in the third circuit

Ultimately I expect Kalshi will have the swaps treatment reaffirmed, and the supremacy clause will override most of the state laws

But for Nevada and Arkansas residents it will be unworkable, and they will just block some forms of bets for residents in those states

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Unless Congress now acts

perhaps, enough people are annoyed at the distortion to sports advertising and their friend’s behaviors that they could get some republican senators support for the 60 vote threshold

otherwise Democrats are still without power to unilaterally pass laws

have there been any proposals to deal with this? bills that didnt make it out of committee?

something as simple as adding some contracts to the ban in the onion futures act I think is a mistake

Some of the states that have issues with Kalshi are red, e.g Utah. There’s a serious states rights issue here as well.

> There’s a serious states rights issue here as well.

Of all of the ridiculous things that qualify as interstate commerce: prediction, futures, and derivatives markets are squarely within the definition.

The only things that should qualify as interstate commerce are physical goods being transported between states, over land or water.

If we're stuck with endemic gun violence because of an 18th century definition of "well regulated militia" then there's no way a purely online marketplace counts as interstate commerce. How do you fit that on a horse, exactly?

> interstate commerce are physical goods being transported between states, over land or water

Okay, so digital marketplaces aren't interstate commerce? Try again. Insurance markets? In what reality is "commerce" defined as exclusively-physical goods?

> well regulated militia

Anyone that spouts this immediately signals their lack of English knowledge, law insight, etc. Even RBG didn't attempt this argument because it's literally, obviously invalid.

> In what reality is "commerce" defined as exclusively-physical goods?

The reality of pre-industrial America circa the writing of the Constitution, which we have decided defines the limit of interpreting the language in that document.

If we're going to do that with guns we should be consistent and do that with everything. Non-physical goods didn't exist back then, the founders didn't know what an internet was, therefore online "commerce" doesn't exist as far as the constitution is concerned.

>Anyone that spouts this immediately signals their lack of English knowledge, law insight, etc. Even RBG didn't attempt this argument because it's literally incorrect.

And yet, DC vs. Heller.

> The reality of pre-industrial America circa the writing of the Constitution, which we have decided defines the limit of interpreting the language in that document. ... Non-physical goods didn't exist back then

Did insurance markets and stock markets not exist back then? The Dutch East India Company is almost 200 years older than the United States.

Insurance and stocks were not subject to the Interstate Commerce clause until the 19th and 20th century, and the Dutch East India company dealt in physical goods, which is what I was talking about.

Why the fuck can't you read?

The Dutch East India Company's ownership was traded internationally... on a stock market. "Non-physical goods didn't exist back then"

> Why the fuck can't you read?

I'm not the one throwing "well-regulated militia" out as a serious argument (as if prefatory clauses somehow change the remainder of a sentence.) Why the fuck can't you read? Perhaps you should volunteer to be on the door-to-door confiscation squads.

>I'm not the one throwing "well-regulated militia" out as a serious argument (as if prefatory clauses somehow change the remainder of a sentence.)

Take it up with the Supreme Court then.

I'll keep machining away, good luck with your facially-incorrect theories!

Interstate commercial services absolutely existed at the founding of the US, e.g: labor, transportation, banking, etc.

Labor is a commercial service that has existed back to prehistoric times.

Ultimately, it seems you are arguing originalism, which is an opinion of interpretation that a minority of justices hold.

I'm not arguing that services didn't exist.

I'm arguing that the Interstate Commerce clause was originally intended to apply to physical goods being transported across state lines.

You could transport physical money across state lines. You couldn't transport "a banking" across state lines.

You could transport horses, humans and machines. You couldn't transport "a labor."

Every one of these things comes down to some physical item that could be taxed as it crossed a border. That was the entire point of it.

So "data" and "information" don't count. Nothing exists that actually crosses state lines.

James Madison who wrote the first damn draft of the commerce clause doesn't agree with you.

Not only was he was alive to see this clarified by SCOTUS in Gibbons v. Ogden, 7 years after he left the presidency -- in letters, he was himself arguing that congress should regulate shipping services.

https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Madison/99-02-02-154...

Now, Ogden was arguing what you are -- that it only applied to the movement of physical goods -- but this was found to be the losing argument. And this was quite early on in that document's history.

each article and amendment are evaluated independently, and at different times by different people. the different people only take up a handful of evaluations every year

so thats easy to square.

good news, the current Supreme Court has expressed interest in re-evaluating the New Deal era interpretations of the interstate commerce clause, in a way that could completely obliterate the Federal state and all of its agencies of the last 100 years

“omg I love SCOTUS now?”

I don’t think anyone is seriously contesting the Congress’s power to regulate prediction markets. The question is whether it has.

The CFTC relied on rules about exempted commodities to grant itself the power to license the likes of Kalshi. The question is whether that’s a major question.

Yeah, and gambling has a clear precedent for state (and tribal) right to regulate.

The question at hand here isn’t either of our points. The question is whether or not prediction markets are gambling with lipstick on.

Why do the same five people end up at the World Series of Poker final table every year?

Probably the reason the president's son is on the board of Kalshi, pure coincidence.

when there is a conflict of laws, federal law reigns supreme, thats the Supremacy Clause

when federal law is completely absent, states have the right to behave however they want, thats the 10th amendment

federal law is not absent, state laws are curbed, in its simplest interpretation

That is in fact the most simple interpretation. Which isn't too helpful here because this isn't a simple case. There are two reasons it may not apply here:

1. Preemption is not absolute, there is a framework of case law for applying it and it sometimes does allow states to have more restrictive laws.

2. The idea that this activity is legitimately regulated under federal law is contested. If CFTC stepped outside of their authority in approving it, then there is no basis for preemption.

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