Gibbons v. Ogden · ¶12

The subject to bewegulated is commerce; and our constitution.being, as was aptly said at the bár, one of enumeration, and not of definition, to as-certaifi the extent of the power, it becomes necessary to settle the meaning of the word. The counsel for the appellee would limit it to traffic* to buying and selling, or the interchange of commodities, and do not admit that it comprehends navigation. This would restrict a general term, applicable to. many objects,. to one of its significations. Commerce, undoubtedly, is traffic, but it is something more.: it is intercourse. It describes the commercial intercourse between nations, and parts of nations, in all its branches, and is ■ regulated by prescribing rules fbr carrying on that intercourse. The mind can scarcely- conceive a system for regulating commerce between nations, which shall exclude all laws concerning navigation, which shall be…

U. S. Reports, bound volume
U. S. Reports, volume 22, at 1 (Library of Congress) · transcription: Caselaw Access Project
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