Wine issue before Supreme Court.Consumer Alert joined with 11 other organizations in filing an amicus curiae brief Noun 1. amicus curiae brief - a brief presented by someone interested in influencing the outcome of a lawsuit but who is not a party to it brief, legal brief - a document stating the facts and points of law of a client's case with the United States Supreme Court United States Supreme Court: see Supreme Court, United States. in a case being heard in oral arguments December 7, 2004. The case, Granholm v. Heald Granholm v. Heald, 544 U.S. 460 (2005), is a court case finally decided by the Supreme Court of the United States, unusual because the arguments centered around the rarely-invoked 21st Amendment to the Constitution ratified in 1933. , concerns the freedom of consumers to order wines directly from vintners in other states. It has been combined with Swedenburg v. Kelly. At issue are laws such as those in the states of Michigan and New York New York, state, United States New York, Middle Atlantic state of the United States. It is bordered by Vermont, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and the Atlantic Ocean (E), New Jersey and Pennsylvania (S), Lakes Erie and Ontario and the Canadian province of which bar direct-to-consumer wine deliveries from other states, while allowing them from wineries in the same state. These laws, on the books in several states, unfairly restrict consumer choice in favor of local wineries and the wholesalers which broker sales between out-of-state wineries and stores carrying wine. The arguments offered by states such as Michigan and New York for imposing these laws--claims of endangering minors and the like--fall apart in that the same purported concerns apply to shipments from in-state wineries as well. Thus, the only real reason behind the laws can be simple, old-fashioned protectionism. "These kind of shenanigans shenanigans Noun, pl Informal 1. mischief or nonsense 2. trickery or deception [origin unknown] are exactly why the Founders gave Congress, not the states, the right to regulate interstate commerce," said CA Executive Director Fran Smith. |
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