It is another question as to whether any of the above is even minimally intellectually honest.

“The Constitution grants Congress the power to “regulate Commerce.” Art. I, §8, cl. 3(emphasis added). The power to regulate commerce presupposes the existence of commercial activity to be regulated. This Court’s precedent reflects this understanding: As expansive as this Court’s cases construing the scope of the commerce power have been, they uniformly describe the power as reaching “activity.” E.g., United States v. Lopez, 514 U. S. 549, 560. The individual mandate, however, does not regulate existing commercial activity. It instead compels individuals to become active in commerce by purchasing a product, on the ground that their failure to do so affects interstate commerce.

“Construing the Commerce Clause to permit Congress to regulate individuals precisely because they are doing nothing would open a new and potentially vast domain to congressional authority. Congress already possesses expansive power to regulate what people do. Upholding the Affordable Care Act under the Commerce Clause would give Congress the same license to regulate what people do not do. The Framers knew the difference between doing something and doing nothing. They gave Congress the power to regulate commerce, not to compel it. Ignoring that distinction would undermine the principle that the Federal Government is a government of limited and enumerated powers. The individual mandate thus cannot be sustained under Congress’s power to “regulate Commerce.” Pp. 16–27.”

“Our precedents read that to mean that Congress may regulate ‘the channels of interstate com­merce,’ ‘persons or things in interstate commerce,’ and ‘those activities that substantially affect interstate com­merce.’ The power over activities that SUBSTANTIALLY AFFECT interstate commerce can be expansive. That power has been held to authorize federal regulation of such seem­ingly local matters as a farmer’s decision to grow wheat for himself and his livestock, and a loan shark’s extor­tionate collections from a neighborhood butcher shop.”

Those first three provisos come from Rhenquist’s opinion in Lopez; after that Roberts explicitly accepts the substantial Affect test and Wickard.

At the end of the opinion, Roberts does say this though:

“The proximity and degree of connection between the mandate and the subsequent commercial activity is too lack­ing to justify an exception of the sort urged by the Gov­ernment.”

Is Roberts using the ‘ole Sutherland proximate cause test? Personally, I don’t think so… on the whole I think the Substantial affect test is controlling here.

But one thing is clear, or should be: originalism does reject the Wickard precedent, which the liberal 4 would extend to just about everything under the sun were they to get one more justice(and they would likely discared the barely restraining Lopez and Morrison precedents in doing so).

CJ, presumably a federal mandate to purchase a product from a private vendor would not be enforceable through a criminal or civil penalty according to the Roberts opinion. Such enforcement of a mandate would be legal according to the Ginsburg concurring opinion. Also, according to Roberts, there is no mandate because the mandate is unconstitutional and the penalty is a tax because it is small enough that it doesn’t actually enforce compliance. What a mess. Though one more liberal Justice and things clean up nicely.