Wickard v. Filburn

Facts

Filburn owned and operated a small farm in Montgomery County, Ohio. He kept dairy cattle, sold milk, raised poultry, and sold poultry and eggs. It was his practice to grow a small acreage of winter wheat, sell part, feed part to poultry and livestock on the farm, use some for flour at home, and keep the rest for seed. The record did not say how he meant to use this crop. The Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1938 aimed to control the volume of wheat moving in interstate and foreign commerce, to avoid surpluses, shortages and abnormally low or high prices. A marketing quota was suspended if more than one-third of the farmers voting in a referendum opposed it. In July 1940, his 1941 crop got an allotment of 11.1 acres. He sowed 23 acres. On May 19, 1941, the Secretary urged approval of the quotas in a radio address that noted the pending amendment's higher wheat loans but not its higher penalty. The amendment of May 26, 1941 made wheat from excess acreage farm marketing excess, penalized at 49 cents a bushel, sold or not, instead of the 15 cents in force when he planted. On May 31, 1941, according to the Secretary's published statement, 81 per cent of the farmers voting approved the quota. Filburn harvested 239 bushels from his 11.9 excess acres, a penalty of $117.11. He did not pay it, store the excess or deliver it to the Secretary, so the committee refused him a marketing card.

Issues

1. Does the commerce power let Congress apply a wheat marketing quota and penalty to wheat that a farmer grows not for sale but wholly for consumption on his own farm?
2. Did the quota and penalty deprive Filburn of property without due process of law under the Fifth Amendment, either through their regulatory effect on him or because the May 26, 1941 amendment, passed after he planted, raised the penalty and newly reached wheat not marketed as the Act defined it?
3. Did the Secretary's radio speech before the farmers' referendum invalidate the referendum that approved the marketing quota?

Holding

The wheat quota and penalty validly reached Filburn's excess wheat, even wheat grown for use on his own farm, because home-consumed wheat, taken together across many farms, has a substantial effect on the price and market for wheat in interstate commerce. The Act did not deny him due process, and the Secretary's speech did not invalidate the referendum.