Case: 25-7187, 02/17/2026, DktEntry: 37.2, Page 17 of 41
67-66, 42 Stat. 187 (1921) (“21 Act”), followed by the Grain Futures Act of 1922, Pub. L. No. 67-331, 42 Stat. 998 (1922) (“22 Act”). In passing these laws, Congress recognized the importance of uniform federal regulation of futures markets, despite concerns by some members of Congress who objected to the proposed law because it would interfere with state police powers. H.R. Rep. No. 67-1095, at 5 (1922) (Conf. Rep.). But the Supreme Court found that this preemptive design was not sufficiently explicit in the statute, which resulted in states continuing to regulate or even prohibit futures trading. Dickson v. Uhlmann Grain Co. , 288 U.S. 188, 198- 99 (1933) (rejecting “the contention that Congress occupied the field in respect to contracts for future delivery; and that necessarily all state legislation in any way dealing with that subject is superseded.”) And when Congress expanded federal oversight of futures markets in 1936 with the Commodity Exchange Act, Pub. L. No. 74-675, 49 Stat. 1491 (1936), the boundary between federal and state authority remained unsettled as futures markets expanded beyond their agricultural origins. Market participants continued to face the persistent threat of state prosecution through a patchwork of state laws and regulations. In 1973, futures exchanges recommended that “federal policy . . . be uniform throughout the United States” and not “subject to the vagaries” of different obligations in “different jurisdictions.” Review of Commodity Exch. Act and
7
Made with FlippingBook - Online catalogs