About Preemption Watch

“Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty” -- Wendell Phillips

New Rules focuses on what communities can do to defend their quality of life and local economies.  We believe in the maxim, “where there’s a will there’s a way”.   Local governments, and certainly state governments, possess sufficient authority to develop and implement rules that can help extract the maximum value from their local resources—human, financial and natural.

While we accentuate the positive, we recognize the negative:  the disturbing and seemingly accelerating tendency by the federal government to undermine and even to preempt local and state initiatives. 

Preemption Watch reports on these developments. We believe that federal preemption often violates both conservative and liberal values and agendas.  We hope that in the coming months, blue states and red states, blue communities and red communities can work together to demand that they be given the authority to protect their futures.

For an excellent backgrounder and overview of recent federal preemption initiatives, see Alison Cassady, Tying the Hands of States. National Association of State PIRGs.

For a well-documented critique of federal preemption see Roderick M. Hills, Jr.  Against Preemption:  How Federalism Can Improve the National Legisaltive Process.  University of Michigan Law School.

A number of other groups cover the federal preemption issue more broadly, more deeply and more often than we will. We urge you to visit their sites.  These include: Electronic Privacy Information Center, National Conference of State Legislatures, National Consumer Law Center , Public Citizen.

While many issues at the forefront right now involve federal preemption of state governments, states also preempt local authority.  At New Rules, we believe that to the maximum extent possible, authority and responsibility should go hand in hand.  As a consequence, Preemption Watch will cover state, as well as federal preemption.