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Full-Text Articles in Law
The Mobility Case For Regionalism, Nestor M. Davidson, Sheila R. Foster
The Mobility Case For Regionalism, Nestor M. Davidson, Sheila R. Foster
Faculty Scholarship
In the discourse of local government law, the idea that a mobile populace can “vote with its feet” has long served as a justification for devolution and decentralization. Tracing to Charles Tiebout’s seminal work in public finance, the legal-structural prescription that follows is that a diversity of independent and empowered local governments can best satisfy the varied preferences of residents metaphorically shopping for bundles of public services, regulatory environment, and tax burden. This localist paradigm generally presumes that fragmented governments are competing for residents within a given metropolitan area. Contemporary patterns of mobility, however, call into question this foundational assumption. …
Constitutionalizing Local Politics, Joseph Blocher, Ilan Graff
Constitutionalizing Local Politics, Joseph Blocher, Ilan Graff
Faculty Scholarship
No abstract provided.
Making Mountains Of Debt Out Of Molehills: The Pro-Cyclical Implications Of Tax And Expenditure Limitations, Mathew D. Mccubbins, Ellen Moule
Making Mountains Of Debt Out Of Molehills: The Pro-Cyclical Implications Of Tax And Expenditure Limitations, Mathew D. Mccubbins, Ellen Moule
Faculty Scholarship
This paper presents evidence that property tax limits have detrimental effects on state and local revenues during recessions. Property tax limits cause states to rely on income–elastic revenue sources, such as the income tax or charges and fees. Greater reliance on these revenue sources results in greater revenue declines during economic downturns. We present analysis of time–series, cross–sectional data for the U.S. states for each of these conclusions. Our results suggest that states would have fewer and more modest financial problems during economic downturns if they did not enact property tax limitations.
When Voters Make Laws: How Direct Democracy Is Shaping American Cities, Elizabeth Garrett, Mathew D. Mccubbins
When Voters Make Laws: How Direct Democracy Is Shaping American Cities, Elizabeth Garrett, Mathew D. Mccubbins
Faculty Scholarship
No abstract provided.
Localism And Regionalism, Richard Briffault
Localism And Regionalism, Richard Briffault
Faculty Scholarship
Localism and regionalism are normally seen as contrasting, indeed conflicting, conceptions of metropolitan area governance. Localism in this context refers to the view that the existing system of a large number of relatively small governments wielding power over such critical matters as local land use regulation, local taxation, and the financing of local public services ought to be preserved. The meaning of regionalism is less clearly defined and proposals for regional governance vary widely, but most advocates of regionalism would shift some authority from local governments, restrict local autonomy, or, at the very least, constrain the ability of local governments …
The Rise Of Sublocal Structures In Urban Governance, Richard Briffault
The Rise Of Sublocal Structures In Urban Governance, Richard Briffault
Faculty Scholarship
The dominant law and economics model of local government, based on the work of Charles M. Tiebout, assumes that decentralization of power to local governments promotes the efficient delivery of public goods and services. In his seminal article, A Pure Theory of Local Expenditures, Tiebout contended that the existence of a large number of local governments in any given area permits a "market solution" to the question of how to determine the level and mix of government services that people desire. The multiplicity of local governments in an area means that, as long as each locality is free to …
Local Government And The New York State Constitution, Richard Briffault
Local Government And The New York State Constitution, Richard Briffault
Faculty Scholarship
On November 4, 1997, the question "Shall there be a convention to revise the [state] constitution and amend the same?" will be submitted to the New York state electorate pursuant to the provision in the state constitution requiring that every twenty years the voters be given the opportunity to call for a constitutional convention. A longstanding constitutional concern in New York is local government and the relations between local governments and the State. With an eye to the upcoming vote on whether to hold a constitutional convention, this paper examines the place of local government and state-local relations in the …
Who Rules At Home: One Person/One Vote And Local Governments, Richard Briffault
Who Rules At Home: One Person/One Vote And Local Governments, Richard Briffault
Faculty Scholarship
Twenty-five years ago, in Avery v Midland County, the United States Supreme Court extended the one person/one vote requirement to local governments. Avery and subsequent decisions applying federal constitutional standards to local elections suggested a change in the legal status of local governments and appeared to signal a shift in the balance of federalism. Traditionally, local governments have been conceptualized as instrumentalities of the states. Questions of local government organization and structure were reserved to the plenary discretion of the states with little federal constitutional oversight. In contrast, Avery assumed that local governments are locally representative bodies, not simply …
Home Rule, Majority Rule, And Dillon's Rule, Richard Briffault
Home Rule, Majority Rule, And Dillon's Rule, Richard Briffault
Faculty Scholarship
Clayton Gillette's In Partial Praise of Dillon's Rule, or, Can Public Choice Theory Justify Local Government Law? is an ambitious attempt to breathe new life into an old local government law chestnut through the analytical tools of modern political economy. Gillette asserts that because the Rule permits state judges to invalidate local legislation that results from "one-sided lobbying," Dillon's Rule increases the allocational efficiency of local decision making and reduces the deadweight losses attendant on special interest pursuit of rent-seeking ordinances. According to Gillette, Dillon's Rule checks the danger of special interest abuse of local politics by constraining local …
Two Sides Of The Same Coin: The Potential Normative Power Of American Cities And Indian Tribes, Kevin J. Worthen
Two Sides Of The Same Coin: The Potential Normative Power Of American Cities And Indian Tribes, Kevin J. Worthen
Faculty Scholarship
People do not normally associate cities with Indian reservations. The mental images typically conjured by each term are radically different. Perhaps for that reason, few think of city governments and tribal governments in similar terms.
However, the two forms of government - cities and Indian reservations - have many things in common. Both are excluded from the federal constitutional framework. Both are subject to the plenary power of one of the constitutionally recognized governments - cities to the state government, tribes to the federal government. Both are the most intimate form of government with which most of their residents are …
Our Localism: Part I – The Structure Of Local Government Law, Richard Briffault
Our Localism: Part I – The Structure Of Local Government Law, Richard Briffault
Faculty Scholarship
Two themes dominate thejurisprudence of American local government law: the descriptive assertion that American localities lack power and the normative call for greater local autonomy. The positive claim of local legal powerlessness dates back to the middle of the nineteenth century and continues to be affirmed by treatises and commentators as a central element of state-local relations. The argument for local selfdetermination has a comparably historic pedigree and broad contemporary support. The scholarly proponents of greater local power – what I will call "localism" – make their case in terms of economic efficiency, education for public life and popular political …
Our Localism: Part Ii – Localism And Legal Theory, Richard Briffault
Our Localism: Part Ii – Localism And Legal Theory, Richard Briffault
Faculty Scholarship
A central theme in the literature of local government law is that local governments are powerless, incapable of initiating programs on behalf of their citizens or of resisting intrusions by the state. How can scholars make this claim when under state legislation and federal and state judicial decisions local autonomy plays a critical role in the law of school finance, land-use regulation and local government formation and preservation? As we have seen, a partial response turns on the varying assessments of the nature of power. But much of the answer also has to do with differing assumptions about the underlying …
State-Local Relations And Constitutional Law, Richard Briffault
State-Local Relations And Constitutional Law, Richard Briffault
Faculty Scholarship
A persistent theme in the literature on state-local relations has been the plenary power of state governments and the legal powerlessness of local governments. The "black letter" rules of state-local relations are that the state governments enjoy complete hegemony over their political subdivisions, that local governments are mere "creatures" of the states, with only those powers that the states delegate to them, and there is no such thing as an "inherent right" of local self-government.