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Full-Text Articles in State and Local Government Law
Voting Rights, Home Rule, And Metropolitan Governance: The Secession Of Staten Island As A Case Study In The Dilemmas Of Local Self-Determination, Richard Briffault
Voting Rights, Home Rule, And Metropolitan Governance: The Secession Of Staten Island As A Case Study In The Dilemmas Of Local Self-Determination, Richard Briffault
Faculty Scholarship
On January 1, 1898, amid fanfare and celebration, the city of Greater New York – "the greatest experiment in municipal government the world has ever known" – was born. The consolidation of the cities, counties, and towns on the New York State side of New York Harbor into one great metropolis was a capstone to one century of rapid economic and population growth and a fitting harbinger of a new century of urban greatness for the region and, indeed, the nation. Now, with another century mark approaching, there is a distinct possibility that the City of New York, already beset …
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 …
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 …