Law Commons^™

The Georgia Home Rule System, R. Perry Sentell Jr.

Mercer Law Review

Few doctrines attract more universal acclaim than local government "home rule"; even fewer possess a more convoluted heritage or content. As for heritage, difficulty inheres in locating a point of origin, for "home rule has roots deep in Anglo-American political history." As for content, imprecision begins with terminology itself, for "in point of fact the term has never been given legal definition and can scarcely be regarded as a term of our law at all."

Local Government Law, R. Perry Sentell Jr.

Mercer Law Review

Plaintiff filed an action against the county for the repeated flooding of his home. The county attorney responded with a deft procedural maneuver:

It was my bright idea to take the plaintiff's deposition at his home. My timing was impeccable. During the deposition .... something on the order of a ten-year storm [occurred], an event which flooded [plaintiff's] property just as [he] had claimed. During our "adjournment" of the deposition, ... I [was] captured on video [by plaintiff's attorney] wading through plaintiff's front yard with my pants legs somewhere in the vicinity of my knees!

The "law" of local government, …

Printz V. United States: Tenth Amendment Limitations On Federal Access To The Mechanisms Of State Government, Kevin Todd Butler

Mercer Law Review

In Printz v. United States, the Supreme Court addressed the Tenth Amendment's protection of state sovereignty, a significant issue in the contemporary debate on the nature of United States federalism. Striking a key provision of the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act ("Brady Act") as unconstitutional, the Court expanded Tenth Amendment limitations on the federal government's access to the mechanisms of state government. The Court decision implicated issues bearing on the commerce power and the power of Congress to enlist state compliance with federal policy objectives.