Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®
Articles 1 - 2 of 2
Full-Text Articles in Law
Can Vermont Put The Nuclear Genie Back In The Bottle: A Test Of Congressional Preemptive Power?, Hope M. Babcock
Can Vermont Put The Nuclear Genie Back In The Bottle: A Test Of Congressional Preemptive Power?, Hope M. Babcock
Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works
Even before the nuclear core meltdowns at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear reactors in Japan re-stoked public anxiety about nuclear energy, Vermont’s Senate, under the auspices of Vermont Act No. 160, voted to block continued operation of Vermont Yankee Nuclear Power Plant after the expiration of its forty-year operating license. This article examines whether a state can legislatively override a permit issued by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission extending the license of a power plant. The author places this question within a broader federalism context, in which states assert their sovereign rights to regulate the environment in the shadow of federal mandates. …
Depoliticizing Federalism, Louis Michael Seidman
Depoliticizing Federalism, Louis Michael Seidman
Georgetown Law Faculty Publications and Other Works
In his great biography of President Andrew Jackson, Arthur Schlesinger, Jr. celebrated Jackson’s defense of the rights of states and opposition to federal power. Yet as a mid-twentieth century liberal, Schlesinger was a strong supporter of the federal government and an opponent of states’ rights. Was Schlesinger’s position inconsistent? He did not think so, and neither does the author. In Jackson’s time, an entrenched economic elite controlled the federal government and used federal power to dominate the lower classes. State governments served as a focal point for opposition to this domination. By mid-twentieth century, the federal government was an engine …