50 States CP Back-Up/federalism Good/etc.

Gracie Cockett 1
Hawaiian HEAT
States CP backup
Table of Contents
Table of Contents....................................................................................................... 1
Recent precedence: States taking a stand in major enviro. issues (examples of

Greenhouse Gases/Climate Change) .........................................................................2
Recent historical precedence: States implement separate, yet systematic, plans

for reducing green house gas emissions.................................................................2
In the past, many states have enacted plans to reduce green house gas emissions
in various areas, such as: power plants and transportation....................................3
States do have sufficient leverage in relation to reducing climate change. ...........3
The states are learning to work together through formal agreements between
sub-national governments. .....................................................................................4
“One size fits all” federal policy fails (specifically in regards to pollution.).................5
In pollution regulation, one size doesn’t fit all. .......................................................5
Example of how a federal, “One size fits all” policy fails: The arsenic rule. ............5
Favorable pollution control is under local jurisdiction. ............................................6
State governance is more cost efficient than federal governance. Example:

pollution emissions. ................................................................................................6
Does not cause race to the bottom. ..........................................................................7
Empirical evidence denies that decentralized regulation will cause a race to the
bottom. ................................................................................................................... 7
Decentralization allows citizens to choose best laws. ................................................8
Decentralization allows citizens to choose the best laws........................................8
Federalism leads to better laws...............................................................................8
Encourages citizens’ involvement in political process................................................9
Decentralization encourages participation in the political process..........................9

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States CP backup
Local government increases opportunity for citizen involvement in political

process....................................................................................................................9
Recent precedence: States taking a stand in major

enviro. issues (examples of Greenhouse
Gases/Climate Change)
Recent historical precedence: States implement separate, yet
systematic, plans for reducing green house gas emissions.
Nicholas Lutsey (Ph.D., Transportation Technology & Policy from UNIVERSITY OF
CALIFORNIA, DAVIS, Institute of Transportation Studies , also B.S., Agricultural and
Biological Engineering, Cornell University; Postdoctoral scholar at University of California,
Davis, Institute of Transportation Studies) and Daniel Sperling (Director of the Institute of
Transportation Studies at the University of California, Davis; member of ten National
Academies committees on Gasoline Taxes, Hydrogen, Transport in China, Biomass Fuels R&D,
Sustainable Transportation, founding chair of standing committees for the U.S. Transportation
Research Board on Alternative Transportation Fuels (1989-’96, advises senior executives of
many automotive and energy companies, environmental groups, and national governments,
including review committees at three DOE national laboratories.), 2008, “America's Bottom-Up
Climate Change Mitigation Policy” Energy Policy (scholarly journal about energy policy) 36,
673-685 http://pubs.its.ucdavis.edu/publication_detail.php?id=1135
“As late as 2004, US climate change policy efforts could be characterized as an uncoordinated
patchwork
of disparate initiatives. Now, in 2007, we see a more systematic strategy and a consistent set of
actions being undertaken by state governments. States that engage in climate change policy
generally follow the steps of inventorying GHG emissions in the state, establishing a GHG
registry, formulating a GHG mitigation action plan, and initiating programs and regulations to
bring about GHG reductions in future years. Numerous governments are engaged in each of
these climate change action steps
(PCGCC, 2007; WRI, 2007b). They are guided by a variety of non-government and government
agencies (Prindle et al., 2003; US EPA, 2006). States’ plans for mitigation steps are routinely
following similar paths for mitigation actions. At least 26 states have used, or are using,
consistent methods to prioritize similar GHG [green house gas] mitigation actions (CCS, 2007).”
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In the past, many states have enacted plans to reduce green house
gas emissions in various areas, such as: power plants and
transportation.
Research Board on Alternative Transportation Fuels (1989-’96), advises senior executives of
many automotive and energy companies, environmental groups, and national governments,
including review committees at three DOE national laboratories. “America's Bottom-Up
Climate Change Mitigation Policy” 2008, Energy Policy (scholarly journal about energy
policy) 36, 673-685 http://pubs.its.ucdavis.edu/publication_detail.php?id=1135
“Many state and city policy-makers have backed up their ‘‘top-down’’ G[reen ]H[ouse ]G[as ]
emission target-setting directives by enacting sector-specific policy mechanisms. The largest
GHG emissions contributors are power plants and vehicles, which represent 39% and 32% of US
GHG emissions, respectively (US EIA, 2007). Many states are now targeting these sources with
mitigation policies (PCGCC, 2007; CCC,
2007; Nadel, 2006). Other targets for state actions include residential energy usage (with
appliance standards) and agricultural and forestry sequestration. Local mitigation action areas
include land use, transportation planning, building codes, and waste reduction policies.”
States do have sufficient leverage in relation to reducing climate

change.
Transportation Studies at the University of California, Davis; National Academies committees
on Gasoline Taxes, Hydrogen, Transport in China, Biomass Fuels R&D, Sustainable
Transportation, founding chair of standing committees for the U.S. Transportation Research
Board on Alternative Transportation Fuel), advises senior executives of many automotive and
energy companies, environmental groups, and national governments, including review
committees at three DOE national laboratories.), “America's Bottom-Up Climate Change
Mitigation Policy” 2008, Energy Policy (scholarly journal about energy policy) 36, 673-685
http://pubs.its.ucdavis.edu/publication_detail.php?id=1135
“The critique that states do not have sufficient leverage on climate change—an example of the
well-known ‘‘commons’’ problem in environmental policy—is undermined by the expanding
initiatives by lower-level governments in the US. Victor et al. (2005) commented that state-level
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actions like emission target-setting, which at that time involved 10 states with 14% of US
electricity generation, lacked the necessary leverage for serious impacts. Earlier statements such
as this did not anticipate the snowball
effect now underway or the creative use of a variety of policy levers to effect change. The state
renewable
electricity standards cover more than half of US electricity generation, and states representing
about half of US vehicle sales are poised to adopt the California GHG regulation for vehicles.”
The states are learning to work together through formal

agreements between sub-national governments.
Research Board on Alternative Transportation Fuels (1989-’96), and Sustainability and
Transportation (2006+), advises senior executives of many automotive and energy companies,
environmental groups, and national governments, including review committees at three DOE
national laboratories. Awarded the 2002 Carl Moyer Memorial Award for Scientific Leadership
and Technical Excellence by the Coalition for Clean Air;), “America's Bottom-Up Climate
Change Mitigation Policy” 2008, Energy Policy (scholarly journal about energy policy) 36,
673-685 http://pubs.its.ucdavis.edu/publication_detail.php?id=1135
“The ‘‘commons’’ problem is falling away as more sub-national governments learn to work
together. Early pioneering state actors saw themselves as models and leaders to be followed by
others. For example, the first state-level emission target-setting, by Vermont, was advanced with
a stated objective to demonstrate that ‘‘there are things individual Vermonters, the state and the
nation can do’’ (Vermont, 1989). When California was developing its vehicle GHG regulations
and later its low-carbon fuel standard, state leaders very deliberately watched and coordinated
their efforts with other governments, within and outside the US. The vehicle regulatory report
cites the importance of the combined impact of the adoption of similar mitigation measures for
vehicles in other US states and other countries (Canada, Japan, and in Europe) (CARB, 2005),
and the low carbon fuel standard was developed through continuing discussion with leaders in
other US states and the European Union, which proposed to adopt a standard nearly identical
to California’s just weeks after California’s initial announcement (EU, 2007; California, 2007).
The tacit agreements between individual states are steadily giving way to formalized agreements
between sub-national US governments. The US partnerships of western states, mid-western
plains states, northeastern states, and cities across the map now represent over 80% of the US
population and GHG emissions. These partnerships bind their climate-mitigation efforts with
coordinated research into mitigation technologies, work toward consistent emissions inventory
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protocols, and seek to ultimately merge those emission-reduction sub-markets. This trend toward
committed partnerships, often involving emissions trading, offers the prospect of overcoming
cross-boundary jurisdiction issues (e.g. electricity generated in one state is consumed in another),
and also cross sectoral issues (e.g. farm-grown ethanol blended in gasoline in other states).”
“One size fits all” federal policy fails (specifically

in regards to pollution.)
In pollution regulation, one size doesn’t fit all.
Wallace Oates (professor of economics at the University of Maryland. He specializes in public

finance (with a focus on fiscal federalism and state-local finance) and environmental economics
(with a focus on economic incentives for environmental management) September 2009
“Environmental Federalism” Resources For the Future
http://www.rff.org/Publications/WPC/Pages/Environmental-Federalism-Wallace-E-Oates.aspx
In contrast, the variation in both the benefits of cleanup activities and costs of certain other forms
of pollution can vary dramatically across different jurisdictions. This, for example, can be the
case for various forms of air and water pollution, where one size doesn’t fit all. An efficient
outcome in such a setting requires different standards for environmental quality depending on
how damaging the effects are and how costly it is to control the polluting activity.
Example of how a federal, “One size fits all” policy fails: The arsenic
rule.

A particularly interesting and provocative case in point arose in the waning days of the Clinton
administration in 2000, when EPA introduced a new measure to reduce the permissible level of
arsenic in U.S. drinking water by 80 percent. The “arsenic rule” applied to all jurisdictions in the
nation. Careful analysis of the new provision revealed that it promised only a minuscule
reduction in health risk on a national scale. EPA estimated that the tough new standard could
save approximately 20 to 30 statistical lives per year (the value of a “statistical” life is typically
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understood by economists to be the cost of reducing the average number of deaths by one). But
this estimate was subject to sufficient uncertainty that it is not unreasonable to believe that no
lives would be saved under the standard. Of special interest in this case was the enormous
variation across the country in the cost per household of meeting the arsenic standard. Huge
economies of scale exist in the treatment of drinking water such that the new measure could be
met in a large water district like New York City for under $1 per year per household. In fact,
many large districts were already in compliance with the new standard. But in very small water
districts, largely in rural areas, the cost of meeting the new standard was in excess of $300 per
household per annum, dwarfing any prospective gains. Indeed, far greater health benefits could
be achieved if such sums were used for other public (or private) health measures, such as
increasing the frequency of mammograms, colon screenings, or a host of other procedures. One
size certainly didn’t fit all in this case: the arsenic rule may have made sense for large water
districts, but it was economically wasteful for smaller districts.
Favorable pollution control is under local jurisdiction.

Basic economics thus suggests an important principle for the structure of environmental
regulation: polluting activities that degrade environmental quality in a local jurisdiction should
therefore be a local responsibility (including the setting of standards). This way, regulatory
measures can be tailored to the specific circumstances of each jurisdiction.
State governance is more cost efficient than federal governance.

Example: pollution emissions.
Neil S. Seigel (Associate Professor of Law and Political Science, Duke University) Duke Law
School Legal Studies Research Paper Series, Research Paper No. 151, March 2007
“International Delegations and the Values of Federalism”
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=971066
Finally, the efficient delivery of local public goods (or alleviation of local
public bads) by states saves various costs when they make more cost-
effective choices than the federal government would make for the nation as
a whole. For example, Rust Belt states favored national emissions standards
for factories to reduce or eliminate a competitive advantage enjoyed by Sun
Belt states in the competition for new industry. If the only standards were air
quality standards, the Sun Belt states could offer less pollution control
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because their air was cleaner. The Rust Belt states accordingly lobbied for a
federal requirement that every new factory of a certain type had to install
the same abatement technology.
Does not cause race to the bottom.

Empirical evidence denies that decentralized regulation will cause a
race to the bottom.

However, a closer look suggests that both in theory and in practice the case for a race to the
bottom is not very compelling. A standard theoretical model in which government seeks to
maximize the well-being of its citizenry reveals no such race. People care about the quality of the
environment—and a government that fails to respond to these concerns is unlikely to stay in
office. Moreover, the existing evidence provides little support for this view. Under the Reagan
administration in the 1980s, several measures were introduced that effectively moved the
responsibility for environmental management on a number of fronts back to the states, creating a
favorable setting for a race to the bottom. Three empirical studies have carefully examined this
episode, however, and none found any evidence of a competitive reduction in environmental
standards. On the contrary, increased state spending on environmental programs and
improvements in environmental quality continued unabated through this period.
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Decentralization allows citizens to choose best

laws.
Decentralization allows citizens to choose the best laws.
Reiner Eichenberger (Professor of Finance at the University of Fribourg, Switzerland, research
director of CREMA (Center for Research in Economics, Management and the Arts), Editor of
Kyklos, and was part-time arbitrator on the Swiss Federal Appeals Commission for
Competition) Kyklos (International Review for Social Sciences) 1994 “The Benefits of
Decentralization and Risks of Overcentralization”
http://www.unifr.ch/finwiss/assets/files/Publikationen/17_The_Benefits_of_Federalism.pdf
In centralized democracies, participating in the political process and collecting information on

the various political alternatives are public goods. Therefore, the population is ‘rationally
ignorant’ and tends to abstain from political activity [DOWNS, 1957]. In largely decentralized
countries, on the other hand, citizens’ incentives are dramatically different. Individuals can use
their information to choose the jurisdiction that provides the best services and the lowest taxes.
Information on political alternatives thus becomes a private good. However, information not only
empowers citizens to vote with their feet. It is also a precondition to effectively exercise the
voice option and to take part in the political process. Consequently, individuals’ capability to
take up the voice option increased the more decentralized a political unit is.
Federalism leads to better laws.
Yale Law Journal, October 2005, “Of Property and Federalism”

http://www.thepocketpart.org/2005/10/bell_parchomovsky.html
Federalism is an engine of legal innovation in the United States. As Justice Brandeis commented,
“[i]t is one of the happy incidents of the federal system that a single courageous state may, if its
citizens choose, serve as a laboratory; and try novel social and economic experiments without
risk to the rest of the country.” Through these experiments, citizens are able to get better laws.
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Charles Tiebout famously observed that while political mechanisms for local government
services and taxes may be clumsy and inefficient, citizens can always vote with their feet by
immigrating to jurisdictions that provide better services for their tax money. The Tiebout
hypothesis shows that even without direct markets for government services, federal competition
can lead to efficient outcomes. Legal scholars have for many years examined the positive effects
of federalism in fields such as contract law, local government and tax law, and corporate law. As
scholars such as Larry Ribstein have shown, individuals’ ability to choose the best law for their
needs leads to competition that improves the quality of law and the efficiency of transactions.
Corporate law has been the scene of a particularly vigorous discussion about the benefits of
federalism.
Encourages citizens’ involvement in political

process.
Decentralization encourages participation in the political process.
Reiner Eichenberger (Professor of Finance at the University of Fribourg, Switzerland, research
director of CREMA (Center for Research in Economics, Management and the Arts), Editor of
Kyklos, and was part-time arbitrator on the Swiss Federal Appeals Commission for
Competition) Kyklos (International Review for Social Sciences) 1994 “The Benefits of
Decentralization and Risks of Overcentralization”
http://www.unifr.ch/finwiss/assets/files/Publikationen/17_The_Benefits_of_Federalism.pdf
In decentralized countries the incentives to actively take part in the political process are further
strengthened, because the individual influence on politics is larger, and personal, local relations
are more important than in centralized countries. Thus, individuals and firms have incentives to
invest in jurisdiction-specific, local human capital and relations. Consequently, decentralization
strengthens local attachment of individuals and firms. This counteracts the direct effects of
decentralization on the incentive to migrate.
Local government increases opportunity for citizen involvement in

political process.
Second, democratic self-government is supposed to be facilitated when there
exists a robust space for participatory politics at levels closer to the people
who are governed.21 Federalism, observed Justice O’Connor for the Court in
Gregory, “increases opportunity for citizen involvement in democratic
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processes.”22 On this point, she referenced Alexis de Tocqueville, who

“understood well that participation in local government is a cornerstone of
American democracy.”
Federalism prevents tyranny.

State governance encourages political accountability and
responsiveness.
Third, political responsiveness and accountability are believed to be

encouraged when states compete for mobile citizens who can vote with both
their hands and their feet. Justice O’Connor wrote for the Gregory Court that
federalism “makes government more responsive by putting the States in
competition for a mobile citizenry.” Responsiveness and accountability are
distinguishable but related. One way to ensure responsiveness is not through
exit but through voice26—that is, voting politicians out of office or pressuring
them. This is often what is meant by accountability.
Federalism prevents tyranny.

First, a powerful check on the abuse of government power is said to exist
when multiple levels of government compete for regulatory authority and
political power is diffused. James Madison famously identified federalism as
part of “a double security” that “arises to the rights of the people.” The
federal and state governments, Madison insisted, “will control each other, at
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the same time that each will be controlled by itself.” Two centuries later,
[Supreme Court] Justice [Sandra Day] O’Connor would invoke the intentions
of the Framers on behalf of the Court in Gregory v. Ashcroft. She identified
the tyranny prevention championed by the Framers as “the principal benefit
of the federalist system.”

50 States CP Back-Up/federalism Good/etc.

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Gracie Cockett 1

Recent precedence: States taking a stand in major enviro. issues (examples of

Recent historical precedence: States implement separate, yet systematic, plans

States do have sufficient leverage in relation to reducing climate change. ...........3

In pollution regulation, one size doesn’t fit all. .......................................................5

Favorable pollution control is under local jurisdiction. ............................................6

State governance is more cost efficient than federal governance. Example:

Does not cause race to the bottom. ..........................................................................7

Decentralization allows citizens to choose best laws. ................................................8

Decentralization allows citizens to choose the best laws........................................8

Federalism leads to better laws...............................................................................8

Encourages citizens’ involvement in political process................................................9

Decentralization encourages participation in the political process..........................9

Local government increases opportunity for citizen involvement in political

Recent precedence: States taking a stand in major

States do have sufficient leverage in relation to reducing climate

The states are learning to work together through formal

“One size fits all” federal policy fails (specifically

Wallace Oates (professor of economics at the University of Maryland. He specializes in public

Wallace Oates (professor of economics at the University of Maryland. He specializes in public

Favorable pollution control is under local jurisdiction.

Wallace Oates (professor of economics at the University of Maryland. He specializes in public

State governance is more cost efficient than federal governance.

Does not cause race to the bottom.

Wallace Oates (professor of economics at the University of Maryland. He specializes in public

Decentralization allows citizens to choose best

In centralized democracies, participating in the political process and collecting information on

Federalism leads to better laws.

Yale Law Journal, October 2005, “Of Property and Federalism”

Encourages citizens’ involvement in political

Local government increases opportunity for citizen involvement in

processes.”22 On this point, she referenced Alexis de Tocqueville, who

Federalism prevents tyranny.

Third, political responsiveness and accountability are believed to be

Federalism prevents tyranny.

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