Prometheus 6   

Hypocrisies abound

Congress flexes muscle on state laws
Federal interference with local legislation called 'troubling trend'

By Richard Simon, Los Angeles Times, 10/20/2003

WASHINGTON -- California passes a tough financial privacy law, and Washington, D.C., moves to scuttle it.

California officials propose strict antipollution standards for certain engines, and a congressional committee moves to block the new rules.

California Governor Gray Davis signs into law a measure allowing illegal immigrants to obtain drivers' licenses, and within days legislation is introduced in Congress to deny federal funds to the state unless it repeals the law.

When it comes to California, the Republican-controlled Congress has abandoned its natural tendency to support states' rights. Congressional Republicans are moving on a variety of fronts to rein in state actions they believe go too far, leaving Democrats to complain about federal interference with state business.

"If anybody had told me that I would be on the floor of Congress arguing states' rights . . . I would have told them they are crazy," Representative Maxine Waters, Democrat of California, said during a recent House debate.

She was objecting to a House-passed measure intended to protect consumers from identity theft but would nullify tougher state laws, including a provision of a new California law that would prohibit companies from sharing customers' personal financial information with affiliates if a consumer objects.

"This is part of a very troubling trend by Congress to use its authority to preempt state laws that go further than federal law in protecting consumers and the environment," University of Southern California law professor Erwin Chemerinsky said. "Congress acting to preempt state laws is not new. But the repeated efforts to preempt more progressive state legislation is new."

Michael Bird, federal affairs counsel for the National Conference of State Legislatures, said the number of measures seeking to "render the states helpless" was on the rise. "You have more organized interests that are seeking one-stop resolution to their perceived problems," he said.

It's not that Congress is necessarily picking on California. Laws in other states, dealing with issues such as e-mail spam, predatory lending, and securities fraud, could be preempted by pending federal legislation. State officials also have objected to a provision of the pending energy bill that would allow federal officials to override state decisions in placing power-transmission lines.

California's laws have drawn special attention because the nation's most populous state is regarded as a trendsetter.

During the recent congressional debate over financial privacy legislation, for example, Representative Michael G. Oxley, Republican of Ohio, said that if California could impose its own rules on financial institutions, other states might follow suit and "ultimately, it becomes California setting national standards."

Congressional Republicans deny their actions violate a core principle of support for states' rights.

"States' rights doesn't mean the right to hurt other states," said Senator Christopher S. Bond, Republican of Missouri, who has put into a spending bill a measure that would block California from imposing tougher pollution rules on engines used in lawn mowers. He contends the rule would prove costly to engine manufacturers. The measure cleared a committee and awaits the full Senate's approval.

Responded Senator Dianne Feinstein, Democrat of California: "It would be a major mistake for the federal government to step in and tell states that they cannot protect their citizens from air pollution."