The research was conducted by collective action constitution Some lessons are provided. First, when countries disagree about the existence or seriousness of collective action problems, these problems are not only present or absent in technical, scientific terms. Cost-effectiveness collective action questions have an objective structure, but their existence and significance require an assessment of the extent to which the costs of a state’s externalization outweigh the benefits of its internalization, and such an assessment may require normative judgment in addition to fact-finding.
Second, the most important evaluator is either the Constitution itself or the government agency with the most democratic legitimacy to make such a judgment. This body is Congress—the first branch of government—where all states and all Americans are represented, while individual state governments are represented by only one state and some Americans. exist McCulloch v. Maryland (1819), Chief Justice Marshall explained the crucial distinction between the democratic legitimacy of the states and the people collectively in Congress and the democratic legitimacy of the states individually outside Congress. Congress also represents all states and all people more broadly than the president, who does not include both political parties at a given time and does not balance interests like Congress.
Third, if Congress is acting within the scope of its enumerated powers, it only needs to comply with the voting rules set forth in the Constitution; Congress does not need to first prove that all or a majority of states agree that a collective action problem exists and that the problem is serious enough to require federal regulation. In other words, Congress does not need to poll the states other than to gain sufficient support in the federal legislative process. Because states are represented in Congress—and because congressional majorities represent (albeit imperfectly) the collective, constitutionally relevant views of the states—to do otherwise would overrepresent the states, effectively making them vote twice. One of the main reasons for the establishment of the Constitution was also Chapter 10 argued that the difficulty with amendment is that Article V essentially lets states vote twice.
Fourth, Congress’s central role in deciding whether and how to resolve states’ collective action problems connects Constitutional provisions, principles, and ideas that might otherwise have little to do with each other. These include, for example, the Interstate Compact Clause (see Chapter 3), the Interstate Commerce Clause (Chapter 5), Congressional approval of exceptions to the dormant commerce doctrine (Chapter 5), and the opening clause of Article III, which allows Congress to Determines whether to establish lower federal courts (Chapter 7), provisions of Article IV that expressly or implicitly authorize congressional legislation (Chapter 8), and democratic procedural rights and doctrines (Chapter 9).
Congress’s primary role in the constitutional scheme raises questions about the contemporary operation of the constitutional separation of powers and the interconnected system (explored in Part III of this book). It’s one thing to argue that the Constitution’s original purpose and design was such that a federal government operating through (super)majority rule would be more likely to solve multistate collective action problems than states operating through unanimous consent rule. It is another matter to show that this is generally true in practice. As George Washington suggested in his letter to Congress presenting the United States Constitution collective action constitutionTo protect national autonomy and individual liberties, the Framers created a bicameral legislature and a system of separation of powers, both of which make legislation more difficult than unicameral legislatures and parliamentary systems. But the Framers did not envision that the availability of the threat of a veto would dominate the decision-making process in cases that had nothing to do with bills deemed to infringe upon the office of the president or deemed unconstitutional by the president. The Framers also failed to take responsibility for the modern unconstitutional “vetogate” in Congress, especially the Senate filibuster, which makes legislation more difficult. Finally, the Framers did not foresee the polarized and confrontational nature of contemporary American politics.
These developments mean that bicameralism and separation of powers (and interrelationships) often do more than limit Congress’s ability to legislate. Horizontal structures and contemporary politics may make it difficult for Congress to do this, especially given the severity and geographic scope of the problems facing the nation and the fact that Americans primarily look to the federal government, rather than states, to solve them. Perhaps the greatest flaw of modern constitutions is that Congress often fails to fulfill its legislative responsibilities in the constitutional scheme. The result was a shift of power from Congress to the executive branch, the federal courts, and the states. The primary solution to congressional gridlock is more frequent unilateral action by the executive branch. Other partial and potentially fraught solutions include federal court efforts to “update” the meaning of federal statutes and strengthen the exercise of state regulatory powers. Given that amending the constitution is virtually impossible, veto practice is unlikely to become more restrictive, and political realignment will take a long time, adequate solutions to the gridlock problem may not emerge quickly. However, ending legislative filibusters in the Senate with a majority vote could have the beneficial (but not costless) consequence of changing the Senate’s typical voting threshold from a three-fifths supermajority to majority rule.
Given the difficulty of legislating in the current era, one might think collective action constitution offers an elegy—a description of how America’s constitutional system should have worked or used to work but no longer does. For readers who view this book as an elegy in an era of presidential administration, judicial supremacy, and arbitrary national legislation, I quote Richard Hooker, who long ago viewed his book as an elegy, and who believed it anyway It was justified to write this book: “Though for no other reason than that posterity may know, we do not by silence let things pass as in a dream.” (My learned colleague H. Jefferson Powell provided this quote talk.)
However in fact, collective action constitution No elegies are offered. There is much to praise about the constitutional structure as opposed to relying on states to take collective action outside of Congress. When the problem is of national or international scope, the relevant comparison is not between the ability of Congress to solve the problem and the ability of a state to solve the problem, but between the ability of the political subdivisions to act and the ability of the states to act collectively through unanimous consent Comparison. Collective action problems would almost certainly be exacerbated if the federal government dissolved and states must unanimously agree to protect the environment; regulate interstate and foreign commerce; build interstate infrastructure; enter into international agreements; contribute revenue to the common treasury and troops to the common army (or coordinate separate militaries); disburse jointly held funds; respond to economic downturns; provide a minimal safety net; and deal with pandemics, among many other issues. Congress still enacts legislation today, and enacts interstate compacts much more frequently than most, let alone all, states do.
As for the executive branch, presidents lack the ability to legislate in a formal and legal manner, so they are unable to address the above issues and issues with similar structures as Congress can. Presidential actions are less durable and far-reaching than legislation. Furthermore, normatively speaking, executive unilateralism carries the risk of democratic deficit and backsliding, whereas congressional power does not.
The most important job of the federal judiciary is largely, though not entirely, to get out of the way. collective action constitution A warning to the U.S. Supreme Court and lower federal courts—both of which have been far more decisive in reviewing the constitutionality of federal laws than the Founding Fathers envisioned (see Chapter 7)—not to significantly limit federal power in the coming years. , whether through constitutional-law holdings that shrink congressional power or executive legal decisions that weaken agency power. The nation will continue to face pressing problems that cross state (or national) borders, requiring federal action to effectively address them. Generally speaking, the federal government has the authority to take action. Given that Americans will continue to live in an era of horizontal structures and partisan polarization and hostility, there are already significant obstacles to members of Congress’s ability and willingness to overcome their own collective action problems and legislate. Especially in modern times, legal principles should facilitate rather than hinder the achievement of the constitution’s main structural purpose—the commitment to collective action.
