Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/boundvolumes/529bv.pdf
Page Number: 736

529US3

Unit: $U54

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Cite as: 529 U. S. 598 (2000)

661

Breyer, J., dissenting

state interests from undue infringement”); see also Kramer,
Putting the Politics Back into the Political Safeguards of
Federalism, 100 Colum. L. Rev. 215 (2000) (focusing on role
of political process and political parties in protecting state
interests). Congress is institutionally motivated to do so.
Its Members represent state and local district interests.
They consider the views of state and local ofﬁcials when they
legislate, and they have even developed formal procedures
to ensure that such consideration takes place. See, e. g., Un-
funded Mandates Reform Act of 1995, Pub. L. 104–4, 109
Stat. 48 (codiﬁed in scattered sections of 2 U. S. C.). More-
over, Congress often can better reﬂect state concerns for
autonomy in the details of sophisticated statutory schemes
than can the Judiciary, which cannot easily gather the rele-
vant facts and which must apply more general legal rules
and categories. See, e. g., 42 U. S. C. § 7543(b) (Clean Air
Act); 33 U. S. C. § 1251 et seq. (Clean Water Act); see also
New York v. United States, 505 U. S. 144, 167–168 (1992) (col-
lecting other examples of “cooperative federalism”). Not
surprisingly, the bulk of American law is still state law, and
overwhelmingly so.

B

I would also note that Congress, when it enacted the stat-
ute, followed procedures that help to protect the federalism
values at stake.
It provided adequate notice to the States
of its intent to legislate in an “are[a] of traditional state regu-
lation.” Ante, at 615. And in response, attorneys general
in the overwhelming majority of States (38) supported con-
gressional legislation, telling Congress that “[o]ur experience
as Attorneys General strengthens our belief that the prob-
lem of violence against women is a national one, requiring
leadership, and federal funds.”
federal attention, federal
Crimes of Violence Motivated by Gender, Hearing before the
Subcommittee on Civil and Constitutional Rights of the
House Committee on the Judiciary, 103d Cong., 1st Sess.,
34–36 (1993); see also Violence Against Women: Victims of