Opinion ID: 4388694
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Tenth Amendment and Anticommandeering

Text: Rule “The Constitution . . . ‘confers upon Congress the power to regulate individuals, not States.’” Murphy v. NCAA, 138 S. Ct. 1461, 1476 (2018) (quoting New York v. United States, 505 U.S. 144, 166 (1992)). Under the Tenth Amendment and other provisions of the Constitution, “the Federal Government may not compel the States to 13 The Seventh Circuit has conducted a similar analysis: “[T]he Attorney General repeatedly characterizes the issue as whether localities can be allowed to thwart federal law enforcement. That is a red herring. . . . [N]othing in this case involves any affirmative interference with federal law enforcement at all, nor is there any interference whatsoever with federal immigration authorities.” City of Chicago v. Sessions, 888 F.3d 272, 282 (7th Cir. 2018), vacated in part on other grounds, No. 17-2991, 2018 WL 4268817 (7th Cir. June 4, 2018). 42 UNITED STATES V. STATE OF CALIFORNIA implement, by legislation or executive action, federal regulatory programs.” Printz v. United States, 521 U.S. 898, 925 (1997). Ultimately, we conclude that the specter of the anticommandeering rule distinguishes the case before us from the preemption cases on which the United States relies. Those cases concerned state laws that affirmatively disrupted federal operations by mandating action (or inaction) contrary to the status quo. 14 In each, a state statute 14 See Arizona II, 567 U.S. at 393–94 (considering four provisions of state law, including “[t]wo [that] create new state offenses” and two that “give specific arrest authority and investigative duties with respect to certain aliens to state and local law enforcement officers”); Crosby, 530 U.S. at 366 (“The issue is whether the Burma law of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, restricting the authority of its agencies to purchase goods or services from companies doing business with Burma, is invalid under the Supremacy Clause of the National Constitution owing to its threat of frustrating federal statutory objectives.” (footnote omitted)); Lockridge, 403 U.S. at 276 (exploring “the extent to which the maintenance of a general federal law of labor relations combined with a centralized administrative agency to implement its provisions necessarily supplants the operation of the more traditional legal processes in this field”); Nash, 389 U.S. at 236 (“The crucial question presented here is whether a State can refuse to pay its unemployment insurance to persons solely because they have preferred unfair labor practice charges against their former employer.”); Paul, 373 U.S. at 133–34 (assessing a state statute that “gauge[d] the maturity of avocados by oil content,” where federal law “gauge[d] the maturity of avocados grown in Florida by standards which attribute no significance to oil content”); Hines, 312 U.S. at 59 (“This case involves the validity of an Alien Registration Act adopted by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania.”); Davis, 161 U.S. at 283 (determining that “an attempt, by a State, to define [the] duties or control the conduct of [the] affairs [of national banks] is absolutely void, wherever such attempted exercise of authority expressly conflicts with the laws of the United States, and either frustrates the purpose of the national legislation or impairs the efficiency of these agencies of the Federal government to discharge the UNITED STATES V. STATE OF CALIFORNIA 43 affirmatively instituted a regulatory scheme that conflicted with federal law, either by commission (for example, by applying differing standards or mandating affirmative action irreconcilable with federal law) or omission (by demanding inaction that directly conflicted with federal requirements). The solution to avoid conflict preemption was the same: invalidate the state enactment. In each case, the status quo would return—either no future conflicting action would be taken, or active compliance with federal law would recommence—and federal activity would no longer be obstructed. Here, by contrast, invalidating SB 54 would not prevent obstruction of the federal government’s activities, because the INA does not require any particular action on the part of California or its political subdivisions. Federal law provides states and localities the option, not the requirement, of assisting federal immigration authorities. SB 54 simply makes that choice for California law enforcement agencies. The United States’ primary argument against SB 54 is that it forces federal authorities to expend greater resources to enforce immigration laws, but that would be the case regardless of SB 54, since California would still retain the ability to “decline to administer the federal program.” New York, 505 U.S. at 177. As the Supreme Court recently rearticulated in Murphy, under the anticommandeering rule, “Congress cannot issue direct orders to state legislatures,” 138 S. Ct. at 1478, and the Court’s earlier decision in New duties, for the performance of which they were created”). Leslie Miller, Gartrell Construction, Tarble’s Case, and Neagle featured similarly affirmative disruptions of federal law; their specific facts are explored in our discussion of AB 103 and preemption. 44 UNITED STATES V. STATE OF CALIFORNIA York underscored that the rule also permits a state’s refusal to adopt preferred federal policies. See 505 U.S. at 161–62. Even in the absence of SB 54, Congress could not “impress into its service—and at no cost to itself—the police officers of the 50 States.” Printz, 521 U.S. at 922. 15 Federal schemes are inevitably frustrated when states opt not to participate in federal programs or enforcement efforts. But the choice of a state to refrain from participation cannot be invalid under the doctrine of obstacle preemption where, as here, it retains the right of refusal. Extending conflict or obstacle preemption to SB 54 would, in effect, “dictate[] what a state legislature may and may not do,” Murphy, 138 S. Ct. at 1478, because it would imply that a state’s otherwise lawful decision not to assist federal authorities is made unlawful when it is codified as state law. We also find no constitutional infirmity in the specific provisions of SB 54 that govern the exchange of information with federal immigration authorities. See Cal. Gov’t Code § 7284.6(a)(1)(C)–(D) (prohibiting California law enforcement agencies from “[p]roviding information regarding a person’s release date or responding to requests for notification by providing release dates or other information unless that information is available to the 15 The United States suggests that these principles do not extend here because “both sovereigns [are] regulat[ing] private individuals,” and the Supreme Court has held that it “is incorrect” to “assume that the Tenth Amendment limits congressional power to pre-empt or displace state regulation of private activities affecting interstate commerce.” Hodel v. Va. Surface Mining & Reclamation Ass’n, 452 U.S. 264, 289–90 (1981). But although the INA and SB 54 both implicate noncitizens—private actors—SB 54 governs how California and its localities can interact with the federal government, not the activities of private individuals, and so Hodel is inapposite. UNITED STATES V. STATE OF CALIFORNIA 45 public,” and “[p]roviding personal information . . . about an individual, including, but not limited to, the individual’s home address or work address unless that information is available to the public”). These two subparts only concern the exchange of information, and the Supreme Court has implied the existence of a Tenth Amendment exception for reporting requirements. See Printz, 521 U.S. at 917–18 (distinguishing between federal statutes that “require only the provision of information to the Federal Government” and those that “force[ the] participation of the States’ executive in the actual administration of a federal program”). The United States relies on Reno v. Condon, which upheld against Tenth Amendment attack a federal statute that “regulate[d] the disclosure and resale of personal information contained in the records of state DMVs” because it did “not require the States in their sovereign capacity to regulate their own citizens” and instead “regulate[d] the States as the owners of data bases.” 528 U.S. 141, 143, 151 (2000). But the Supreme Court recently explained, The anticommandeering doctrine does not apply when Congress evenhandedly regulates an activity in which both States and private actors engage. That principle formed the basis for the Court’s decision in Reno v. Condon, which concerned a federal law restricting the disclosure and dissemination of personal information provided in applications for driver’s licenses. The law applied equally to state and private actors. It did not regulate 46 UNITED STATES V. STATE OF CALIFORNIA the States’ sovereign authority to “regulate their own citizens.” Murphy, 138 S. Ct. at 1478–79 (citation omitted) (quoting Reno, 528 U.S. at 151). Here, by contrast, it is the state’s responsibility to help enforce federal law, and not conduct engaged in by both state and private actors, that is at issue. We therefore conclude that Murphy’s reading of Reno suggests that the latter is not applicable here. SB 54 may well frustrate the federal government’s immigration enforcement efforts. However, whatever the wisdom of the underlying policy adopted by California, that frustration is permissible, because California has the right, pursuant to the anticommandeering rule, to refrain from assisting with federal efforts. The United States stresses that, in crafting the INA, Congress expected cooperation between states and federal immigration authorities. That is likely the case. But when questions of federalism are involved, we must distinguish between expectations and requirements. In this context, the federal government was free to expect as much as it wanted, but it could not require California’s cooperation without running afoul of the Tenth Amendment.