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27. Which of the following is the best argument in favor of the state's effort to have this lawsuit dismissed?
Congress enacted a federal statute providing that any state may «require labeling to show the state or other geographic origin of citrus fruit that is imported into the receiving state.» Pursuant to the federal statute, a state that produced large quantities of citrus fruit enacted a law requiring all citrus fruit imported into the state to be stamped with a two-letter postal abbreviation signifying the state of the fruit's origin. The law did not impose any such requirement for citrus fruit grown within the state. When it adopted the law, the state legislature declared that its purpose was to reduce the risks of infection of local citrus crops by itinerant diseases that have been found to attack citrus fruit. A national association of citrus growers has sued to have the state law declared unconstitutional. The association claims that the law is prohibited by the negative implications of the commerce clause of the Constitution.
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The Commerce Clause grants Congress the power to regulate commerce among the states, including the ability to explicitly authorize states to regulate interstate commerce themselves. However, the Clause does limit each state's ability to unilaterally pass laws that burden interstate commerce. The negative implications of the Commerce Clause (called the «Dormant Commerce Clause») mean that, in the absence of federal regulations on the subject, states cannot pass regulations on local aspects of interstate commerce unless they do not discriminate against out-of-state parties to benefit local economic interests and are not unduly burdensome. When a state regulation does not discriminate, but merely burdens interstate commerce, it may be upheld based on a case-by-case balancing of the legitimate state interest versus the burden on interstate commerce. This balancing test is appropriate only if Congress has not enacted a statute authorizing the state regulation at issue.
When a state regulation does discriminate against interstate commerce, absent federal authorization, a more difficult test applies: (i) the state law must further an important, non-economic state interest; and (ii) there must be no reasonable alternative options available.
B is correct. In this question, the state's requirement discriminates against interstate commerce, and would therefore typically run afoul of the Commerce Clause. However, because Congress may authorize states to regulate (and burden) interstate commerce, as the federal statute expressly did here, the suit should be dismissed.
A is incorrect. This answer applies the wrong test. This test is used when a state's non-discriminatory regulation burdens interstate commerce, which may be upheld if that burden is outweighed by a legitimate state interest. The more appropriate (and stricter) test that would likely apply is when a state does discriminate against interstate commerce (because the state law here only applies to out-of-state imports). However, there is no need to even determine the appropriate test because the governing basis for the dismissal of this suit is that Congress expressly authorized the state to do what it has done.
C is incorrect. This is an incorrect application of the law to these facts. The state law imposes a requirement only on imported fruit, but on not fruit grown and shipped from inside the state. Thus, the state law does discriminate against out-of-state growers or producers.
D is incorrect. This answer is partially applying the stricter test for state regulations that discriminate against out-of-state interests, which the state regulation here does. However, this is not the correct answer because the prevailing argument is that the federal statute authorized the state regulation, thus ending the analysis before applying either test described above.