The Supreme Court’s Attempts Via Its Dormant Commerce Clause Jurisprudence to Navigate State Police Power and National Free Trade: Potential Lessons for International Trade

This Essay makes two modest moves. First, it identifies the circuitous path of the United States Supreme Court’s Dormant Commerce Clause case law. I describe the different legal doctrines and tests utilized by the U.S. Supreme Court since the beginning of the Republic to navigate the tension between, on the one hand, the reserved police power of individual states to regulate in their citizens’ interests and, on the other hand, the Interstate Commerce Clause’s grant of power to the federal government to make the United States free from interstate trade barriers.