Wednesday was a difficult day for The American Independent News Network, which is the larger entity that operates The Iowa Independent. Our chief executive and founder announced two of our sister sites would close and their content would be moved to The American Independent.
A recently introduced bill could have far-reaching impact on the U.S. sugar industry, including American Crystal Sugar, a farmer-owned cooperative that locked out 1,300 Midwest workers on Aug. 1.
The chairman for Herman Cain’s Iowa effort says the campaign “relied more on the word of farmers than Washington regulators” in deciding to run an ad containing claims the Environmental Protection Agency says are false.
The Iowa Senate will remain under the control of a slim 26-25 Democratic majority when it reconvenes in January 2012.
Republican gubernatorial hopeful and Senate Minority Leader Paul McKinley blasted Democrats Monday for blocking a bill during this year’s legislative session asserting Iowa’s sovereignty under the 10th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.
Under the 10th Amendment, states and citizens retain all powers not specifically given to the federal government.
In response to a story in the Omaha World Herald about a similar bill being considered in Nebraska, McKinley posted on his Twitter that Iowa Democrats are “obstructing my state sovereignty resolution.” The mostly symbolic bill, Senate Concurrent Resolution 1, doesn’t call for seccession from the union, only that the federal government “cease and desist, effective immediately, enacting federal mandates on the states that are beyond the scope of these constitutionally delegated powers.”
The bill was introduced to the Senate Rules and Administration Committee in January.
Sovereignty supporters point to things like mandates on money distributed as part of the federal stimulus package as evidence the government has overstepped its bounds. President Barack Obama’s push for health care reform has also riled this group over fear of a government-run system. Last week, Texas Gov. Rick Perry threatened to invoke the 10th Amendment to resist health care reform.
However, as Salon’s Alex Koppelman pointed out in April, the U.S. Supreme Court has routinely upheld the federal government’s right to issue mandates, leaving sovereignty supporters on shaky legal ground.
What [these bills] describe has now become commonplace — it’s the way Congress effectively mandated a federal drinking age — and, in cases like South Dakota v. Dole, the Supreme Court has declared the practice Constitutional. Louis R. Cohen, a former U.S. deputy solicitor general, successfully argued that case on behalf of the federal government. He told Salon, “Insofar as Congress is spending federal money, Congress has very wide authority to state the conditions under which it will spend federal money. If that means that the state has to do certain things in order to qualify for the federal money, that’s perfectly Constitutional.”
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