Yes, the U.S. Supreme Court once considered the question of whether a state government could prohibit the importation of solid or liquid waste from across state lines, and concluded that no, it cannot. (I may have exaggerated a little in my title when I implied that the case was just about “poop,” but you’re reading now, aren’t you?) I came across this fun decision during a work-related Googling. It is amazing the things you find.
Anyway, Philadelphia v. New Jersey, 437 U.S. 617 (1978), caught my eye, because why would the city of Philadelphia be suing the state of New Jersey? In the 1970’s of all times? It turns out that New Jersey had a law that “prohibit[ed] the importation of most solid of liquid waste which originated or was collected outside the territorial limits of the State…” Id. at 618. Quite a few private landfills in New Jersey and cities outside of New Jersey had business arrangements, in which those cities shipped their trash to New Jersey. I’m lazy, so just make your own New Jersey jokes here. I’ll wait.
Those private landfills and non-Jersey cities were not too happy. The landfills didn’t like losing business, and the cities didn’t like not being able to ship their effluvia to New Jersey (I’m paraphrasing Justice Stewart’s recitation of the facts, but I imagine the mayor of Philadelphia raging about not understanding the point of being so close to New Jersey if you can’t dump your crap there. Al Pacino is playing the role of the mayor in my imagination. It’s some awesome scenery-chewing.) So they sued the state of New Jersey for violating the Commerce Clause of the Constitution.
Typically, when you hear the term “states’ rights,” you either think of segregation or the Tenth Amendment. More jurisprudence related to what states can and cannot do, or what the federal government can or cannot make states do, derives from the Commerce Clause and other provisions nearby. In this situation, rather than a federal government that, depending on how you look at it, was either the source of or the last bastion against tyranny, private businesses were suing their own state, and municipal governments were suing a foreign (i.e. different) state. It doesn’t quite fit the standard “states’ rights” rhetorical model, but it does bring up a good question: does a state government, ostensibly of, by, and for its people, have the right to keep other people’s garbage out?
Short answer, no. If you’ve read this far but would really rather be off elsewhere eating a Hot Pocket, you may go now.
From the point of view of the landfill owners, who probably didn’t live right next to their offices, this was a great victory, obviously. For the ordinary citizens of New Jersey….maybe now we know why Snooki drank so much. (I had to go there.) Justice Stewart, writing for the 7-2 majority, explained how this decision actually benefits everyone in the long run, because turnabout is fair play:
Today, cities in Pennsylvania and New York find it expedient or necessary to send their waste into New Jersey for disposal, and New Jersey claims the right to close its borders to such traffic. Tomorrow, cities in New Jersey may find it expedient or necessary to send their waste into Pennsylvania or New York for disposal, and those States might then claim the right to close their borders. The Commerce Clause will protect New Jersey in the future, just as it protects her neighbors now, from efforts by one State to isolate itself in the stream of interstate commerce from a problem shared by all.
Id. at 629.
Hard to argue with that, right? Well, Justice (and future Chief Justice) Rehnquist disagreed, along with then-Chief Justice Burger. Rehnquist actually wrote the following:
The health and safety hazards associated with landfills present appellees with a currently unsolvable dilemma. Other, hopefully safer, methods of disposing of solid wastes are still in the development stage and cannot presently be used. But appellees obviously cannot completely stop the tide of solid waste that its citizens will produce in the interim. For the moment, therefore, appellees must continue to use sanitary landfills to dispose of New Jersey’s own solid waste despite the critical environmental problems thereby created.
Id. at 630.
He almost sounds like a hippie there, and he has a very good point. This is an epic battle between public health and private enterprise. Rehnquist cites precedent cases that allow states to ban importation of items that might cause or spread infection, and notes that garbage sort of fits that category.
In my opinion, these cases are dispositive of the present one. Under them, New Jersey may require germ-infected rags or diseased meat to be disposed of as best as possible within the State, but at the same time prohibit the importation of such items for disposal at the facilities that are set up within New Jersey for disposal of such material generated within the State. The physical fact of life that New Jersey must somehow dispose of its own noxious items does not mean that it must serve as a depository for those of every other State. Similarly, New Jersey should be free under our past precedents to prohibit the importation of solid waste because of the health and safety problems that such waste poses to its citizens. The fact that New Jersey continues to, and indeed must continue to, dispose of its own solid waste does not mean that New Jersey may not prohibit the importation of even more solid waste into the State. I simply see no way to distinguish solid waste, on the record of this case, from germinfected rags, diseased meat, and other noxious items.
Id. at 632 (emphasis in original).
Unfortunately, the rest of the Court, save Rehnquist and Burger, did not see it that way, and the trash continued to flow. In the battle between New Jersey’s right to control the flow of junk into its borders and the right of (a) other cities to dispose of their junk and (b) the right to profit off others’ junk, states’ rights lost.
Photo credit: elingil on stock.xchng.
