Does Federalism Have Relevance to Government Reorganization for the Third Century?

Abstract

Within the constitutional framework, the politics of intergovernmental relations has been shaped and is likely to be shaped in the future. In order to understand the relevance of federalism to government reorganization one must, I think, review the key constitutional debates of the last two hundred years that concern the relations between the states and the national government. The general outcome of these debates has been to strengthen national authority at the expense of the states. The major problem of government reorganization is growing national authority coupled with the political and organizational power of civil servants, congressional staffs, and highly vocal interest groups. In the face of these factors, states and local governments are losing their capacity for independent action. How one addresses the problems of government reorganization will be dealt with in the later sections of this article.