Laboratories of democracy is a phrase popularized by U.S. Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis in ''

New State Ice Co. v. Liebmann ''New State Ice Co. v. Liebmann'', 285 U.S. 262 (1932), was a decision by the Supreme Court of the United States. Facts The New State Ice Company, which was properly licensed in by the Corporation Commission of Oklahoma, brought suit against Lie ...

'' to describe how "a single courageous State may, if its citizens choose, serve as a laboratory; and try novel social and economic experiments without risk to the rest of the country."''

'', Brandeis was an associate justice of the Supreme Court of the United States from 1916 to 1939. This concept explains how within the federal framework, there exists a system of state autonomy where state and local governments act as social laboratories, where laws and policies are created and tested at the state level of the democratic system, in a manner similar (in theory, at least) to the

scientific method The scientific method is an empirical method for acquiring knowledge that has characterized the development of science since at least the 17th century (with notable practitioners in previous centuries; see the article history of scientific ...

. An example today would be the legalization of marijuana in Colorado despite the fact that it is illegal federally. The Tenth Amendment of the United States Constitution provides that "all powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people." This is a basis for the ''laboratories of democracy'' concept, because the Tenth Amendment assigns most day-to-day governance responsibilities, including general police power, to the state and local governments. Because there are 50 semi-autonomous states, different policies can be enacted and tested at the state level without directly affecting the entire country. As a result, a diverse patchwork of state-level government practices is created. If any one or more of those policies are successful, they can be expanded to the national level by acts of Congress. For example, the Massachusetts

legislature A legislature is an assembly with the authority to make law Law is a set of rules that are created and are enforceable by social or governmental institutions to regulate behavior,Robertson, ''Crimes against humanity'', 90. with its p ...

established a health care reform law in 2006 that became the model for the subsequent

Affordable Care Act The Affordable Care Act (ACA), formally known as the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act and colloquially known as Obamacare, is a landmark U.S. federal statute enacted by the 111th United States Congress and signed into law by Pres ...

at the national level in 2010, or the various concealed carry state reciprocity agreements that motivated the subsequent proposed federal

Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act of 2017 The Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act, oHouse Bill 38 is a bill that would amend Title 18 of the United States Code to require all U.S. states to recognize concealed carry permits granted by other states. It would also allow the concealed transport o ...

References

External links

State and Local Governments: Laboratories of Democracy
America.gov, 16 December 2007

CommonDreams.org, 31 May 2004
Laboratories of Democracy: Anatomy of a Metaphor
AEI Federalist Outlook,

Michael Greve Michael S. Greve is a professor at the George Mason University School of Law. Previously, he served as the John G. Searle Scholar and Director of the Federalism Project at the American Enterprise Institute. He is also a member of the board of dir ...

, March 2001 Federalism in the United States {{US-law-stub