Public Health Law Map - Beta 5 - Medical and Public Health Law Site

so completely controls the area that there is no room for state regulation. Federal
regulation of television and radio, both intrinsically interstate activities because of
the potential for their signals to cross state lines, leaves no room for state laws
governing electronic communications. The FDA regulations on the approval,
manufacture, labeling, and promotion of prescription drugs are so comprehensive as
to leave little room for state regulation.
In some cases, federal law also preempts private lawsuits brought under state law.
The Cigarette Labeling Act provided that states cannot require more or different
health warnings on a cigarette package than those required by federal law. The
Supreme Court found that this preempted state court lawsuits by smokers who
claimed that the cigarettes were defective because the packages did not carry
adequate warnings (the tobacco litigation has been based on fraudulently concealing
the risks of smoking). Federal law also preempts certain lawsuits alleging vaccine-
related injuries and substitutes an administrative compensation fund for possible state
tort recoveries.
4. Limits to Federal Power
Federal power is limited. If there is no interstate commerce involved and the matter
does not involve individual rights under the Constitution, the states have the right to
control their affairs. The federal government also has very limited authority to
commandeer state personnel to enforce federal law. If the federal government wants
to regulate an area that is reserved to the states, or does not have the funds to take a
specific action with a federal agency, it can provide the states with a financial
incentive to encourage them to follow federal guidelines. When Congress wanted the
states to pass laws requiring people in cars to wear seatbelts, it told the states to pass
seatbelt laws or lose some of their federal highway construction money. The
Medicaid program is a state–federal partnership in which the federal government
controls actions of state personnel through restrictions on the federal matching
money.
5. The State Court System
The state legal systems are quite diverse. Many predate the formation of the United
States. The East Coast states derive their law from the English common law, many of
the western states were influenced by the Spanish civil law, Louisiana follows the
French civil law, and Texas entered the Union as an independent nation with a strong
Spanish and Mexican heritage.
Despite the diverse backgrounds, the state court systems tend to follow the three
levels of the federal courts. The levels have different names, but the process of
starting in a trial court, progressing to an appeals court, and ending up in a state
supreme court is common to most of the states. In some cases that involve federal
laws or constitutional rights, it is possible to appeal the state supreme court decision
directly to the U.S. Supreme Court.
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