Preemption is a doctrine of American constitutional law, under which states and local governments are deprived of their power to act in a given area, whether or not the state or local law, rule or action is in direct conflict with federal law. This book covers not only the basics of preemption but also focuses on such topics as federal mechanisms for agency preemption, implied forms of preemption, and defensive use of federal preemption in civil litigation.

This book examines the theory, law, and reality of preemption choice. The Constitution's federalist structures protect states' sovereignty but also create a powerful federal government that can preempt and thereby displace the authority of state and local governments and courts to respond to a social challenge. Despite this preemptive power, Congress and agencies have seldom preempted state power. Instead, they typically have embraced concurrent, overlapping power. Recent legislative, agency, and court actions, however, reveal an aggressive use of federal preemption, sometimes even preempting more protective state law. Preemption choice fundamentally involves issues of institutional choice and regulatory design: should federal actors displace or work in conjunction with other legal institutions? This book moves logically through each preemption choice step, ranging from underlying theory to constitutional history, to preemption doctrine, to assessment of when preemptive regimes make sense and when state regulation and common law should retain latitude for dynamism and innovation.

This book considers federalism's constitutional basis and its practical applications.

Committee Serial No. 22. Considers H.R. 3, to allow states to pass legislation in areas also covered by Federal statute as long as the state statute does not contradict the Federal statute. Hearing includes complete text of 1959 hearing on H.R. 3 (Serial No. 1, 86th Congress) House Committee on Judiciary, "Establishing Rules of Interpretation Governing Questions of the Effect of Acts of Congress on State Laws," May 12, 1959 (p. 65-90).

Calabresi complains that we are "choking on statutes" and proposes a restoration of the courts to their common law function. From a series of lectures given by Calabresi as part of The Oliver Wendell Holmes Lectures delivered at Harvard Law School in March 1977. "In his most recent publication, A Common Law for the Age of Statutes, based on the Oliver Wendell Holmes lectures he delivered at Harvard in March of 1977, Professor Calabresi has brought his ample juristic talents to bear on a foundational problem of the legal and democratic process. He has produced a monograph that in its quality, timeliness and provocativeness is likely to stand alongside the seminal works of Ronald Dworkin and Grant Gilmore." --Allan C. Hutchinson and Derek Morgan, 82 Columbia Law Review (1982) 1752. GUIDO CALABRESI [b. 1932] is Sterling Emeritus Professor of Law and Professorial Lecturer in Law at Yale Law School. He was Dean of Yale Law School from 1985-1994 and became a United States Circuit Judge in 1994. He is also the author of The Costs of Accidents (1970), Tragic Choices (1978) and Ideals, Beliefs, Attitudes, and the Law (1985).

Leading scholars of intellectual property and information policy examine what the common law can contribute to discussions about intellectual property's scope, structure and function.