Whether viewed as advocating on behalf of “special interests” or the broader “public interest,” interest groups play a central role in modern politics. But theories of pluralism presume that, so long as interest groups have access to participate in the political process, the outcome of...

We analyze the policy issue of medical marijuana to illustrate how key virtues of federalism can be used to make a threshold determination as to whether a particular public policy should be subject to federal regulation or reserved for states. When the substantive merits of the policy issue are...