Dual Federalism

Dual federalism is a theory of federal constitutional law in the United States according to which governmental power is divided into two separate spheres. One sphere of power belongs to the federal government of the United States while the other severally belongs to each constituent state. Each sphere is mutually equal, exclusive, and limiting upon the other sphere, and each entity is supreme within its own sphere.

Under this theory, provisions of the Constitution such as the Commerce, Necessary and Proper, and Supremacy Clauses are interpreted, construed, and applied in a manner to maximize the authority of each government within its own respective sphere, while simultaneously minimizing, limiting, or negating its power within the opposite sphere. Within such jurisprudence, the federal government has authority only where the Constitution so enumerates. Consequently, there is a large group of residual powers belonging to the states or the people, and the federal government is considered limited generally to only those powers listed in the Constitution.

The theory originated within the Jacksonian democracy movement as pushback against the mercantilist American System and centralization of government under the Adams administration during the 1820s. With an emphasis on local autonomy and individual liberty, the theory served to unite the principles held by multiple sectional interests: the republican principles of northerners, the pro-slavery ideology of southern planters, and the laissez-faire entrepreneurialism of western interests.

During the 1830s, Jacksonian Democrats employed the theory with effect. President Jackson used the theory as part of his justification in combating the national bank (e.g., the bank's reauthorization bill sought to shield the private, non-governmental business of the national bank from state taxation). Additionally, the Supreme Court—under the leadership of Jackson's appointee to Chief Justice, Roger B. Taney—moved the law in the direction of dual federalism. Chiefly, the Court used the theory to underpin its rationale in cases where it narrowed the meaning of commerce (and thereby Congress's power over it) and expanded state authority through enlarging state police power, particularly with an eye toward protecting southern autonomy and its power over slavery.