Podcast: Now Batting for Federalism: The Supremacy Clause
Lecture by Larry Sabato
15 minutes
Click the play button ( 
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Larry Sabato is the founder and director of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia, a professor of politics, and a nationally renowned elections scholar. He is also one of the authors of American Government: Roots and Reform.
Summary
Since the country’s founding, there have always been power struggles between the states and the federal government. The Civil War’s devastation of half the states and the federal government’s usurping of state powers in the New Deal are low points for state power, but other times in history see the balance of power shifting the other way. This long game of tug-of-war ensures that no one group will dominate.
Though the supremacy clause clearly gives final authority to the federal government, the Tenth Amendment's distribution of undelegated powers is presented with a vagueness that has been cause for much debate over the years. Why, then, does Sabato say that these "gray areas" are a good thing, and what are some examples of other gray areas of language in the Constitution?
