• Home
  • Independent Voter News
  • Quizzes
  • Election Dissection
  • Sections
  • Events
  • Directory
  • About Us
  • Glossary
  • Opinion
  • Campaign Finance
  • Redistricting
  • Civic Ed
  • Voting
  • Fact Check
  • News
  • Analysis
  • Subscriptions
  • Log in
Leveraging Our Differences
  • news & opinion
    • Big Picture
      • Civic Ed
      • Ethics
      • Leadership
      • Leveraging big ideas
      • Media
    • Business & Democracy
      • Corporate Responsibility
      • Impact Investment
      • Innovation & Incubation
      • Small Businesses
      • Stakeholder Capitalism
    • Elections
      • Campaign Finance
      • Independent Voter News
      • Redistricting
      • Voting
    • Government
      • Balance of Power
      • Budgeting
      • Congress
      • Judicial
      • Local
      • State
      • White House
    • Justice
      • Accountability
      • Anti-corruption
      • Budget equity
    • Columns
      • Beyond Right and Left
      • Civic Soul
      • Congress at a Crossroads
      • Cross-Partisan Visions
      • Democracy Pie
      • Our Freedom
  • Pop Culture
      • American Heroes
      • Ask Joe
      • Celebrity News
      • Comedy
      • Dance, Theatre & Film
      • Diversity, Inclusion & Belonging
      • Faithful & Mindful Living
      • Music, Poetry & Arts
      • Sports
      • Technology
      • Your Take
      • American Heroes
      • Ask Joe
      • Celebrity News
      • Comedy
      • Dance, Theatre & Film
      • Diversity, Inclusion & Belonging
      • Faithful & Mindful Living
      • Music, Poetry & Arts
      • Sports
      • Technology
      • Your Take
  • events
  • About
      • Mission
      • Advisory Board
      • Staff
      • Contact Us
Sign Up
  1. Home>
  2. Balance of Power>
  3. state government>

Reimagining the sharing of government authority in the time of Covid

Gregg Girvan
September 10, 2020
U.S. Capitol, coronavirus
Sono Creative/Getty Images

Girvan is a research fellow at the Foundation for Research on Equal Opportunity, a free-market think tank focused on policies affecting the poor.


As the death toll from Covid-19 surpasses 190,000 and state economies continue to limp along under uneven levels of lockdown, a centuries-old constitutional debate keeps raging about the central question of federalism: What is the balance of powers among the local, state and national governments?

This time, public health experts wonder whether the United States' federalist approach to public health is fatally flawed, in that we rely too heavily on local officials to fight a pathogen that knows no borders.

But before we accelerate toward nationalizing the country's pandemic response, it is worth understanding how we got here and what strengths each level of government brings to our public health infrastructure. We find that a measured rebalancing of responsibilities, rather than a federal takeover, will prevent another public health crisis of this magnitude from happening again.

The nation's public health system has come under attack — from public health experts themselves — for being too decentralized and lacking a singular nationwide response. They blame the federal government as being slow and inconsistent and local authorities as rebellious and uncoordinated.

Sign up for The Fulcrum newsletter

Earlier this year Rebecca L. Haffajee and Michelle M. Mello gave voice to this when they wrote this in the New England Journal of Medicine: "One lesson from the Covid-19 epidemic is already clear: When epidemiologists warn that a pathogen has pandemic potential, the time to fly the flag of local freedom is over."

Admittedly, there is a certain appeal to ceding greater powers to the national government to fight pandemics. After all, the novel coronavirus is highly infective and spreads easily across borders. Local governments have responded unevenly, possibly facilitating the virus' spread even to locations that implemented stricter containment measures.

With so much at stake, it is understandable to ask why we should give so many disparate local authorities so much discretion, increasing the chances that poor decisions undermine an effective response.

To be sure, governments at all levels have made mistakes. This is obvious when we consider that 45 percent of Covid-19 deaths have been nursing home residents, who comprise less than 1 percent of the U.S. population. Some states acted quickly and focused efforts on protecting those in nursing homes and other vulnerable populations, resulting in fewer fatalities. But the federal government didn't start collecting data on the virus in nursing homes until April, well after it was known that residents were at increased risk of Covid-related illness and mortality. Months later, the data is still full of inaccuracies that make it harder for local policymakers to respond appropriately.

These results, among others, suggest a stronger federal response will not achieve the results advertised by public health experts.

The analogy of peacetime vs. wartime is one way to think about how to divide the responsibilities of government to fight pandemics.

The federal government has the resources in money, material, and manpower to build national pandemic preparedness in peacetime — prior to the onset of a pandemic or disaster. In fact, entire federal agencies are built to do this.

Through the Strategic National Stockpile — of antibiotics, vaccines, chemical antidotes and other critical medical supplies — the federal government prepares for disaster and bolsters immediate state responses. But it is only as good as the amount of material it has in store, along with the government's ability to distribute the pharmaceuticals quickly and where needed most. Contrary to popular belief, the repository was never meant to handle by itself all the stressors of a prolonged pandemic. It was always meant to work in tandem with other federal agencies and the states.

States and municipalities cannot muster resources like the federal government. However, their role is important as well. But they do have "on the ground" surveillance that helps guide decision-making with information that might elude national command centers in Washington. In this way, state and local governments activate in "wartime" — when the pandemic arrives — to act quicker and more decisively than their federal counterparts as conditions change on the ground

So what can be done to ensure the next pandemic does not catch the United States flat-footed again?

The best path forward is a new preparedness model that plays to the strengths of each level of government. Doing these three things would mean resources get deployed faster and decision-making is streamlined.

First, the federal government should help states form their own strategic state stockpiles. Leveraging federal dollars and know-how, they would build their own cache of resources that could be deployed faster. States would also avoid battling each other for resources from the federal stockpile, as we have seen this time over personal protective equipment and ventilators.

Second, when a pathogen arrives, states should respond based on local conditions. The federal government can only act as fast as state reporting allows. Such an extra layer of decision-making can prove deadly, given the infectious nature of pathogens like Covid-19 in vulnerable populations. On the other hand, states have a better sense of places and businesses where an outbreak is most likely to occur — nursing homes or meat processing plants, for example.

Confusion and finger-pointing would be reduced by clearly vesting decision-making power to states on resource allocation, community mitigation measures, and timing and benchmarks for reopening businesses and schools, based on state and local officials' intimate knowledge of their own backyards.

Finally, federally facilitated assistance must be refined. Rather than resources and decisions being issued all from Washington, it would take the role as provider of last resort, deploying resources where state stockpiles fall short and providing guidance only when states ask for it. Meanwhile, the federal government can assist in areas under its constitutional purview — reducing a pathogen's spread by invoking the Commerce Clause, for example, to limit interstate travel.

While centralization of power to fight a pandemic may seem appealing, we must resist the urge to plunge headfirst. The message is clear: Our system of federalism need not be vilified, but rather leveraged to take on the pandemics of the future.

From Your Site Articles
  • Fact checking Trump's power to use the Insurrection Act - The Fulcrum ›
  • While fighting the virus, liberals rally behind states' rights banner ›
  • The coronavirus response: Trump vs. the states - The Fulcrum ›
  • Who's in charge of lifting lockdowns? - The Fulcrum ›
  • Empower local government to develop environmental solutions - The Fulcrum ›
  • Patriotism, freedom: The most misused terms in U.S. politics - The Fulcrum ›
  • Medicine Man: A light hearted song about Covid - The Fulcrum ›
  • Endemic Covid-19 should be cause for celebration - The Fulcrum ›
  • Podcast: How national parties are breaking state politics - The Fulcrum ›
  • The fight for democracy: Five reasons to focus on the states - The Fulcrum ›
Related Articles Around the Web
  • State Powers | Federalism | Constitution USA | PBS ›
  • The relationship between the states and the federal government ... ›
  • The Powers of National Government | American Government - Reading ›
  • State & Local Government | The White House ›
state government

Want to write
for The Fulcrum?

If you have something to say about ways to protect or repair our American democracy, we want to hear from you.

Submit
Get some Leverage Sign up for The Fulcrum Newsletter
Follow
Contributors

How a college freshman led the effort to honor titans of democracy reform

Jeremy Garson

Our poisonous age of absolutism

Jay Paterno

Re-imagining Title IX: An opportunity to flex our civic muscles

Lisa Kay Solomon

'Independent state legislature theory' is unconstitutional

Daniel O. Jamison

How afraid are we?

Debilyn Molineaux

Politicians certifying election results is risky and unnecessary

Kevin Johnson
latest News

How the anti-abortion movement shaped campaign finance law and paved the way for Trump

Amanda Becker, The 19th
24 June

Podcast: Journalist and political junkie Ken Rudin

Our Staff
24 June

A study in contrasts: Low-turnout runoffs vs. Alaska’s top-four, all-mail primary

David Meyers
23 June

Video: Team Democracy Urges Citizens to Sign SAFE Pledge

Our Staff
23 June

Podcast: Past, present, future

Our Staff
23 June

Video: America's vulnerable elections

Our Staff
22 June
Videos

Video: Memorial Day 2022

Our Staff

Video: Helping loved ones divided by politics

Our Staff

Video: What happened in Virginia?

Our Staff

Video: Infrastructure past, present, and future

Our Staff

Video: Beyond the headlines SCOTUS 2021 - 2022

Our Staff

Video: Should we even have a debt limit

Our Staff
Podcasts

Podcast: Did economists move the Democrats to the right?

Our Staff
02 May

Podcast: The future of depolarization

Our Staff
11 February

Podcast: Sore losers are bad for democracy

Our Staff
20 January

Deconstructed Podcast from IVN

Our Staff
08 November 2021
Recommended
Bridge Alliance intern Sachi Bajaj speaks at the June 12 Civvy Awards.

How a college freshman led the effort to honor titans of democracy reform

Leadership
abortion law historian Mary Ziegler

How the anti-abortion movement shaped campaign finance law and paved the way for Trump

Campaign Finance
Podcast: Journalist and political junkie Ken Rudin

Podcast: Journalist and political junkie Ken Rudin

Media
Abortion rights and anti-abortion protestors at the Supreme Court

Our poisonous age of absolutism

Big Picture
Virginia primary voter

A study in contrasts: Low-turnout runoffs vs. Alaska’s top-four, all-mail primary

Video: Team Democracy Urges Citizens to Sign SAFE Pledge

Video: Team Democracy Urges Citizens to Sign SAFE Pledge

Voting