Our Work

"The Wisconsin Supreme Court in April 2025 upheld Gov. Tony Evers’ use of the partial veto to convert a two-year funding increase for schools into one that would last 2,425 years, prompting Republican lawmakers to propose a constitutional amendment limiting the governor’s veto power on the November 2026 ballot, according to the court’s majority opinion in LeMieux v. Evers."

"'Because the legal doctrine is murky, it is difficult to predict how legal challenges to mask bans might play out,' according to the paper, 'Can States Prohibit Federal Law Enforcement From Masking on the Job?'"

"Bridget Lavender, a staff attorney with the State Democracy Research Initiative, said the federal government could override the city’s moratorium because of the Constitution’s supremacy clause, which states that federal law generally trumps conflicting state or local laws. Because the moratorium is already in place, Lavender said, if DHS wants a permit, 'it would require the federal government to challenge the ordinance in court.'"

This year, states have stepped into the spotlight. The Supreme Court’s opinion in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization has focused attention on the state role in defining individual rights, while democracy cases like Moore v. Harper have underscored the important state role in elections. In addition, many high-profile issues are being brought directly to voters through state ballot measures. As state institutions take center stage, state-focused scholarship has never been more timely or important.

"University of Wisconsin Law’s professor Rob Yablon joined For the Record this Sunday to discuss two recent decisions from the Wisconsin Supreme Court where the justices voted in the same way on decisions that provided victories for both conservatives seeking a ban on dropboxes, as well as public health officials to continue setting emergency orders."

The episode discusses ongoing battles of state legislatures stripping power from governors, how states and localities are using COVID-related federal aid, and state constitutional law. As part of the conversation, we also get into institutional design of state and local governments and how these institutions promote or hinder majoritarianism.

Although states sit at the heart of the American democratic system, academic and popular discourse often overlook state-level public law. The lion’s share of attention, instead, goes to the federal government. In this Special Issue, the states take center stage. The essays in this collection explore issues relating to subnational democracy, government, and institutions. These essays were first presented at a conference entitled “Public Law in the States,” which took place in June 2021. The conference was the inaugural academic convening of the new State Democracy Research Initiative at the University of Wisconsin Law School. Like this Special Issue, the Initiative aims to contribute to the vitality of democracy at the state level through research and learning focused on the states.

This Article identifies and theorizes the role of civil society oversight at the state level. It finds that state agencies frequently lack the civil society check that commentators celebrate at the federal level. State agencies are, on the whole, less transparent than their federal counterparts, less closely followed by watchdog groups, and less tracked by the shrinking state-level media. Thus, despite the common refrain that state government is "closer to the people," the realities of state administration suggest the opposite is often true.