{
  "id": "RL33214",
  "type": "CRS Report",
  "typeId": "REPORTS",
  "number": "RL33214",
  "active": false,
  "source": "EveryCRSReport.com",
  "versions": [
    {
      "source": "EveryCRSReport.com",
      "id": 311131,
      "date": "2005-12-30",
      "retrieved": "2016-04-07T19:23:42.926029",
      "title": "Federalism: Selected Opinions of Judge Samuel Alito",
      "summary": "During his 15 years as a federal appellate judge on the Third Circuit, Judge Samuel Alito has\nwritten\nseveral opinions related to federalism. Two of these cases appear to be of particular significance. \nIn  Chittister v. Department of Community and Economic Development , Judge Alito\nauthored a\nunanimous opinion which held that an individual could not sue a state under the Family Medical\nLeave Act (FMLA). This opinion addressed an issue which has been controversial in recent years\n-- the parameters of the 11th Amendment and Section 5 of the 14th Amendment. The decision held\nthat a provision of the Family Medical Leave Act which mandates the provision of sick leave for\nemployees with serious health conditions could not be enforced by employees against states agencies\nor instrumentalities.\n In  United States v. Rybar , Judge Alito authored a dissent to a decision that upheld\na law\nproviding that \"it shall be unlawful for any person to transfer or possess a machine gun\" as within\nthe authority of the Congress under the Commerce Clause. Judge Alito, noting that the statute lacked\nboth a requirement for a specific connection to interstate commerce and findings that the purely\nintrastate possession of machine guns had a substantial effect on interstate commerce, would have\nstruck the law down.\n In general, it appears that Judge Alito's opinion in the  Chittister  case was consistent\nwith\nSupreme Court precedent at the time. Although Judge Alito has been criticized because his opinion\ndid not anticipate the result in the subsequent case of  Nevada Department of Human Resources\nv.\nHibbs , the  Hibbs  case actually addressed a separate provision of the FMLA. The\n Chittister  case is\narguably distinguishable from the  Hibbs  case, a conclusion which has been reached by\nother federal\ncircuits.\n Judge Alito's dissent in the  Rybar  case, however, seems to have anticipated a more\nexpansive\napplication of the Supreme Court decisions in  Lopez  and  Morrison  than was\nbeing utilized by most\nother circuits at the time. Further, his reasoning in  Rybar  may have been repudiated by\nthe Supreme\nCourt in  Gonzales v. Raich . Consequently, it would appear that Judge Alito's dissent\nwas an\nargument for a more limited interpretation of the Commerce Clause than is consistent with current\ncase law.",
      "type": "CRS Report",
      "typeId": "REPORTS",
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}