President Barack Obama is preparing to ask Congress to ban vending machines of sugary snacks and drinks. It could raise another fight over federalism.
Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said the administration will seek changes when Congress overhauls the Childhood Nutrition Act. It is a worthy goal to say the least. However, there is a serious constitutional question over the federal government’s increasing role in dictating specific policies in local school systems. Often Congress conditions federal funds on states complying with such guidelines. The use of such conditions has long raised federalism concerns, though the courts have largely upheld such conditions (as opposed to direct legislative bans).
Obviously, states should not have to be told by the federal government to rid our schools of such junk food. It is beyond me how educators would choose small vendor fees over student health. However, states’ rights advocates complain that Congress has found a way around federalism protections by collecting more taxes than the federal government requires in order to return the money to the states with such mandates or conditions. There may be good reasons to consider the federalization of the entire school system to guarantee uniformity and excellence. However, that is not the system that we have. Schools (with police powers) are the touchstone of federalism principles. This could prove an interesting fight over not the merits but the means of the federal plan.
For the full story, click here.
Buddha: “The question shouldn’t be is the market control valid, because by extension of the Commerce Clause, it is. The question should be is it necessary. If you look into the uses of high fructose corn syrup and the nutritional impact it has, there is an argument for limiting distribution as a health maintenance cost savings, or in the alternative, ban the use of HFCS in manufactured foods (a better decision). But the point is that there is an argument and it’s not based in paternalism, but economics. Unnecessary regulation is a burden I will not argue that point. But regulation is required or corporations will kill us all in their amoral quest for profits.”
Commerce clause and it’s not based in paternalism.
Hmm.
Look it up HFCS is not sugar! FYI, Most schools in Ontario has had this ban is practice for several years now. In addition, kids who bring lunches from home cannot have any product containing nuts, and unhealthy snacks are discouraged. I can’t understand anyone defending the right of kids to eat junk food on a whim!
The reason for a ban is relatively simple….” out of sight out of mind “!
So Smoker’s alley, which moved off campus with zero tolerance, becomes Mt Dew drinker’s alley?
What I put in my body is between me, my conscience and Dr Pepper.
The only vending machine in my high school was in the teacher’s lounge. If you wanted a snack you had to go to Jerry’s which was off campus, gawd forbid you had to eat the cafeteria’s slop.
We can’t drink, can’t smoke. Can’t eat trans fat. Now we can’t eat sugar. At long last is nothing sacred…for fun’s sake?
Is prescription drugs to control mood all that’s acceptable?
rafflaw,
They do have a website called lawyerswithdepression.com maybe that will get you over the hurdle….
All I know is that “Bulls Eyes” got me through Law School and if they ban those, I might have to go for grief counseling!
I think I read that schools are entering into exclusive advertising with some suppliers”
Schools Sell Blood, Day Care, Dr. Pepper
Some Parents Are Tapping a Vein for Kids’ Schools: Is Anything Enough?
Link: http://abcnews.go.com/US/story?id=90639&page=1
Get rid of the vending machines all together. Sell it at a snack bar. Make it available to all. The catch is a lot of the company’s such as Coke and Pepsi have long term contracts with the school. This is how some fund the sports or other activities. How do you get around this?
Why is HFCS so commonly used in today’s foods?
It is not lack of regulation. In fact, quite the opposite. Heavy government subsidies of corn production combined with government limits on sugar imports created the massive supply and demand for HFCS. These subsidies not only fundamentally altered the nature of our calories, they destroyed the family farm over decades in favor of agribusiness. In places like Iowa what few family farms remained were done in by government’s ethanol policy, architected by ADM itself.
http://www.apple.com/trailers/independent/kingcorn/
In Japan all kinds of alcohol can be purchased from vending machines. Alcohol holds little forbidden allure for Japan’s teenagers. Japan’s adult alcoholism rate is 4%, compared to 7% in the United States where alcohol is strictly controlled.
Not only is this proposed vending machine policy flawed in its approach, it is further expansion of government’s role outside of its contract. It is simply not the role of government to control food access and choices of individuals. Would it be better if people made smarter choices? Perhaps it would. Or perhaps the highest purpose of government is to leave us free to live our own lives.
Byron,
This is an instance where we are in agreement that education is the best solution as a practical matter. And while were at comparison, eggs are not thalidomide and HFCS is not sugar. Eggs are natural and sugar can be/is minimally processed, but both thalidomide and HFCS are manufactured products not found in nature but for our technical intervention. So I’m not talking about arguments about what has been human food since we started being humans. I’m talking food like products. Technological artifacts. Regulation should be proportionate to societal risk exposure. Let’s take pasteurization. Milk as we drink it today is a manufactured product: fractionated from whole milk into skim, re-blended for fat content, homogenized and sterilized. Kids love the stuff. I like it in coffee from time to time. Would you rather its manufacture be unregulated because it impinges upon the freedom of the individual stockholders to make a profit or would you rather your kids be able to have milk and cookies and not have to worry if they’ll keel over from an additive designed to artificially boost volume like melamine. Chinese milk? Got some? Of course not.
For further example, those criminals responsible for CDS’s should have been so heavily regulated in the first place that they couldn’t damage the banking system in the first place. But an environment of 30 years of deregulation got us exactly the problems we deserve for not better safeguarding the interests of the public over the interests of the corporate.
Byron,
I have to disagree with you. Look at the statistics for obesity, early onset Type II Diabetes, and heart disease in recent years. Is it a co-incidence that the numbers are starting to soar in the generation X age group? It seems more that there is a corelation between my generation, ( really the first who were raised on sugar pops for breakfast, canned raviolli for lunch and take out, for dinner )and these horrible diseases!
Experts are now suggesting that the current generation can expect to see the same health consequences as early as their 20’s if they continue to eat high amounts of HFCS containing foods while sitting in front of the tube 6 hours a day ( at least my generation were still active ).
So you’re right in one respect, Thalidomide only caused misdevelopment of fetuses, while HFCS overload will eventually lead to death!
Buddha:
Sugar is not Thalidomide. At one point we thought eggs were bad as well as chocolate and coffee. Although HFCS does appear to be a bad actor. Education not legislation.
The proper venue for attacking these products is the court system. In my opinion that is where the regulation should occur.
They’ve already banned chocolate-chip cookie dough flavored cigars. And now this. Where will it all end?
Lead paint.
Asbestos.
Thalidomide.
The Ford Pinto.
Opium.
Snake Oil.
They all used to be acceptable products too, Byron.
Controls on the market are not paternalism. They are laws to keep harm from the general public. Regulation is required because not all actors are good actors. The totally free market ideal you aspire to is a utopian fiction that requires all people not only act with rational self interest (in itself problematic) but with sufficient altruism to not harm others. This is contrary to human nature as demonstrated up to this point in history.
The question shouldn’t be is the market control valid, because by extension of the Commerce Clause, it is. The question should be is it necessary. If you look into the uses of high fructose corn syrup and the nutritional impact it has, there is an argument for limiting distribution as a health maintenance cost savings, or in the alternative, ban the use of HFCS in manufactured foods (a better decision). But the point is that there is an argument and it’s not based in paternalism, but economics. Unnecessary regulation is a burden I will not argue that point. But regulation is required or corporations will kill us all in their amoral quest for profits.
The key is balance.
And personally as far as HFCS goes?
How about Obama worrying about restoring the damn rule of law and all the other important stuff he was elected to do like curb corporatist influence in Washington instead of wasting our collective time with this low priority bullshit?
We must maintain state rights and federal constitutional rights. They feds have enough that they can’t handle already.
this is a ridiculous idea. If local schools want to ban sugar then let the states do it or the local governments. The federal government has no business banning a legal food product even if it is bad for your health. Don’t drink soda or eat candy bars if you think they are unhealthy.
When is the Nanny State going to end? The tyranny of soft paternalism is tyranny nonetheless.
Not the feds job to micromange vending machines in schools. I am perplexed that as a society we are so quick to comply to this type of control from a gov’t that is so wasteful & inept.
The linked to story states that the Obama admin. is looking to expand school lunch and breakfast programs. School lunches and breakfasts at my daughter’s school are terrible(fried and laden with salt and high fructose carn syrup).
Under its power to regulate interstate commerce, Congress could directly ban vending machines with junk food, and not merely in schools. Doing so would be no different in principle from banning the sale of marijuana and other drugs.