The Local Government Antitrust Act: A Comment on the Constitutional Questions

Abstract

In 1978 the United States Supreme Court held for the first time, in City of Lafayette v. Louisiana Power & Light Co., that municipalities do not enjoy a blanket exemption from the coverage of the federal antitrust laws. Although a majority of the Justices agreed that Congress had intended to exempt some conduct of local governments under the antitrust laws, there was no majority support for either of the two proposed formulations of the exemption. It was not until 1982, in Community Communications Co. v. City of Boulder, that the Court agreed on the requirements for state-action exemption for municipalities: a state acting in its sovereign capacity is immune from the antitrust laws under Parker v. Brown, while a local government is immune if it acts "in furtherance or implementation of clearly articulated and affirmatively expressed state policy."

A wave of antitrust litigation against local governments followed the City of Lafayette decision. The author discusses the response of the local governments to the Supreme Court’s decisions, and analyzes the developments brought by the Local Government Antitrust Act of 1984.

Keywords: Antitrust law, Local Government, Supreme Court, City of Lafayette v. Louisiana Power & Light Co., Community Communications Co. v. City of Boulder