C & a Carbone, Inc. v. Town of Clarkstown, New York

Summary

The Supreme Court held that Clarkstown's flow control ordinance, which requires all solid waste generated or collected in the town to be deposited at the town's designated Route 303 transfer station, violates the dormant Commerce Clause because it discriminates against interstate commerce: the article of commerce is the service of processing and disposing of waste, and the ordinance reserves that local market to a single favored operator, depriving out-of-state processors of access. Discrimination in favor of local business or investment is per se invalid absent rigorous-scrutiny proof that no other means advances a legitimate local interest, and the town's facility-financing goal could be pursued through nondiscriminatory means such as uniform safety regulations, general taxes, or municipal bonds, so the Court reversed the New York courts' judgment upholding the ordinance. Justice O'Connor concurred in the judgment, arguing the ordinance is better analyzed as imposing an excessive burden under Pike balancing than as facially discriminatory, and that RCRA does not explicitly authorize flow control. Justice Souter, joined by Chief Justice Rehnquist and Justice Blackmun, dissented, contending the ordinance aids a traditional municipal function rather than a class of local private businesses, burdens only local residents who fund it, and is not protectionist.