Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.

This is from a couple of days ago:

San Francisco’s board of supervisors has voted, by a veto-proof margin, to ban most of McDonald’s Happy Meals as they are now served in the restaurants. The measure will make San Francisco the first major city in the country to forbid restaurants from offering a free toy with meals that contain more than set levels of calories, sugar and fat.

….Daniel Conway, spokesman for the California Restaurant Assn., bemoaned the ordinance’s passage and contrasted it with San Franciscans’ exuberant feelings after the Giants won the world series on Monday night. “One day you’re world champions, and the next day, no toys for you,” Conway said.

That’s mighty sad. But here’s what I’m curious about: does McDonald’s or the California Restaurant Assn. have any kind of constitutional case to make against this statute based on the commerce clause? The obvious answer is no: the commerce clause merely gives the federal government the right to regulate commercial activity if it wants to. If it doesn’t, there’s nothing stopping states or local governments from passing any regulation they want. And they do. Every state has different insurance regulations, different environmental regulations, different health and safety regulations, etc.

And yet….something here bothers me. Leave aside the substantive question of whether San Francisco’s decision was a righteous blow for our children’s future or the first step down the slippery slope of fascism. McDonald’s, like every big company, sells standardized merchandise nationwide. This is impractical if every city in America decides to have its own rules. No toys in San Francisco. No trans fats in New York City. No styrofoam containers in Houston. No factory farmed beef in Seattle. No California potatoes in Boise. No artificial sweeteners in Boston. Etc.

I dunno. Does this make sense? What’s the proper dividing line between states and cities being allowed to set their own rules as they see fit, and nationwide companies being allowed to effectively sell their products nationwide? I haven’t really thought this through, but I imagine plenty of others have. What’s the state-of-the-art thinking on this?

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

AN IMPORTANT UPDATE

We’re falling behind our online fundraising goals and we can’t sustain coming up short on donations month after month. Perhaps you’ve heard? It is impossibly hard in the news business right now, with layoffs intensifying and fancy new startups and funding going kaput.

The crisis facing journalism and democracy isn’t going away anytime soon. And neither is Mother Jones, our readers, or our unique way of doing in-depth reporting that exists to bring about change.

Which is exactly why, despite the challenges we face, we just took a big gulp and joined forces with the Center for Investigative Reporting, a team of ace journalists who create the amazing podcast and public radio show Reveal.

If you can part with even just a few bucks, please help us pick up the pace of donations. We simply can’t afford to keep falling behind on our fundraising targets month after month.

Editor-in-Chief Clara Jeffery said it well to our team recently, and that team 100 percent includes readers like you who make it all possible: “This is a year to prove that we can pull off this merger, grow our audiences and impact, attract more funding and keep growing. More broadly, it’s a year when the very future of both journalism and democracy is on the line. We have to go for every important story, every reader/listener/viewer, and leave it all on the field. I’m very proud of all the hard work that’s gotten us to this moment, and confident that we can meet it.”

Let’s do this. If you can right now, please support Mother Jones and investigative journalism with an urgently needed donation today.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate