State and Local Governmental Law

This course explores local democracy and decentralized power that is shared among governments. Topics include legal doctrines that determine powers of local governments; relationships between local and state governments; how state constitutions legally construct local governments and subject them to state control; the profound consequences that the legal structure of local governments have on the organization of American society; school financing; land-use; housing policy; economic development; city-suburb relations; and racial and class segregation.