Murphy v. National Collegiate Athletic Assn.
Headline: Court strikes down federal ban that stopped states from authorizing sports betting, allowing states like New Jersey to legalize and regulate sports gambling and removing federal limits.
Holding:
- Allows states to legalize and regulate sports betting within their borders.
- Removes federal prohibition that had blocked state licensing and authorization of sports gambling.
- Shifts responsibility for gambling policy to state governments and, potentially, to Congress to act directly.
Summary
Background
New Jersey’s governor and state officials sought to allow sports betting after voters and the legislature changed state law. A federal law called PASPA made it unlawful for a State to “authorize” or “license” sports gambling. The NCAA and three major professional leagues sued New Jersey, saying the state law violated PASPA. The case reached the Third Circuit, which agreed with the NCAA, and New Jersey appealed to the Supreme Court.
Reasoning
The Court addressed whether PASPA unlawfully told state legislatures what laws they could pass. The Justices held that when a State repeals laws that prohibited sports betting it effectively “authorizes” that activity under PASPA. The ruling relied on the Constitution’s anticommandeering principle: Congress cannot directly order state legislatures how to legislate. The Court concluded PASPA’s bans on state authorization and licensing are commands to states and thus unconstitutional. The Court also rejected the argument that PASPA functions as ordinary federal preemption of state law.
Real world impact
Because the Court struck down PASPA’s state-focused bans and found those provisions not severable from the rest of the law, the entire federal prohibition falls. States are therefore free to change their own laws and to authorize or license sports betting if they choose. The decision leaves questions of regulation, taxation, and enforcement to the states and to Congress if it decides to regulate directly.
Dissents or concurrances
Some Justices would have preserved the federal ban on privately run betting that operates pursuant to state law or would have severed parts of PASPA, an approach the majority declined.
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