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Mandates  Congress, Extortion, and Unfunded Mandates    • Daily
July 8 2014 July 8, 2014  Tags Big GovernmentTaxes and
SpendingInterventionism  Associated Scholar James T. Bennett’s
new book Unfunded Mandates: How Congress Forces States and
Localities to Do Its Bidding and Pay for the Privilege explores
the many ways that the United States government has expanded
federal law into many matters once considered strictly local.
Dr. Bennett recently spoke with the Mises Institute about his
research.   Mises Institute: What are federal mandates?  James
Bennett: A federal mandate requires either state or local
governments to take some action that federal politicians deem
desirable. Unfunded mandates occur when the federal government
fails to provide inadequate or no funding to carry out the
federal dictates, so state and local politicians must do
Congress’s bidding and pay for the privilege.  MI: Is this a new
thing that the Feds do or has it been going