Does the government control what time it is?
<p>Does the government control what time it is?</p>

<p>Recently, I read that the west coast states are considering dropping Daylight Savings Time. Apparently, the process is first for the states to agree, and then they have ask for permission from the federal government. I believe it was also the federal government who made the decision to adjust the dates for DST a few years ago. </p>

<p>So that got me thinking, does the federal government have authority over what time it is? Could the federal government theoretically decide to just cancel 7:39 AM for one week and order everyone to go directly from 7:38 to 7:40? Would there be a legal issue if someone founded a cult that believes that it is just always 6:27 PM?</p>

<p>This also seems like it could be a problem for elections either way. If the federal government can decide what time it is, could it just decide that November will never come and there will never be an election? On the other hand, if the federal government can’t decide what time it is, could a state just declare “In our state, it is 2026, and Trump is no longer president”?</p>

<p><a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/15/chapter-6/subchapter-IX" rel="noreferrer">15 USC Subchapter IX</a> gives the Secretary of Transportation powers to set rules about the 11 time zones, and those laws supersede state and local laws. Observance of Daylight Savings Time is optional for a state. <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/15/260a" rel="noreferrer">This</a> is the DST law. First, it says that at the DST changeover times,  </p>

<blockquote>
  <p>the standard time of each zone established by sections 261 to 264 of
  this title...shall be advanced one hour...however, (1) any State that
  lies entirely within one time zone may by law exempt itself from the
  provisions of this subsection providing for the advancement of time,
  but only if that law provides that the entire State (including all
  political subdivisions thereof) shall observe the standard time
  otherwise applicable during that period, and (2) any State with parts
  thereof in more than one time zone may by law exempt either the entire
  State as provided in (1) or may exempt the entire area of the State
  lying within any time zone.</p>
</blockquote>

<p>which allows a state to stay on permanent standard time (but not permanent DST). The appearance that government has to approve the change comes from the fact that states (other than Arizona, Hawaii, <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/15/267" rel="noreferrer">Guam</a> etc) seem to want to switch to permanent DST, not standard time.</p>

<p>The standardization of time is governed by laws passed by congress, so the government can change it, <em>if</em> they can pass a bill through both houses and get the president to sign. </p>

<p>tl/dr: All states have to use US Standard Time.</p>

<p><strong>The US Gov't power of standards</strong></p>

<p>The US Gov't's power to keep time falls under <a href="https://constitution.congress.gov/browse/article-1/section-8/" rel="noreferrer">Article 1 Section 8 Clause 5</a> of the US Constitution:</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>To coin Money, regulate the Value thereof, and of foreign Coin, and fix the Standard of Weights and Measures;</p>
</blockquote>

<p>Currently, the US Department of Commerce National Institute of Standards and Technology (<a href="https://www.nist.gov/about-nist" rel="noreferrer">NIST</a>) is the regulatory authority for Weights and measures. However, traditionally, the US Gov't has taken a very hands-off approach to weights and measures and allowed industries to standardize themselves. (see, e.g., <a href="https://standards.ieee.org/" rel="noreferrer">IEEE SA</a>, <a href="https://www.ashrae.org/technical-resources/standards-and-guidelines/general-information" rel="noreferrer">ASHRAE</a>, etc.).</p>

<p>However, every state also have its own weights and measures programs. This is somewhat because of the hands-off attitude.</p>

<p><strong>International Time Standards in the USA</strong></p>

<p>Now, for time. The two main time standards are International Atomic Time (TAI) set by the International Bureau of Weights and Measures and the UTC (Coordinated Universal Time), another international standard computed based on observations of distant quasars. UTC is now standardized against TAI with leap seconds. The UTC (at the time Greenwich Mean Time or GMT) was adopted by the US in the Standard Time Act of 1918 (now in <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/15/261" rel="noreferrer">15 USC s 261</a>). </p>

<p>In the Standard Time Act, the time-zones of the US were established as were the standards used:</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>In this section, the term “Coordinated Universal Time” means the time scale maintained through the General Conference of Weights and Measures and interpreted or modified for the United States by the Secretary of Commerce in coordination with the Secretary of the Navy. </p>
</blockquote>

<p><strong>State Authority and Time</strong></p>

<p>So, from that the US adopted the SI unit of a "second". So the US Sec. of Commerce can modify the standard (through a rule-making procedure), but time is, by statute, maintained through the <a href="https://www.bipm.org/en/worldwide-metrology/cgpm/" rel="noreferrer">General Conference of Weights and Measures</a>. </p>

<p>According the the <a href="https://www.transportation.gov/regulations/time-act" rel="noreferrer">USDoT</a>:</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>The time zones established by the Standard Time Act, as amended by the Uniform Time Act, are Atlantic, eastern, central, mountain, Pacific, Hawaii–Aleutian, Samoa, and Chamorro. </p>
</blockquote>

<p>Accordingly, states may <a href="https://www.transportation.gov/regulations/procedure-moving-area-one-time-zone-another" rel="noreferrer">request to change a Time zone</a> (discussed below). But there is not process for setting a particular <em>time</em>, that is, <strong>all states have to use US standard time</strong> (<a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/15/262" rel="noreferrer">15 USC s 262</a>). </p>

<blockquote>
  <p>it shall be understood and intended that the time shall insofar as practicable (as determined by the Secretary of Transportation) be the United States standard time of the zone within which the act is to be performed)</p>
</blockquote>

<p>The legal description of the time zones can be found in <a href="https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CFR-2019-title49-vol1/xml/CFR-2019-title49-vol1-part71.xml" rel="noreferrer">49 CFRR 71</a>.</p>

<p>The request has to come from the highest political authority in the area subject to the request. Meaning a governor or legislature, or, from local government, from a position similar to the Board of County Commissioners.</p>

<p>The political authority has to provide:</p>

<ol>
<li>Certification that the request is a result of official action.</li>
<li>Contact info of the person requesting.</li>
<li>Supporting Info - supporting contention that the requested change would serve the convenience of Commerce. </li>
</ol>

<p>Requirements:</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>The principal standard for deciding whether to change a time zone is the convenience of commerce, which is defined very broadly to include consideration of all of the impacts upon a community that would result in a change in its standard of time.  Examples of some of these considerations that should be addressed in the supporting information are the following:</p>
  
  <ul>
  <li>Where do businesses in the community get their supplies and to where
  do they ship their goods or products? </li>
  <li>Where does the community receive television and radio broadcasts from? </li>
  <li>Where are the newspapers published that serve the community? </li>
  <li>Where does the community get its bus and passenger rail services; if there is no
  scheduled bus or passenger rail service in the community, where must
  residents go to obtain these services? Where is the nearest airport;
  if it is a local service airport, to what major airport does it carry
  passengers? </li>
  <li>What percentage of residents of the community work outside of the community; where do these residents work? </li>
  <li>What are the major elements of the community’s economy; is the community’s economy
  improving or declining; what Federal, State, or local plans, if any,
  are there for economic development in the community? </li>
  <li>If residents leave the community for schooling, recreation, health care, or
  religious worship, what standard of time is observed in the places
  where they go for these purposes?</li>
  </ul>
</blockquote>

<p>This is addressing the last paragraph: could the federal government decide on "eternal October" to avoid a presidential election?</p>

<p>The date of the election itself is <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Election_Day_(United_States)" rel="noreferrer">set by statute</a>. However the Constitution specifies that the President shall hold office for a term of "4 years".</p>

<p>Suppose the executive (in this case the Secretary of State for Commerce) decides to do an end-run around this by declaring that October will continue forever, with dates numbered accordingly. If this is intended to have general legal effect then it would have huge side effects; imagine if no November mortgage payment ever came due, or that legal birthdays ceased to occur so nobody could ever come of age. Its hard to see how such a rule could ever be made to stick in the real world.</p>

<p>Back in the legal world, such rulemaking would be subject to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judicial_review_in_the_United_States" rel="noreferrer">judicial review</a>. The executive does not have untrammelled power; its rule-making must be done pursuant to legitimate goals. Preventing an election is not a legitimate goal, and given the huge negative side effects there is no question that such a rule would be be thrown out by any court that looked at it. A court might also read an implied term into the intent of both the law and the constitution that the dates and years were to be reckoned according to the Gregorian calendar, so that the executives rules would have no effect on the number of days until an election occurred or the Presidential term ended. Either would be enough to knock such a cockamamie scheme on the head. </p>

<p>As a point of interest, the Gregorian calendar was the first ever international standard. It was defined in the Papal Bull "<em><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inter_gravissimas" rel="noreferrer">Inter gravissimas</a></em>" ("Among the most serious") of February 24th 1582, and this remains the official definition (so if you need to prove compliance, first learn Latin). However it only has legal effect within the Catholic church; its adoption in any particular country is a matter for national legislation.</p>

<p>Yes, the government determines what time it is. Examples of it happening in the past:</p>

<ul>
<li>The UK "lost" 11 days when it <a href="https://www.historic-uk.com/HistoryUK/HistoryofBritain/Give-us-our-eleven-days/" rel="noreferrer">switched from the Julian calendar to the Gregorian calendar in 1752</a></li>
<li>Samoa "lost" 1 day when they <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-13334229" rel="noreferrer">switched across the international date line in 2011</a></li>
</ul>

<p>The effect on elections is a different issue, and is governed by a different set of laws - in particular the ones that say "a new election must be held no later than ___ after the previous one. If the government were to declare that we are skipping November for December, a legal challenge stating that a new election must be declared (because X time has passed) will surely be mounted, and it's hard to see that it won't succeed.</p>

<p>Atomic physicist here. Not here to discuss whether the Federal government has the legal authority to set time, but wanted to say <em>how they actually do it</em>.</p>
<p>Several governments maintain their own master clock facilities which serve as the national standard time. Essentially every clock in the country (including your phones/computers using NTP) is referenced to a master time source.  The <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Naval_Observatory#Time_service" rel="nofollow noreferrer">U.S. Naval Observatory</a> maintains one of these clocks underneath the Vice President's House (thats only a slight embellishment).</p>
<p>Almost exclusively, these are either cesium or rubidium fountain clocks - two old but good atomic clocks that date from the 80's.  But those clocks are over a million times less accurate than the best clock ever made - the Al-Mg <a href="https://www.nist.gov/news-events/news/2019/07/nists-quantum-logic-clock-returns-top-performance" rel="nofollow noreferrer">&quot;quantum logic&quot; clock</a> built by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST).  Running continuously, it would take the quantum logic clock 33 billion years to slip by a single second.</p>
<p>So yes, the government controls what time it is.  And they have invested millions of dollars to do just that.</p>

<p>An interesting fact about how silly it is. Denmark does not follow UTC+1 by law, but instead have some old law about how the sun is placed.</p>

<p>This means two things. </p>

<ol>
<li>Denmark cannot participate in any international groups coordinating
UTC.  </li>
<li>Everybody ignores it and just pretend it is UTC+1</li>
</ol>

<p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_in_the_Danish_Realm" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_in_the_Danish_Realm</a></p>

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