ABSTRACT
State and local governments must participate directly or indirectly in the federal policymaking process to protect the interest groups on which their own economic viability depends, as well as the more general interests they represent by virtue of their populations and geography. The balance between state and national interests and responsibilities in many areas is delicate and constantly shifting, but environmental issues pose especially thorny problems because so many of them involve phenomena that embrace or cross state or regional boundaries. Regional associations among states, such as the Coalition of Northeast Governors (CONEG), have been formed to anticipate such problems and address them collectively. Conservation issues in some parts of the US have shorter roots and are generally less contentious, activities as diverse as logging in Maine's forests, to sugar production in Florida's Everglades, to ethanol production in Iowa's cornfields find the states in active advocacy roles to promote, protect, and defend the interests important to them.
