Rob at Mirror of Justice discusses "Subsidiarity in the Real World"

Wired Catholic had this headline from Mirror of Justice about Subsidiarity in the Real World

Warning: technical vocabulary alert. Lawyers are in discussion. Potential mental melt-downs are a distinct possibility. Proceed at your own risk.

Basically, he's saying that subsidiarity should be given a chance in the US legal and constitutional framework. While the Federal government's intervention in certain association's affairs may benefit society as a whole, this does not in and of itself mean that the Fed works that well all the time. Local norms and expectations need to be honored. Honoring them without respecting subsidiarity--and enforcing it through appropriate legal decision-making by the central government--is double-talk.

He gives the issue of "spill-over" as an example of how the Fed can and should step in:

Tom asks whether spillover effects can justify higher-level action. I would say it depends on the injury threatened by the spillover. Environmental stewardship is a fairly strong justification for government action under Catholic Social Thought, and the spillover effects of air pollution would (in my view) warrant federal regulation. (Even absent spillover, a state's failure to address its own air pollution may warrant intervention from the higher body.) But the mere fact that the autonomy of lower bodies impacts other lower bodies is not enough to curtail that autonomy. (An association's right to exclude, for example, is meaningless unless it impacts the freedom of other groups and individuals.)

He observes how Federal action can protect those associations that can't protect themselves from another association's irresponsibility. This example is textbook subsidiarity, practically lifted from Centenimus Annum. Note that the example does not call for an exclusion of associations' right to authority within it's own sphere. It's simply gives a case where Solidarity in action may trump it over a specific circumstance. Not on principle.

Rob makes other good points. Read the whole thing.