Dan Hopkins

Broadly speaking, this means that the political allegiances and controversies that characterize federal politics have now come to dominate state-level politics too, crowding out the sectional concerns and idiosyncratic political parties that once distinguished states from one another and from the national political scene.

So political scientist Dan Hopkins has demonstrated that when people vote for state officeholders, say for a governor, they increasingly do so in ways that reflect their loyalty to federal level or national parties and candidates.

Even candidates in local school board elections now draw on national donor networks to fund their campaigns, reflecting the remarkable penetration of national fights into sub-national politics.

OK, so you might think our old stories about federalism just don't apply to our new 21st century reality.