19 states have “no more changing the clocks” laws passed, but aren’t allowed to do so without approval of the federal government?
It’s pretty obvious you can just do what you want these days, consequences are trivial to non-existent, so why don’t we just not change our clocks? (or change them and not change them back, whatever floats your boat)
Why can’t we (states) ignore clock changes without the federal government?
I’m not sure what you mean. There are places in the US that don’t do DST.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daylight_saving_time
In the United States, it is observed by all states except Hawaii, Arizona (within the latter, however, the Navajo Nation does observe it), and the U.S. Territories.[2]
From the same article:
In the United States, several states have enacted legislation to implement permanent DST, but the bills would require Congress to change federal law in order to take effect. The Uniform Time Act of 1966 permits states to opt out of DST and observe permanent standard time, but it does not permit permanent DST.
So what? Not changing clocks is the bigger issue, and I’m someone that very much prefers DST through the winter, as it gives me more sunlight after the typical work day.
But I’d settle for a single, non-switching time.
Plus I’m sure if a state decided to go permanent DST, the Fed would have a hard time forcing the issue, as suddenly the Interstate clause would get challenged in the Supreme Court, and the Fed wants to avoid that at all costs.
Scientists know which one is better and the last time a bill was presented in Congress it was actually the wrong one.
Time zones were originally mandated for the sake of railroads: before trains each town used its own local time, and each locality refused to change their clocks to match anyone else’s. So time zones were set by the federal government because there was little chance that every town in the country would reach a consensus otherwise.
When DST was introduced much later, time zones were already an accepted thing—so the federal government gave states the discretion to adopt DST or not. But they have to take it or leave it: they can’t make it year-round because that would effectively move them to a different time zone, which is still the prerogative of the federal government.
The answer is that there is a law, The Uniform Time Act.
Ad to why we just don’t ignore it, I’m sure it’s because the support for it just isn’t strong enough to merit ignoring a federal law.
