A state enacts a law imposing an additional tax on goods imported from other states, while exempting similar goods produced within the enacting state. What constitutional principle most likely renders this law invalid?
The Dormant Commerce Clause
The Supremacy Clause
Substantive Due Process
The Taxing and Spending Power
The Dormant Commerce Clause refers to the principle that state regulations must not discriminate against or unduly burden interstate commerce, even in the absence of federal legislation on the matter. In this question, the state's tax discriminates against goods from other states in favor of its own goods, burdening interstate commerce and giving local commerce an advantage. Such discriminatory economic protectionism generally violates the Dormant Commerce Clause unless the state can show an extraordinary justification or that no less discriminatory alternatives exist.
Other answers are incorrect because the Supremacy Clause pertains to conflicts between federal and state laws where federal law preempts state law, the Taxing and Spending Power is a congressional power unrelated to state-level laws, and Substantive Due Process is a doctrine that protects certain fundamental rights from government interference, not state tax schemes targeting interstate commerce.
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