Cite as: 504 U. S. 334 (1992)
Rehnquist, C. J., dissenting
lations, 496 U. S. 18, 31 (1990); Tyler Pipe Industries, Inc. v. Washington State Dept. of Revenue, 483 U. S. 232, 251- 253 (1987).
So ordered.
Chief Justice Rehnquist, dissenting.
I have already had occasion to set out my view that States need not ban all waste disposal as a precondition to protecting themselves from hazardous or noxious materials brought across the State's borders. See Philadelphia v. New Jersey, 437 U. S. 617, 629 (1978) (Rehnquist, J., dissenting). In a case also decided today, I express my further view that States may take actions legitimately directed at the preservation of the State's natural resources, even if those actions incidentally work to disadvantage some out-of-state waste generators. See Fort Gratiot Sanitary Landfill, Inc. v. Michigan Dept. of Natural Resources, post, p. 368 (Rehnquist, C. J., dissenting). I dissent today, largely for the reasons I have set out in those two cases. Several additional comments that pertain specifically to this case, though, are in order.
Taxes are a recognized and effective means for discouraging the consumption of scarce commodities—in this case the safe environment that attends appropriate disposal of hazardous wastes. Cf. 26 U. S. C. §§ 4681, 4682 (1988 ed., Supp. III) (tax on ozone-depleting chemicals); 26 U. S. C. § 4064 (gas guzzler excise tax). I therefore see nothing unconstitutional in Alabama's use of a tax to discourage the export of this commodity to other States, when the commodity is a public good that Alabama has helped to produce. Cf. Fort Gratiot, post, at 372 (Rehnquist, C. J., dissenting). Nor do I see any significance in the fact that Alabama has chosen to adopt a differential tax rather than an outright ban. Nothing in the Commerce Clause requires Alabama to adopt an "all or nothing" regulatory approach to noxious materials coming
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