Kirkland & Ellis also represented automakers in another case against California regulators. In 2002, the industry -- backed by the Justice Department -- challenged a state rule that required production of a certain number of non-polluting vehicles.
Rosen said he did not participate in that case while he was with the law firm. The case was settled when the state agreed to remove language that the industry said amounted to regulating fuel economy.
The Bush administration also helped two industry groups overturn a regulation requiring the purchase of cleaner-running fleet vehicles such as buses and garbage trucks in Southern California.
The Engine Manufacturers Assn. and Western States Petroleum Assn. claimed the rule by the South Coast Air Quality Management District was preempted by federal law. Their challenge was rejected in federal district court and by a federal appeals court.
When the case went to the U.S. Supreme Court, the Justice Department filed a brief siding with the industry. The high court agreed that the local rules were preempted.
In the past, said California's Atty. Gen. Lockyer, when industries challenged state regulations, "the federal government abstained from those lawsuits."
Now, he said, there's "a policy of rubber-stamping whatever business wants, and that's too bad."
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The idea behind another California law was simple: Tell credit cardholders on monthly bills how long it would take to retire their debt if they paid the minimum amount.
But major banks issuing most of the nation's credit cards didn't like it. In a 2002 court challenge, they attacked the state's credit disclosure law with help from a powerful ally.
The U.S. Office of the Comptroller of the Currency joined forces with the American Banking Assn., Citibank and other plaintiffs, arguing in a friend-of-the-court brief that the law interfered with federal authority to regulate national banks, and with powers granted to the banks by their federal charters.
A federal judge blocked the law from going into effect, and the state lost a subsequent appeal.
Intervention by the comptroller's office "definitely tipped the balance," said Gail Hillebrand, a lawyer for Consumers Union, which had backed the state's position.
In recent years, the comptroller's office on many occasions has helped national banks and their subsidiaries fend off investigations or enforcement actions by state officials on preemption grounds.
