Obstacles in both Democratic and Republican states alike. Pretty sad. Also damn hypocritical of the states which regularly complain of Federal overreach to go restricting their own local governments.
Not at all. The federal government and state governments are separate sovereigns. Municipal governments are mere appendages of the state governments (and at the end of the day, the state governments are on the hook for anything bad that happens as a result of municipal decisions, e.g. Flint Michigan.)