Hundreds of farm groups are lobbying Congress to pass the Agricultural Labeling Uniformity Act to prohibit states from requiring warnings on crop-protection products different than required by the Environmental Protection Agency. (Courtesy National Park Service)

Farm groups are looking for at least one branch of the federal government to ban state laws that contradict pesticide and herbicide labels approved by the Environmental Protection Agency.

Some 365 groups wrote Senate and House leaders May 28 asking Congress to pass the Agricultural Labeling Uniformity Act. The measure has languished without a hearing since it was introduced two years ago by Reps. Dusty Johnson, R-South Dakota, and Jim Costa, D-Calif.

It would prohibit states from adding warnings to labels, or penalizing chemical makers for not printing warnings the EPA concluded were unnecessary.

Some of the same farm groups earlier in May submitted a friend-of-the-court brief asking the U.S. Supreme Court to take up a case stemming from allegations glyphosate, the active ingredient in Roundup products, causes cancer, even though the EPA says it’s not carcinogenic to humans.

In addition, attorneys general from 18 states have petitioned the EPA to write a rule affirming that the agency’s findings on the health effects of pesticides are nationally binding.

The farm groups, which include the American Farm Bureau and the Oregon, Idaho, Washington and California farm bureaus argue that farmers need to be sure that EPA labels are the law.

“We’re really taking an ‘all of the above’ approach to bring certainty to this issue,” American Soybean Association President Caleb Ragland said in a statement. “Unless there is clarity, we’re worried manufacturers could exit the market and leave farmers without much-needed tools.”

The EPA registers and labels crop protection products under the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide and Rodenticide Act. The law allows states to regulate the sale and use of pesticides, as long as they don’t allow uses prohibited by the EPA.

Johnson and Costa’s bill would leave alone state authority to regulate the use of pesticides, but would prohibit warning labels such as the kind California attempted to put on glyphosate before it was stopped by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals.

Other courts, however, looked more favorable at state laws. Farm groups asked House Speaker Mike Johson, Senate Majority Leader John Thune, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer to support Johnson and Costa’s bill to clarify EPA’s authority.

“Gowers and users need reaffirmation from Congress that while states have authority to regulate the sale and use of pesticides within their jurisdiction, they cannot impose labeling or packaging requirements in addition or different from the scientific conclusions of the EPA,” the groups stated.

The Monsanto Company, owned by Bayer AG and makers of glyphosate, seeks the same outcome in its appeal to the Supreme Court.

A Missouri jury, following state law, awarded $1.25 million to a man who claimed glyphosate gave him non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. A state appeals court upheld the judgement, ruling Monsanto failed to warn the man about potential risks.

The Supreme Court has yet to agree to take up the appeal. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, in a friend-of-the-court brief, said the stakes are enormous. If the Missouri verdict stands, businesses will be subject to a “crazy-quilt” of state requirements, according to the chamber.

The 18 attorneys general, mostly from Midwest and Southern states, argue the EPA should assert its authority. “Courts and states should not be allowed to undermine EPA’s risk assessments under FIFRA,” the attorneys general stated in comments to the EPA. The agency has not announced whether it will propose a rule.