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WASHINGTON, DC-Developers, manufacturers and municipal and state representatives breathed a sigh of relief over the Supreme Court's unanimous decision to vacate the Sixth Circuit Court's finding in Cuno v. DaimlerChrysler. The case had threatened to upend the practice of providing tax incentives for direct investment and expansion activities.

"It clears away a cloud of uncertainty that has been hanging over market place for the better part of year," says John C. Biggins, co-founder and president of Stadtmauer Bailkin Biggins, LLC and partner on CoreNet Global Economic Development Leadership Awards. The decision, though, was not the best-case scenario for which many had been hoping--that is, confirmation that such incentives do not violate the US Constitution's Commerce Clause. Essentially, the Supreme Court said the plaintiffs did not have the standing to bring the case into the federal court system. In other words, a plaintiff that does have "standing" could try again.

"It was a good result--just not the best possible of results," says Kyle Sollie, partner in Dechert law firm and co-author of one of the Amicus Briefs filed in the DaimlerChrysler case. "The Supreme Court could have said, and didn't, that these types of credits are constitutional."