If a company illegally pollutes, I have no problem with an EPA official metaphorically "crucifying" the pollutier to the fullest extent the law allows, which I think is what that official was saying. 

I also have no problem with states asserting their own sovereignty as allowed under the Constitution.  I have a slight problem with legislators who pander and scaremonger over imagined threats to sovereignty, and waste time "solving" some fictional problem.

But, to bring it back to your original topic, can you explain to me what actual problem that Alabama law solved?  If the UN had been trampling on Alabama's sovereignty for 30 years, surely there was some real world effect, right?