502
Syllabus
far in the past, and unrelated to any commitment that the employers made or to any injury they caused. Pp. 529-537.
Justice Kennedy concluded that application of the Coal Act to Eastern would violate the proper bounds of settled due process principles. Although the Court has been hesitant to subject economic legislation to due process scrutiny as a general matter, this country's law has harbored a singular distrust of retroactive statutes, and that distrust is reflected in this Court's due process jurisprudence. For example, in Usery v. Turner Elkhorn Mining Co., 428 U. S. 1, 15, the Court held that due process requires an inquiry into whether a legislature acted in an arbitrary and irrational way when enacting a retroactive law. This formulation has been repeated in numerous recent cases, e. g., United States v. Carlton, 512 U. S. 26, 31, which reflect the recognition that retroactive lawmaking is a particular concern because of the legislative temptation to use it as a means of retribution against unpopular groups or individuals, Landgraf v. USI Film Products, 511 U. S. 244, 266. Because change in the legal consequences of transactions long closed can destroy the reasonable certainty and security which are the very objects of property ownership, due process protection for property must be understood to incorporate the settled tradition against retroactive laws of great severity. The instant case presents one of those rare instances where the legislature has exceeded the limits imposed by due process. The Coal Act's remedy bears no legitimate relation to the interest which the Government asserts supports the statute. The degree of retroactive effect, which is a significant determinant in a statute's constitutionality, e. g., United States v. Carlton, supra, at 32, is of unprecedented scope here, since the Coal Act created liability for events occurring 35 years ago. While the Court has upheld the imposition of liability on former employers based on past employment relationships when the remedial statutes were designed to impose an actual, measurable business cost which the employer had been able to avoid in the past, e. g., Turner Elkhorn, supra, at 19, the Coal Act does not serve this purpose. The beneficiaries' expectation of lifetime benefits was created by promises and agreements made long after Eastern left the coal business, and Eastern was not responsible for the perilous condition of the 1950 and 1974 Plans which jeopardized the benefits. Pp. 547-550.
OTMConnor, J., announced the judgment of the Court and delivered an opinion, in which Rehnquist, C. J., and Scalia and Thomas, JJ., joined. Thomas, J., filed a concurring opinion, post, p. 538. Kennedy, J., filed an opinion concurring in the judgment and dissenting in part, post, p. 539. Stevens, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which Souter, Ginsburg, and Breyer, JJ., joined, post, p. 550. Breyer, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which Stevens, Souter, and Ginsburg, JJ., joined, post, p. 553.
Page: Index Previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 NextLast modified: October 4, 2007