Morales v. Trans World Airlines, Inc., 504 U.S. 374, 12 (1992)

Page:   Index   Previous  5  6  7  8  9  10  11  12  13  14  15  16  17  18  19  Next

Cite as: 504 U. S. 374 (1992)

Opinion of the Court

482 U. S. 437, 445 (1987), a canon particularly pertinent here, where the "saving" clause is a relic of the pre-ADA/no preemption regime. A general "remedies" saving clause cannot be allowed to supersede the specific substantive pre-emption provision—unless it be thought that a State having a statute requiring "reasonable rates," and providing remedies against "unreasonable" ones, could actually set airfares. As in International Paper Co. v. Ouellette, 479 U. S. 481, 494 (1987), "we do not believe Congress intended to undermine this carefully drawn statute through a general saving clause."

Petitioner contends that § 1305(a)(1) only pre-empts the States from actually prescribing rates, routes, or services. This simply reads the words "relating to" out of the statute. Had the statute been designed to pre-empt state law in such a limited fashion, it would have forbidden the States to "regulate rates, routes, and services." See Pilot Life, supra, at 50 ("A common-sense view of the word 'regulates' would lead to the conclusion that in order to regulate [a matter], a law . . . must be specifically directed toward [it]").2 Moreover,

2 The dissent believes petitioner's position on this point to be supported by the history and structure of the ADA (sources it deems "more illuminating" than a "narrow focus" on the ADA's language, post, at 421), because the old regime did not pre-empt the state laws involved here and the ADA's legislative history contains no statements specifically addressed to state regulation of advertising. Post, at 421-426. Suffice it to say that legislative history need not confirm the details of changes in the law effected by statutory language before we will interpret that language according to its natural meaning. See, e. g., Harrison v. PPG Industries, Inc., 446 U. S. 578, 591-592 (1980).

It also bears mention that the rejected Senate bill did contain language that would have produced precisely the result the dissent desires: "No State shall enact any law . . . determining routes, schedules, or rates, fares, or charges in tariffs of . . . ." S. 2493, § 423(a)(1), reprinted in S. Rep. No. 95-631, p. 39 (1978) (emphasis added). The dissent is unperturbed by the full Congress' preference for "relating to" over "determining," because the Conference Report gave "no indication that the conferees thought the House's 'relating to' language would have a broader

385

Page:   Index   Previous  5  6  7  8  9  10  11  12  13  14  15  16  17  18  19  Next

Last modified: October 4, 2007