Morales v. Trans World Airlines, Inc., 504 U.S. 374, 50 (1992)

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

Stevens, J., dissenting

were substituted for the recently removed federal regulations, Congress thought it necessary to pre-empt such state regulation. Consequently, Congress enacted § 105(a) of the Act, which pre-empts any state regulation "relating to rates, routes, or services of any air carrier having authority under subchapter IV of this chapter to provide air transportation." 49 U. S. C. App. § 1305(a)(1).

At the same time, Congress retained § 411, which gave the Civil Aeronautics Board the power to prohibit "unfair or deceptive practices or unfair methods of competition in air transportation." 49 U. S. C. App. § 1381(a). Congress also retained the saving clause that preserved common-law and statutory remedies for fraudulent and deceptive practices. See § 1506; Nader, 426 U. S., at 298-300. Moreover, the state prohibitions against deceptive practices that had coexisted with federal regulation in the airline industry for 40 years, and had coexisted with federal regulation of unfair trade practices in other areas of the economy since 1914,5 were not mentioned in either the ADA or its legislative history.

In short, there is no indication that Congress intended to exempt airlines from state prohibitions of deceptive advertising. Instead, this history suggests that the scope of the

5 The FTCA does not, by its own force, pre-empt state prohibitions of unfair and deceptive trade practices. Thus, unless a state prohibition conflicts with a Federal Trade Commission rule, state laws and regulations are not pre-empted. See, e. g., American Financial Services Assn. v. FTC, 247 U. S. App. D. C. 167, 199-200, 767 F. 2d 957, 989-991 (1985); Verkuil, Preemption of State Law by the Federal Trade Commission, 1976 Duke L. J. 225.

Because the Department of Transportation has authority to prohibit unfair or deceptive practices and unfair methods of competition in air transportation, 49 U. S. C. App. § 1381, it, too, could promulgate regulations that would pre-empt inconsistent state laws and regulations. But the Court does not rest its holding on the fact that the state prohibitions of unfair and deceptive advertising conflict with federal regulations; instead, it relies on the much broader holding that the ADA itself pre-empts state prohibitions of deceptive advertising.

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