Cite as: 507 U. S. 170 (1993)
Souter, J., dissenting
What, then, if we call it a tie on the contextual analysis? The answer is that Congress has given courts faced with uncertain meaning a clear tiebreaker in RICO's "liberal construction" clause, which directs that the "provisions of this title shall be liberally construed to effectuate its remedial purposes." Pub. L. 91-452, § 904(a), 84 Stat. 947, note following 18 U. S. C. § 1961. We have relied before on this "express admonition" to read RICO provisions broadly, see Sedima, S. P. R. L. v. Imrex Co., 473 U. S. 479, 497-498 (1985), and in this instance, the "liberal construction" clause plays its intended part, directing us to recognize the more inclusive definition of the word "conduct," free of any restricting element of direction or control.2 Because the Court of Appeals employed a narrower reading, I would reverse.
Even if I were to adopt the majority's view of § 1962(c), however, I still could not join the judgment, which seems to me unsupportable under the very "operation or management" test the Court announces. If Arthur Young had confined itself in this case to the role traditionally performed by an outside auditor, I could agree with the majority that Arthur Young took no part in the management or operation of the Farmer's Cooperative of Arkansas and Oklahoma, Inc. (Co-op). But the record on summary judgment, viewed
22. There is no indication that the congressional shorthand was meant to attend to the statutory nuance at issue here. As the Court concedes, "[T]he fact that Members of Congress understood § 1962(c) to prohibit the operation or management of an enterprise through a pattern of racketeering activity does not necessarily mean that they understood § 1962(c) to be limited to the operation or management of an enterprise." Ante, at 182.
2 The majority claims that without an element of direction, the word "conduct," when it appears as a noun, becomes superfluous. Ante, at 178. Given the redundant language Congress has chosen for § 1962(c), however, any consistent reading of "conduct" will tend to make one of its two appearances superfluous.
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