664
Opinion of the Court
interest of avoiding unintended encroachment on the authority of the States, however, a court interpreting a federal statute pertaining to a subject traditionally governed by state law will be reluctant to find pre-emption. Thus, preemption will not lie unless it is "the clear and manifest purpose of Congress." Rice v. Santa Fe Elevator Corp., 331 U. S. 218, 230 (1947). Evidence of pre-emptive purpose is sought in the text and structure of the statute at issue. Shaw v. Delta Air Lines, Inc., 463 U. S. 85, 95 (1983). If the statute contains an express pre-emption clause, the task of statutory construction must in the first instance focus on the plain wording of the clause, which necessarily contains the best evidence of Congress' pre-emptive intent.
According to § 434, applicable federal regulations may preempt any state "law, rule, regulation, order, or standard relating to railroad safety." Legal duties imposed on railroads by the common law fall within the scope of these broad phrases. Cf. Cipollone v. Liggett Group, Inc., 505 U. S. 504, 522 (1992) (federal statute barring additional " 'requirement[s]' . . . 'imposed under State law' " pre-empts common-law claims); id., at 548-549 (Scalia, J., concurring in judgment in part and dissenting in part) (same). Thus, the issue before the Court is whether the Secretary of Transportation has issued regulations covering the same subject matter as Georgia negligence law pertaining to the maintenance of, and the operation of trains at, grade crossings. To prevail on the claim that the regulations have pre-emptive effect, petitioner must establish more than that they "touch upon" or "relate to" that subject matter, cf. Morales v. Trans World Airlines, Inc., 504 U. S. 374, 383-384 (1992) (statute's use of "relating to" confers broad pre-emptive effect), for "covering" is a more restrictive term which indicates that pre-emption will lie only if the federal regulations substantially subsume the subject matter of the relevant state law. See Webster's Third New International Dictionary 524 (1961) (in the phrase "policy clauses covering the situation," cover means "to com-
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