642
Opinion of the Court
the collective-bargaining agreements, which we find no more helpful to Concrete Pipe than those adduced in the facial challenge brought in Connolly, as described in that opinion:
"By the express terms of the Trust Agreement and the Plan, the employer's sole obligation to the Pension Trust is to pay the contributions required by the collective-bargaining agreement. The Trust Agreement clearly states that the employer's obligation for pension benefits to the employee is ended when the employer pays the appropriate contribution to the Pension Trust. This is true even though the contributions agreed upon are insufficient to pay the benefits under the Plan." Id., at 218 (citations and footnotes omitted).
Indeed, one provision of the Trust Agreement on which Concrete Pipe primarily relies is substantially identical to the one at issue in Connolly. Compare n. 22, supra, with Connolly, supra, at 218, n. 2.
We said in Connolly that
"[a]ppellants' claim of an illegal taking gains nothing from the fact that the employer in the present litigation was protected by the terms of its contract from any liability beyond the specified contributions to which it had agreed. 'Contracts, however express, cannot fetter the constitutional authority of Congress. Contracts may create rights of property, but when contracts deal with a subject matter which lies within the control of Congress, they have a congenital infirmity. Parties cannot remove their transactions from the reach of dominant constitutional power by making contracts about them.'
"If the regulatory statute is otherwise within the powers of Congress, therefore, its application may not be defeated by private contractual provisions." 475 U. S., at 223-224 (citations omitted).
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