Cite as: 519 U. S. 213 (1997)
Opinion of O'Connor, J.
banks. In both instances, the floor is needed to limit state efforts to weaken liability standards; in both instances a floor serves that purpose; and the reasons for believing the statute only sets such a floor are equally strong.
A more thorough answer lies in the fact that Congress nowhere separated its consideration of federally chartered, from that of state-chartered, banks. Congress did not ask whether one looked to federal common law or to state law to find the liability standard applicable to federally chartered banks. Nor did it try to determine the content of federal common law. One can reconcile congressional silence on the matter with a "gross negligence" statute, the language of which brings all banks (federal- and state-chartered) within its scope, simply by assuming that Congress, when enacting the statute, wanted to leave other law, including the law applicable to federally chartered banks, exactly where Congress found it. That, after all, is what the statute says. And the saving clause language taken at face value permits Congress to achieve its basic objective (providing a "gross negligence" floor) without having to unravel the arcane intricacies of federal common law. In our view, this understanding of congressional intent better explains the statute's language and history than the petitioner's interpretation, imputing to Congress an intent to apply a uniform "gross negligence" standard to federally chartered, but not state chartered, institutions.
For these reasons, the judgment of the Court of Appeals is vacated, and the case is remanded for proceedings consistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
Justice O'Connor, with whom Justice Scalia and Justice Thomas join, concurring in part and concurring in the judgment.
I join all of the Court's opinion, except to the extent that it relies on the notably unhelpful legislative history to 12 U. S. C. § 1821(k). Ante, at 228-230. As the Court cor-
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