Cite as: 526 U. S. 86 (1999)
OTMConnor, J., dissenting
The judgment of the Fourth Circuit is vacated, and the cases are remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
It is so ordered.
Justice OTMConnor, with whom The Chief Justice joins, and with whom Justice Scalia and Justice Thomas join as to Part I, dissenting.
The Court today ignores the plain meaning of the Federal Service Labor-Management Relations Statute (Federal Labor Statute or Statute) and erroneously concludes that when an agency responds to a judicial decision by abandoning its own interpretation of a statute and adopting that of the judicial forum this Court should defer to the agency's revised position, rather than evaluate whether the revised interpretation renders, in fact, the most plausible reading of the statute. I respectfully dissent.
I
The Federal Labor Statute plainly does not impose a general duty on agencies to bargain midterm. See Social Security Administration v. FLRA, 956 F. 2d 1280, 1281 (CA4 1992). Whether the language of a statute is plain or ambiguous is determined "by reference to the language itself, the specific context in which that language is used, and the broader context of the statute as a whole." Robinson v. Shell Oil Co., 519 U. S. 337, 341 (1997).
Here, the language of the Federal Labor Statute, as well as the specific and broader contexts in which that language is used, demonstrates that the Statute is unambiguous. The Federal Labor Statute specifies a few instances where mid-term bargaining is required, see 5 U. S. C. § 7106(b), but it contains no provision that expressly or implicitly imposes a general duty on agencies to bargain during the term of a collective bargaining agreement. Rather, Congress defined
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