106
Opinion of the Court
509; duties of senior licensed officers to relieve the master, id., at 511; manning standards for foreign vessels, id., at 513; reporting of marine casualties, ibid.; minimum standards for plating thickness, id., at 515; tank vessel manning requirements, id., at 517; and tank vessel construction standards, id., at 517-518, among other extensive regulations. If Congress had intended to disrupt national uniformity in all of these matters, it would not have done so by placement of the saving clauses in Title I.
The saving clauses are further limited in effect to "this Act, the Act of March 3, 1851 . . . , or section 9509 of [the Internal Revenue Code]." §§ 2718(a) and (c). These explicit qualifiers are inconsistent with interpreting the saving clauses to alter the pre-emptive effect of the PWSA or regulations promulgated thereunder. The text of the statute indicates no intent to allow States to impose wide-ranging regulation of the at-sea operation of tankers. The clauses may preserve a State's ability to enact laws of a scope similar to Title I, but do not extend to subjects addressed in the other titles of the Act or other acts.
Limiting the saving clauses as we have determined respects the established federal-state balance in matters of maritime commerce between the subjects as to which the States retain concurrent powers and those over which the federal authority displaces state control. We have upheld state laws imposing liability for pollution caused by oil spills. See Askew v. American Waterways Operators, Inc., 411 U. S., at 325. Our view of OPA's saving clauses preserves this important role for the States, which is unchallenged here. We think it quite unlikely that Congress would use a means so indirect as the saving clauses in Title I of OPA to upset the settled division of authority by allowing States to impose additional unique substantive regulation on the atsea conduct of vessels. We decline to give broad effect to saving clauses where doing so would upset the careful regulatory scheme established by federal law. See, e. g., Morales
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