OPINION OF THE COURT
ROWE V. NEW HAMPSHIRE MOTOR TRANSP. ASSN.
552 U. S. ____ (2008)
SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
NO. 06-457
G. STEVEN ROWE, ATTORNEY GENERAL OF MAINE,
PETITIONER
v. NEW HAMPSHIRE MOTOR TRANSPORT ASSOCIATION
et al.
on writ of certiorari to the united states court of
appeals for the first circuit
[February 20, 2008]
Justice Breyer delivered the
opinion of the Court.
We here consider whether a
federal statute that prohibits States from enacting any law
“related to” a motor carrier “price, route, or service” pre-empts
two provisions of a Maine tobacco law, which regulate the delivery
of tobacco to customers within the State. 49 U. S. C.
§§14501(c)(1), 41713(b)(4)(A); see Me. Rev. Stat. Ann., Tit. 22,
§§1555–C(3)(C), 1555–D (second sentence) (2004). We hold that the
federal law pre-empts both provisions.
I
A
In 1978, Congress “determin[ed]
that ‘maximum reliance on competitive market forces’ ” would
favor lower airline fares and better airline service, and it
enacted the Airline Deregulation Act.
Morales v.
Trans
World Airlines, Inc.,
504 U. S. 374, 378
(1992) (quoting 49 U. S. C. App. §1302(a)(4) (1988 ed.)); see
92 Stat. 1705. In order to “ensure that the States would not undo
federal deregulation with regulation of their own,” that Act
“included a pre-emption provision” that said “no State … shall
enact or enforce any law … relating to rates, routes, or services
of any air carrier.”
Morales,
supra, at 378; 49
U. S. C. App. §1305(a)(1) (1988 ed.).
In 1980, Congress deregulated
trucking. See Motor Carrier Act of 1980, 94 Stat. 793. And a little
over a decade later, in 1994, Congress similarly sought to pre-empt
state trucking regulation. See Federal Aviation Administration
Authorization Act of 1994, 108 Stat. 1605–1606; see also ICC
Termination Act of 1995, 109 Stat. 899. In doing so, it borrowed
language from the Airline Deregulation Act of 1978 and wrote into
its 1994 law language that says: “[A] State . . . may not enact or
enforce a law . . . related to a price, route, or service of any
motor carrier . . . with respect to the transportation of
property.” 49 U. S. C. §14501(c)(1); see also §41713(b)(4)(A)
(similar provision for combined motor-air carriers).
The State of Maine subsequently adopted An Act
To Regulate the Delivery and Sales of Tobacco Products and To
Prevent the Sale of Tobacco Products to Minors, 2003 Me. Acts p.
1089, two sections of which are relevant here. The first section
forbids anyone other than a Maine-licensed tobacco retailer to
accept an order for delivery of tobacco. Me. Rev. Stat. Ann., Tit.
22, §1555–C(1). It then adds that, when a licensed retailer accepts
an order and ships tobacco, the retailer must “utilize a delivery
service” that provides a special kind of
recipient-verification service. §1555–C(3)(C). The
delivery service must make certain that (1) the person who bought
the tobacco is the person to whom the package is addressed; (2) the
person to whom the package is addressed is of legal age to purchase
tobacco; (3) the person to whom the package is addressed has
himself or herself signed for the package; and (4) the person to
whom the package is addressed, if under the age of 27, has produced
a valid government-issued photo identification with proof of age.
Ibid. Violations are punishable by civil penalties. See
§§1555–C(3)(E) to C(3)(F) (first offense up to $1,500; subsequent
offenses up to $5,000).
The second section forbids any person
“knowingly” to “transport” a “tobacco product” to “a person” in
Maine unless either the sender or the receiver has a Maine license.
§1555–D. It then adds that a “person is
deemed to know
that a package contains a tobacco product” (1) if the package is
marked as containing tobacco and displays the name and license
number of a Maine-licensed tobacco retailer; or (2) if the person
receives the package from someone whose name appears on a list of
un-licensed tobacco retailers that Maine’s Attorney
General distributes to various package-delivery companies.
Ibid. (emphasis added); see also §§1555–C(3)(B),
1555–D(1). Violations are again punishable by civil penalties.
§1555–D(2) (up to $1,500 per violation against violator and/or
violator’s employer).
B
Respondents, several transport
carrier associations, brought this lawsuit in federal court,
claiming that federal law pre-empts several sections of Maine’s
statute. The District Court held (among other things) that federal
law pre-empts the portions of the two sections we have described,
namely the “recipient-verification” provision (§1555–C(3)(C)) and
the “deemed to know” provision (the second sentence of §1555–D).
See 377 F. Supp. 2d 197, 220 (Me. 2005). On appeal, the Court
of Appeals for the First Circuit agreed that federal law pre-empted
the two provisions. 448 F. 3d 66, 82 (2006). We granted
certiorari to review these determinations. 551 U. S. ___
(2007).
II
A
In
Morales, this Court
interpreted the pre-emption provision in the Airline Deregulation
Act of 1978. See 504 U. S., at 378. And we follow
Morales
in interpreting similar language in the 1994 Act before us here. We
have said that “when judicial interpretations have settled the
meaning of an existing statutory provision, repetition of the same
language in a new statute indicates, as a general matter, the
intent to incorporate its judicial interpretations as well.”
Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner & Smith Inc. v.
Dabit,
547
U. S. 71, 85 (2006) (internal quotation marks and alterations
omitted). Here, the Congress that wrote the language before us
copied the language of the air-carrier pre-emption provision of the
Airline Deregulation Act of 1978. Compare 49 U. S. C.
§§14501(c)(1), 41713(b)(4)(A), with 49 U. S. C. App.
§1305(a)(1) (1988 ed.); see also H. R. Conf. Rep. No. 103–677,
pp. 82–83, 85 (1994) (hereinafter H. R. Conf. Rep.). And it
did so fully aware of this Court’s interpretation of that language
as set forth in
Morales. See H. R. Conf. Rep., at 83
(motor carriers will enjoy “the identical intrastate preemption of
prices, routes and services as that originally contained in” the
Airline Deregulation Act);
ibid. (expressing agreement
with “the broad preemption interpretation adopted by the United
States Supreme Court in
Morales”);
id., at
85.
In
Morales, the Court
determined: (1) that “[s]tate enforcement actions
having a
connection with, or reference to” carrier “ ‘rates,
routes, or services’ are pre-empted,” 504 U. S., at 384 (emphasis
added); (2) that such pre-emption may occur even if a state law’s
effect on rates, routes or services “is only indirect,”
id., at 386 (internal quotation marks omitted); (3) that,
in respect to pre-emption, it makes no difference whether a state
law is “consistent” or “inconsistent” with federal regulation,
id., at 386–387 (emphasis deleted); and (4) that
pre-emption occurs at least where state laws have a “significant
impact” related to Congress’ deregulatory and pre-emption-related
objectives,
id., at 390. The Court described Congress’
overarching goal as helping assure transportation rates, routes,
and services that reflect “maximum reliance on competitive market
forces,” thereby stimulating “efficiency, innovation, and low
prices,” as well as “variety” and “quality.”
Id., at 378
(internal quotation marks omitted).
Morales held that,
given these principles, federal law pre-empts States from enforcing
their consumer-fraud statutes against deceptive airline-fare
advertisements.
Id., at 391. See
American Airlines,
Inc. v.
Wolens,
513 U. S. 219, 226–228
(1995) (federal law pre-empts application of a State’s general
consumer-protection statute to an airline’s frequent flyer
program).
Finally,
Morales said that federal
law might not pre-empt state laws that affect fares in only a
“tenuous, remote, or peripheral … manner,” such as state laws
forbidding gambling. 504 U. S., at 390 (internal quotation marks
omitted). But the Court did not say where, or how, “it would be
appropriate to draw the line,” for the state law before it did not
“present a borderline question.”
Ibid. (internal quotation
marks omitted);
see also Wolens,
supra, at 226.
B
In light of
Morales, we find that federal law pre-empts the Maine laws
at issue here. Section 1555–C(3)(C) of the Maine statute forbids
licensed tobacco retailers to employ a “delivery service” unless
that service follows particular delivery procedures. Me. Rev. Stat.
Ann., Tit. 22, §1555–C(3)(C). In doing so, it focuses on trucking
and other motor carrier services (which make up a substantial
portion of all “delivery services,” §1551(1–C)), thereby creating a
direct “connection with” motor carrier services. See
Morales, 504 U. S., at 384.
At the same
time, the provision has a “significant” and adverse “impact” in
respect to the federal Act’s ability to achieve its
pre-emption-related objectives. Id., at 390. The Solicitor
General and the carrier associations claim (and Maine does not
deny) that the law will require carriers to offer a system of
services that the market does not now provide (and which the
carriers would prefer not to offer). And even were that not so, the
law would freeze into place services that carriers might prefer to
discontinue in the future. The Maine law thereby produces the very
effect that the federal law sought to avoid, namely, a State’s
direct substitution of its own governmental commands for
“competitive market forces” in determining (to a significant
degree) the services that motor carriers will provide.
Id., at 378 (internal quotation marks omitted).
We concede that the
regulation here is less “direct” than it might be, for it tells
shippers what to choose rather than carriers what
to do. Nonetheless, the effect of the regulation is that carriers
will have to offer tobacco delivery services that differ
significantly from those that, in the absence of the regulation,
the market might dictate. And that being so, “treating sales
restrictions and purchase restrictions differently for pre-emption
purposes would make no sense.” Engine Mfrs. Assn. v.
South Coast Air Quality Management Dist., 541 U. S. 246, 255
(2004). If federal law pre-empts state efforts to regulate, and
consequently to affect, the advertising about carrier
rates and services at issue in Morales, it must pre-empt
Maine’s efforts to regulate carrier delivery services
themselves.
Section 1555–D’s “deemed to
know” provision applies yet more directly to motor carrier
services. The provision creates a conclusive presumption of carrier
knowledge that a shipment contains tobacco when it is marked as
originating from a Maine-licensed tobacco retailer or is sent by
anyone Maine has specifically identified as an unlicensed tobacco
retailer. That presumption means that the Maine law imposes civil
liability upon the carrier, not simply for its knowing transport of
(unlicensed) tobacco, but for the carrier’s failure
sufficiently to examine every package. The provision thus
requires the carrier to check each shipment for certain markings
and to compare it against the Maine attorney general’s list of
proscribed shippers. And it thereby directly regulates a
significant aspect of the motor carrier’s package pick-up and
delivery service. In this way it creates the kind of state-mandated
regulation that the federal Act pre-empts.
Maine replies that the
regulation will impose no significant additional costs upon
carriers. But even were that so (and the carriers deny it), Maine’s
reply is off the mark. As with the recipient-verification
provision, the “deemed to know” provision would freeze in place and
immunize from competition a service-related system that carriers do
not (or in the future might not) wish to provide. Supra,
at 5–6. To allow Maine to insist that the carriers provide a
special checking system would allow other States to do the same.
And to interpret the federal law to permit these, and similar,
state requirements could easily lead to a patchwork of state
service-determining laws, rules, and regulations. That state
regulatory patchwork is inconsistent with Congress’ major
legislative effort to leave such decisions, where federally
unregulated, to the competitive marketplace. See H. R. Conf.
Rep., at 87. If federal law pre-empts state regulation of the
details of an air carrier’s frequent flyer program, a program that
primarily promotes carriage, see Wolens,
supra, at 226–228, it must pre-empt state
regulation of the essential details of a motor carrier’s system for
picking-up, sorting, and carrying goods—essential details of the
carriage itself.
C
Maine’s primary
arguments focus upon the reason why it has enacted the
provisions in question. Maine argues for an exception from
pre-emption on the ground that its laws help it prevent minors from
obtaining cigarettes. In Maine’s view, federal law does not
pre-empt a State’s efforts to protect its citizens’ public health,
particularly when those laws regulate so dangerous an activity as
underage smoking.
Despite the
importance of the public health objective, we cannot agree with
Maine that the federal law creates an exception on that basis,
exempting state laws that it would otherwise pre-empt. The Act says
nothing about a public health exception. To the contrary, it
explicitly lists a set of exceptions (governing motor vehicle
safety, certain local route controls, and the like), but the list
says nothing about public health. See 49 U. S. C.
§§14501(c)(2) to (c)(3); see also §41713(b)(4)(B). Maine suggests
that the provision’s history indicates that Congress’ primary
concern was not with the sort of law it has enacted, but instead
with state “economic” regulation. See, e.g., H. R.
Conf. Rep., at 88; see also Columbus v. Ours Garage
& Wrecker Service, Inc., 536 U. S. 424, 440
(2002). But it is frequently difficult to distinguish between a
State’s “economic”-related and “health”-related motivations, see
infra, at 9, and, indeed, the parties vigorously dispute
Maine’s actual motivation for the laws at issue here. Consequently,
it is not surprising that Congress declined to insert the term
“economic” into the operative language now before us, despite
having at one time considered doing so. See S. Rep. No.
95–631, p. 171 (1978) (reprinting Senate bill).
Maine’s argument for an
implied “public health” or “tobacco” exception to federal
pre-emption rests largely upon (1) legislative history containing a
list of nine States, with laws resembling Maine’s, that Congress
thought did not regulate “intrastate prices, routes and services of
motor carriers,” see H. R. Conf. Rep., at 86; and (2) the
Synar Amendment, a law that denies States federal funds unless they
forbid sales of tobacco to minors, see 42 U. S. C.
§§300x–26(a)(1), (b)(1). The legislative history, however, does not
suggest Congress made a firm judgment about, or even focused upon,
the issue now before us. And the Synar Amendment nowhere mentions
the particular state enforcement method here at issue; indeed, it
does not mention specific state enforcement methods at
all.
Maine’s inability to find
significant support for some kind of “public health” exception is
not surprising. “Public health” does not define itself. Many
products create “public health” risks of differing kind and degree.
To accept Maine’s justification in respect to a rule regulating
services would legitimate rules regulating routes or rates for
similar public health reasons. And to allow Maine directly to
regulate carrier services would permit other States to do the same.
Given the number of States through which carriers
travel, the number of products, the variety of potential adverse
public health effects, the many different kinds of regulatory rules
potentially available, and the difficulty of finding a legal
criterion for separating permissible from impermissible
public-health-oriented regulations, Congress is unlikely to have
intended an implicit general “public health” exception broad enough
to cover even the shipments at issue here.
This is not to
say that this federal law generally pre-empts state public health
regulation: for instance, state regulation that broadly prohibits
certain forms of conduct and affects, say, truckdrivers, only in
their capacity as members of the public (e.g., a
prohibition on smoking in certain public places). We have said that
federal law does not pre-empt state laws that affect rates, routes,
or services in “too tenuous, remote, or peripheral a manner.”
Morales, 504 U. S., at 390 (internal quotation marks
omitted). And we have written that the state laws whose “effect” is
“forbidden” under federal law are those with a
“significant impact” on carrier rates, routes, or
services. Id., at 388, 390 (emphasis
added).
In this case,
the state law is not general, it does not affect truckers solely in
their capacity as members of the general public, the impact is
significant, and the connection with trucking is not tenuous,
remote, or peripheral. The state statutes aim directly at the
carriage of goods, a commercial field where carriage by commercial
motor vehicles plays a major role. The state statutes require motor
carrier operators to perform certain services, thereby limiting
their ability to provide incompatible alternative services; and
they do so simply because the State seeks to enlist the motor
carrier operators as allies in its enforcement efforts. Given these
circumstances, from the perspective of pre-emption, this case is no
more “borderline” than was Morales. Id., at 390
(internal quotation marks omitted); see also Wolens, 513
U. S., at 226.
Maine adds that
it possesses legal authority to prevent any tobacco
shipments from entering into or moving within the State, and that
the broader authority must encompass the narrower authority to
regulate the manner of tobacco shipments. But even
assuming purely for argument’s sake that Maine possesses the
broader authority, its conclusion does not follow. To accept that
conclusion would permit Maine to regulate carrier routes, carrier
rates, and carrier services, all on the ground that such regulation
would not restrict carriage of the goods as seriously as would a
total ban on shipments. And it consequently would severely
undermine the effectiveness of Congress’ pre-emptive provision.
Indeed, it would create the very exception that we have just
rejected, extending that exception to all other products a State
might ban. We have explained why we do not believe Congress
intended that result. Supra, at 7–10.
Finally, Maine says that to set aside its
regulations will seriously harm its efforts to prevent cigarettes
from falling into the hands of minors. The Solicitor General denies
that this is so. He suggests that Maine, like other States, can
prohibit all persons from providing tobacco products to minors (as
it already has, see Me. Rev. Stat. Ann., Tit. 22, §1555–B(2) (Supp.
2007)); that it can ban all non-face-to-face sales of tobacco; that
it might pass other laws of general (non-carrier-specific)
applicability; and that it can, if necessary, seek appropriate
federal regulation (see, e.g., H. R. 4081, 110th
Cong., 1st Sess. (2007) (proposed bill regulating tobacco
shipment); H. R. 4128, 110th Cong., 1st Sess., §§1411–1416,
pp. 577–583 (2007) (proposed bill providing criminal penalties for
trafficking in contraband tobacco)). Regardless, given
Morales, where the Court held that federal law pre-empts
state consumer-protection laws, we find that federal law must also
pre-empt Maine’s efforts directly to regulate carrier
services.
For
these reasons, the judgment of the Court of Appeals is
affirmed.
It is so
ordered.
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