Argument of Speaker
Mr. Speaker: The opinion of the Court in No. 98-1811, Geier versus American Honda Motor Company will be announced by Justice Breyer.
Argument of Justice Breyer
Mr. Breyer: This case involves a tort plaintiff who was hurt while she was driving a 1987 Honda Accord equipped with seat belts which she had buckled up at the time of the accident.
She bases her claim on the theory that the car should have been equipped with airbags as well; and the legal question is whether federal law, in particular a 1984 National Highway Transportation Safety Act standard called the “Passive Restraint” standard, whether that forbids in effect the bringing of this kind of State Court tort suit.
In other words, does federal law preempt the suit?
The District Court found that it did preempt the suit; so the plaintiff couldn’t bring it.
And like other Federal Courts that have considered similar matters, the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit agreed.
But some State Courts have taken a different view, and so we agreed to hear the case to resolve the differences.
Now, it is a complicated case and we answer three separate questions: first, there is an express preemption provision in the National Highway Transportation Safety Act.
Does that express preemption provision, preempt this lawsuit?
And we read that preemption provision in light of another provision which saves certain tort suits; and read that way, we say the answer is, “No, it does not expressly preempt a suit.”
Then the second question is, well, what about that Savings Clause?
Does that Savings Clause really require the opposite?
Does it preserve in some way or other, state tort suits like this one?
Again, we say the answer is ‘No.’
What we think applies, are just ordinary preemption principles.
Alright third; using those ordinary preemption principles -- those principles by the way require, or say, state that a federal regulation will preempt a state common law tort action -- either you can’t bring it -- if that tort action actually conflicts with the regulation.
So we have to decide using that principle is there an actual conflict here?
Now, after going into the history of the regulation in some detail, we conclude that there is an actual conflict.
The regulation in our view was designed to promote safety by producing a mix of different passive restraint devices, not just airbags; and moreover, that mix was to be introduced gradually over time, and the agency had safety related and administrative reasons for doing that.
And we think that petitioner’s tort suit, which in effect, would insist upon immediate introduction and uniform introduction of airbags would stand as an obstacle to achieving that safety objective, at least as the agency understood that and embodied it in the regulation.
For these reasons which we elaborate in our opinion, we agree with the lower Federal Courts that the regulation, and therefore the Act preempts this tort suit.
Justice Stevens has filed a dissenting opinion in which Justice Souter, Justice Thomas and Justice Ginsburg joined.
