NOT RECOMMENDED FOR PUBLICATION

File Name: 14a0645n.06

No. 12-4366

UNITED STATES COURTS OF APPEALS

FOR THE SIXTH CIRCUIT

PEABODY COAL COMPANY,

Petitioner,

v.

DIRECTOR, OFFICE OF WORKERS’ 

COMPENSATION PROGRAMS, UNITED 

STATES DEPARTMENT OF LABOR,

and

EVA ELIZABETH HILL,

Respondents.

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ON PETITION FOR REVIEW 

OF AN ORDER OF THE

BENEFITS REVIEW BOARD, 

UNITED STATES 

DEPARTMENT OF LABOR

BEFORE: DAUGHTREY, COOK, and WHITE, Circuit Judges.

HELENE N. WHITE, Circuit Judge. Peabody Coal Company (Peabody) petitions for 

review of the Benefits Review Board’s (Board) grant of Petitioner Eva Hill’s (Hill) second claim 

for survivor benefits under the Black Lung Benefits Act (BLBA), 30 U.S.C. §§ 901–44, as 

amended by § 1556 of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA), Pub. L. No. 111–

148, § 1556, 124 Stat. 119 (2010). We deny the petition.

Hill is the widow of Arthur Hill, who passed away in May 2000 after working as a miner 

for forty-one years. Hill first filed a claim for survivor benefits on June 19, 2000. The Board 

denied her claim for failure to show that her husband died “due to” pneumoconiosis, as then 

required under the BLBA. This court denied her petition for review in 2004. 
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In 2010, Congress enacted the ACA, § 1556, which included a provision reinstating

30 U.S.C. § 932(l) of the BLBA under which the eligible survivor of a miner who was 

determined eligible for benefits at the time of his death is automatically entitled to receive 

benefits, and need not prove that the miner died “due to” pneumoconiosis. The ACA 

amendments to the BLBA apply to “claims filed . . . . after January 1, 2005, that are pending on 

or after [March 23, 2010].” Pub. L. No. 111–148, §1556(c). In January 2011, after the ACA 

amendments took effect, Hill filed a second, or “subsequent,” claim for survivor benefits; the 

claim was granted, and the Board affirmed. 

On appeal, Peabody challenges the Board’s determination that the ACA amendments to 

the BLBA apply to subsequent claims filed by survivors after the denial of a prior claim. 

Construing § 1556 to apply to survivors’ subsequent claims, Peabody argues, reopens prior final 

decisions denying benefits and thereby violates the separation of powers, res judicata principles, 

and due process. This court’s decision in Consolidation Coal Co. v. Maynes, 739 F.3d 323, 325 

(6th Cir. 2014), filed after briefing concluded, disposes of Peabody’s arguments. In

Consolidation Coal, as here, the Board had denied a survivor’s original claim for benefits on the 

ground that she could not demonstrate that her husband died “due to” pneumoconiosis. After 

enactment of the ACA, the survivor filed a subsequent claim for benefits under the reinstated

§ 932(l), which the Board granted. See id. at 326. On appeal, the coal company raised, and this 

court rejected, the same res judicata and separation-of-powers arguments Peabody raises here. 

See id. at 329 (“[T]he Board’s decision to award benefits in response to [the survivor’s]

subsequent claim did nothing to alter, undermine, disturb or overturn the Board’s prior denial of 

her 2003 claim; nor does it challenge this Court’s affirmance of that decision.”). In the instant 

case, Peabody raises the additional argument that the Board’s failure to give preclusive effect to 
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its denial of the survivor’s original claim for benefits violates due process. But our conclusion 

that the Board’s decision does not offend principles of finality disposes of that argument too. 

See RAG Am. Coal Co. v. Office of Workers’ Comp. Programs, 576 F.3d 418, 428 n.6 (7th Cir. 

2009) (dismissing a similar due-process argument, stating “RAG’s claim that the refusal to apply 

ordinary principles of finality denies it due process of law is nothing more than a variation of its 

res judicata argument which we have already addressed”). 

Accordingly, we DENY the petition for review.