Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/18pdf/18-481_5426.pdf
Page Number: 12.0

Cite as:  588 U. S. ____ (2019) 

9 

Opinion of the Court 

like this one, where the witness statements do not comport 
with  official  committee  reports  that  are  consistent  with 
the  plain  and  ordinary  meaning  of  the  statute’s  terms.
See  S. Rep.  No.  813,  89th  Cong.,  1st  Sess.,  9  (1965)  (Ex-
emption  4  protects  information  “which  would  customarily 
not  be  released  to  the  public  by  the  person  from  whom  it 
was  obtained”  such  as  “business  sales  statistics”  and 
“customer  lists”);  H. R.  Rep.  No.  1497,  89th  Cong.,  2d 
Sess.,  10  (1966)  (Exemption  4  exempts  material  “if  it 
would not customarily be made public by the person from
whom  it  was  obtained  by  the  Government”  and  “infor-
mation which is given to an agency in confidence” such as
“business sales statistics”). 
  Unsurprisingly, National Parks has drawn considerable 
criticism  over  the  years.    See,  e.g.,  Critical  Mass  Energy 
Project  v.  NRC,  931  F. 2d  939,  947  (CADC  1991)  (Ran-
dolph, J., concurring) (National Parks was “ ‘fabricated . . . 
out  of  whole  cloth’ ”);  New  Hampshire  Right  to  Life  v. 
Department  of  Health  and  Human  Servs.,  577  U. S.  ___ 
(2015)  (THOMAS,  J.,  joined  by  Scalia,  J.,  dissenting  from
denial of certiorari).  Even the D. C. Circuit has distanced 
itself  from  the  decision.    While  retaining  National  Parks 
principally  as  a  matter  of  stare  decisis  in  the  context  of 
information  a  private  entity  is  required  to  provide  to  the
government, the court has pointedly declined to extend the 
National Parks test to information provided voluntarily to 
the government under Exemption 4.  There, the court has 
adhered  to  a  much  more  traditional  understanding  of  the
statutory  term  “confidential,”  holding  that  information 
qualifies  as  confidential  “if  it  is  of  a  kind  that  would  cus-
tomarily  not  be  released  to  the  public  by  the  person  from 
whom  it  was  obtained.”    Critical  Mass  Energy  Project  v. 
NRC, 975 F. 2d 871, 879–880 (CADC 1992) (en banc); see 
also  id.,  at  880–882  (Randolph,  J.,  concurring).    Nor,  un-
bound  by  D. C.  Circuit  precedent,  can  we  discern  a  per-
suasive reason to afford the same statutory term two such