Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/13pdf/12-158_6579.pdf
Page Number: 27

Cite as:  572 U. S. ____ (2014) 

3 

SCALIA, J., concurring in judgment 

have thought.2 

The  Court  does  not  think  the  interpretive  exercise  so 
simple.  But that is only because its result-driven antitex-
tualism befogs what is evident. 

B.  The Court’s Interpretation 

The  Court’s  account  of  the  clear-statement  rule  reads 
like a really good lawyer’s brief for the wrong side, relying
on  cases  that  are  so  close  to  being  on  point  that  someone 
eager  to  reach  the  favored  outcome  might  swallow  them. 
The  relevance  to  this  case  of  United  States  v.  Bass,  404 
U. S. 336 (1971), and Jones v. United States, 529 U. S. 848 
(2000), is, in truth, entirely made up.  In Bass, we had to 
decide  whether  a  statute  forbidding  “ ‘receiv[ing],  pos-
sess[ing],  or  transport[ing]  in  commerce  or  affecting  com-
merce  . . .  any  firearm’ ”  prohibited  possessing  a  gun  that
lacked any connection to interstate commerce.  404 U. S., at 
337–339.  Though the Court relied in part on a federalism-
inspired  interpretive  presumption,  it  did  so  only  after  it 
had  found,  in  Part  I  of  the  opinion,  applying  traditional
interpretive  tools,  that  the  text  in  question  was  ambigu-
ous, id., at 339–347.  Adopting in Part II the narrower of 
the  two  possible  readings,  we  said  that  “unless  Congress 
conveys  its  purpose  clearly,  it  will  not  be  deemed  to  have 
significantly  changed  the  federal-state  balance.”    Id.,  at 
349  (emphasis  added).  Had  Congress  “convey[ed]  its
purpose  clearly”  by  enacting  a  clear  and  even  sweeping 
statute, the presumption would not have applied. 
—————— 

2 Petitioner offers one textual argument that the Court does not con-
sider.  She  argues  that  the  exception  for  “peaceful  purposes”  is  best
understood  as  a  term  of  art  meaning  roughly  any  purpose  that  is  not
“warlike.”    Brief  for  Petitioner  50–57.    Though  that  reading  is 
more defensible than the Court’s, the Act will not bear it.  If “peaceful”
meant  “nonwarlike,”  the  statute’s  exception  for  “any  individual  self-
defense device, including . . . pepper spray or chemical mace,” §229C—
the  prosaic  uses  of  which  are  surely  nonwarlike—would  have  been 
unnecessary.