Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/14pdf/13-271_j4ek.pdf
Page Number: 23.0

2 

ONEOK, INC. v. LEARJET, INC. 

SCALIA, J., dissenting 

§717  et  seq.  But  it  does  not  empower  the  Commission  to
regulate  the  opening  and  closing  phases—production  at 
one  end,  retail  sales  at  the  other—thus  leaving  those 
matters to the States.  §717(b).  (Like the Court, I will for 
simplicity’s  sake  call  the  sales  controlled  by  the  Commis-
sion wholesale sales, and the companies controlled by the
Commission pipelines.  See ante, at 4.)

Over  70  years  ago,  the  Court  concluded  that  the  Act
confers “exclusive jurisdiction upon the federal regulatory
agency.”  Public Util. Comm’n of Ohio v. United Fuel Gas 
Co.,  317  U. S.  456,  469  (1943).  The  Court  thought  it
“clear”  that  the  Act  contemplates  “a  harmonious,  dual
system  of  regulation  of  the  natural  gas  industry—federal
and  state  regulatory  bodies  operating  side  by  side,  each 
active  in  its  own  sphere,”  “without  any  confusion  of  func-
tions.”  Id., at 467.  The Court drew this inference from the 
law’s  purpose  and  legislative  history,  though  it  could  just 
as  easily  have  relied  on  the  law’s  terms  and  structure. 
The  Act  grants  the  Commission  a  wide  range  of  powers 
over wholesale sales and transportation, but qualifies only 
some of these powers  with reservations of state authority
over the same subject.  See §717g(a) (concurrent authority 
over  recordkeeping);  §717h(a)  (concurrent  authority  over
depreciation and amortization rates).  Congress’s decision
to  include  express  reservations  of  state  power  alongside 
these grants of authority, but to omit them alongside other 
grants  of  authority,  suggests  that  the  other  grants  are 
exclusive.  Right  or  wrong,  in  any  event,  our  inference  of
exclusivity is now settled beyond debate. 

United  Fuel  rejected  a  State’s  regulation  of  wholesale 
rates.  Id.,  at  468.    But  our  later  holdings  establish  that 
the  Act  makes  exclusive  the  Commission’s  powers  in
general,  not  just  its  rate-setting  power  in  particular.    We 
have  again  and  again  set  aside  state  laws—even  those 
that do not purport to fix wholesale rates—for regulating a 
matter  already  subject  to  regulation  by  the  Commission.