Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/boundvolumes/529bv.pdf
Page Number: 222.0

529US1

Unit: $U36

[09-26-01 08:36:38] PAGES PGT: OPIN

Cite as: 529 U. S. 120 (2000)

147

Opinion of the Court

the applicability of the Act to tobacco products. See Brief
for Petitioners 22, n. 4. Given the economic and political
signiﬁcance of the tobacco industry at the time, it is ex-
tremely unlikely that Congress could have intended to place
tobacco within the ambit of the FDCA absent any discussion
of the matter. Of course, whether the Congress that
enacted the FDCA speciﬁcally intended the Act to cover to-
bacco products is not determinative; “it is ultimately the pro-
visions of our laws rather than the principal concerns of our
legislators by which we are governed.” Oncale v. Sun-
downer Offshore Services, Inc., 523 U. S. 75, 79 (1998); see
also TVA v. Hill, 437 U. S. 153, 185 (1978) (“It is not for us
to speculate, much less act, on whether Congress would have
altered its stance had the speciﬁc events of this case been
anticipated”). Nonetheless, this intent is certainly relevant
to understanding the basis for the FDA’s representations
to Congress and the background against which Congress
enacted subsequent tobacco-speciﬁc legislation.

Moreover, before enacting the FCLAA in 1965, Congress
considered and rejected several proposals to give the FDA
In April 1963, Repre-
the authority to regulate tobacco.
sentative Udall introduced a bill “[t]o amend the Federal
Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act so as to make that Act applica-
ble to smoking products.” H. R. 5973, 88th Cong., 1st Sess.,
1. Two months later, Senator Moss introduced an identical
bill in the Senate. S. 1682, 88th Cong., 1st Sess. (1963).
In
discussing his proposal on the Senate ﬂoor, Senator Moss
explained that “this amendment simply places smoking prod-
ucts under FDA jurisdiction, along with foods, drugs, and
cosmetics.”
In December
1963, Representative Rhodes introduced another bill that
would have amended the FDCA “by striking out ‘food, drug,
device, or cosmetic, each place where it appears therein and
inserting in lieu thereof ‘food, drug, device, cosmetic, or
smoking product.’ ” H. R. 9512, 88th Cong., 1st Sess., § 3
(1963). And in January 1965, ﬁve months before passage of

109 Cong. Rec. 10322 (1963).