Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/20pdf/18-540_m64o.pdf
Page Number: 16

Cite as:  592 U. S. ____ (2020) 

3 

THOMAS, J., concurring 

this phrase is so broad that it is meaningless.  See New York 
State Conference of Blue Cross & Blue Shield Plans v. Trav-
elers Ins. Co., 514 U. S. 645, 655 (1995).  But many times it 
is  the  ordinary,  not  literalist,  meaning  that  is  the  better 
one.    See, e.g.,  McBoyle  v.  United  States,  283 U. S.  25,  26 
(1931)  (“vehicle”  in  the  1930s  did  not  include  aircraft  be-
cause “in everyday speech ‘vehicle’ calls up the picture of a 
thing moving on land”).  “[A] reasonable person conversant 
with  applicable  social  conventions”  would  not  understand 
“relate  to”  as  covering  any  state  law  with  a  connection  to 
employee benefit plans, no matter how remote the connec-
tion.  Manning,  What  Divides  Textualists  From  Purposiv-
ists? 106 Colum. L. Rev. 70, 77 (2006); see also California 
Div.  of  Labor  Standards  Enforcement  v.  Dillingham 
Constr., N. A., Inc., 519 U. S. 316, 336 (1997) (Scalia J., con-
curring) (interpreting “relate to” literally would lead to re-
sults “no sensible person could have intended”).  If someone, 
for instance, asserted that he is “related to Joe,” it would be 
reasonable to presume a close familial relationship.  No one 
would assume that the speaker was referencing a mutual 
tie to Adam and Eve.  So too here.  A state law needs more 
than  a  “tenuous,  remote,  or  peripheral”  connection  with 
ERISA  plans  to  trigger  the  statute.    Shaw  v.  Delta  Air 
Lines,  Inc.,  463  U. S.  85,  100,  n.  21  (1983);  cf.  Wisconsin 
Dept. of Revenue v. William Wrigley, Jr., Co., 505 U. S. 214, 
231 (1992) (“ ‘the law cares not for trifles’ ”).   

II 
  Here, the parties have not pointed to any ERISA provi-
sion that governs the same matter as Act 900.  That alone 
should resolve the case.  But the parties certainly cannot be 
faulted for not raising this argument.  Our amorphous prec-
edents  have  largely  ignored  this  step.    E.g.,  District  of 
Columbia, 506 U. S., at 129. 
  Instead,  we  have  asked  only  if  the  state  law  “ ‘relate[d] 
to’ ” ERISA plans.  Ibid.  But this has proved problematic