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

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

3 

Opinion of BREYER, J. 

long,  onerous  court  proceedings  concerning  issues  far 
removed from the genuine fear of harm that leads firms to
keep  information  secret  in  the  first  place.  The  National 
Parks decision itself led to a remand for days of hearings, 
a  second  appeal,  and  yet  another  remand,  so  that  more 
evidence  about  the  competitive  conditions  facing  two 
particular  park  concessionaires  could  be  heard.    National 
Parks  and  Conservation  Assn.  v.  Kleppe,  547  F. 2d  673, 
675 (CADC 1976).  Like the majority, I can find nothing in
FOIA’s  language,  purposes,  or  history  that  imposes  so 
stringent a requirement.  Accordingly, I would clarify that
a  private  harm  need  not  be  “substantial”  so  long  as  it  is 
genuine.

On  the  other  hand,  I  cannot  agree  with  the  majority’s
decision  to  jump  to  the  opposite  conclusion,  namely,  that
Exemption 4 imposes no “harm” requirement whatsoever.
After all, the word “confidential” sometimes refers, at least 
in the national security context, to information the disclo-
sure  of  which  would  cause  harm.  See,  e.g.,  Webster’s 
Third  New  International  Dictionary  476  (1966)  (defining 
“confidential”  to  mean  “characterized  by  or  relating  to 
information  considered  prejudicial  to  a  country’s  inter-
ests”);  Webster’s  New  Collegiate  Dictionary  237  (1974) 
(defining  “confidential”  to  mean  “containing  information 
whose  unauthorized  disclosure  could  be  prejudicial  to  the
national interest”).  And a speaker can more sensibly refer
to  his  Social  Security  number  as  “confidential”  than  his 
favorite color, in part because release of the former is more 
likely to cause harm.  “Confidential,” in this sense, conveys
something  about  the  nature  of  the  information  itself,  not 
just (as the majority suggests) how it is kept by those who
possess it.

Reading  “confidential”  in  this  more  restrictive  sense  is
more  faithful  to  FOIA’s  purpose  and  how  we  have  inter-
preted the Act in the past.  This Court has made clear that 
the  “mandate  of  the  FOIA”  is  “broad  disclosure  of  Gov-