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GEIER v. AMERICAN HONDA MOTOR CO.

Opinion of the Court

has thus refused to read general “saving” provisions to toler-
ate actual conﬂict both in cases involving impossibility, see,
e. g., AT&T, 524 U. S., at 228, and in “frustration-of-purpose”
cases, see, e. g., Locke, ante, at 103–112; International Paper
Co. v. Ouellette, 479 U. S. 481, 493–494 (1987); see also Chi-
cago & North Western Transp. Co. v. Kalo Brick & Tile Co.,
450 U. S. 311, 328–331 (1981). We see no grounds, then,
for attempting to distinguish among types of federal-state
conﬂict for purposes of analyzing whether such a conﬂict
warrants pre-emption in a particular case. That kind of
analysis, moreover, would engender legal uncertainty with
its inevitable systemwide costs (e. g., conﬂicts, delay, and
expense) as courts tried sensibly to distinguish among varie-
ties of “conﬂict” (which often shade, one into the other)
when applying this complicated rule to the many federal
statutes that contain some form of an express pre-emption
provision, a saving provision, or as here, both. Nothing in
the statute suggests Congress wanted to complicate ordinary
experience-proved principles of conﬂict pre-emption with an
added “special burden.”
Indeed, the dissent’s willingness to
impose a “special burden” here stems ultimately from its
view that “frustration-of-purpos[e]” conﬂict pre-emption is a
freewheeling, “inadequately considered” doctrine that might
well be “eliminate[d].” Post, at 907–908, and n. 22.
In a
word, ordinary pre-emption principles, grounded in long-
standing precedent, Hines, supra, at 67, apply. We would
not further complicate the law with complex new doctrine.

IV

The basic question, then, is whether a common-law “no
airbag” action like the one before us actually conﬂicts with
FMVSS 208. We hold that it does.

In petitioners’ and the dissent’s view, FMVSS 208 sets a
minimum airbag standard. As far as FMVSS 208 is con-
cerned, the more airbags, and the sooner, the better. But
that was not the Secretary’s view. The Department of