Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/14pdf/13-7451_m64o.pdf
Page Number: 29.0

2 

YATES v. UNITED STATES 

KAGAN, J., dissenting 

more  conventional  result:  A  “tangible  object”  is  an  object
that’s  tangible.    I  would  apply  the  statute  that  Congress
enacted and affirm the judgment below. 

I 
While  the  plurality  starts  its  analysis  with  §1519’s
heading, see ante, at 10 (“We note first §1519’s caption”), I 
would  begin  with  §1519’s  text.  When  Congress  has  not
supplied  a  definition,  we  generally  give  a  statutory  term 
its  ordinary  meaning.  See,  e.g.,  Schindler  Elevator  Corp. 
v. United States ex rel. Kirk, 563 U. S. ___, ___ (2011) (slip 
op.,  at  5).  As  the  plurality  must  acknowledge,  the  ordi-
nary meaning of “tangible object” is “a discrete thing that
possesses  physical  form.”    Ante,  at  7  (punctuation  and
citation omitted).  A fish is, of course, a discrete thing that
possesses  physical  form.    See  generally  Dr.  Seuss,  One
Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish (1960).  So the ordinary 
meaning  of  the  term  “tangible  object”  in  §1519,  as  no
one  here  disputes,  covers  fish  (including  too-small  red 
grouper).

That  interpretation  accords  with  endless  uses  of  the 
term  in  statute  and  rule  books  as  construed  by  courts.
Dozens  of  federal  laws  and  rules  of  procedure  (and  hun-
dreds  of  state  enactments)  include  the  term  “tangible
object” or its first cousin “tangible thing”—some in associ-
ation  with  documents,  others  not.    See,  e.g.,  7  U.  S.  C. 
§8302(2) (referring to “any material or tangible object that
could  harbor  a  pest  or  disease”);  15  U. S. C.  §57b–1(c) 
investigative  demands  for  “documentary 
(authorizing 
material  or  tangible  things”);  18  U. S. C.  §668(a)(1)(D) 
(defining  “museum”  as  entity  that  owns  “tangible  objects
that  are  exhibited  to  the  public”);  28  U. S. C.  §2507(b) 
(allowing  discovery  of  “relevant  facts,  books,  papers,  doc-
uments  or  tangible  things”).1    To  my  knowledge,  no  court  

—————— 

1 From  Alabama  and  Alaska  through  Wisconsin  and  Wyoming  (and