Source: https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/501/597/
Timestamp: 2019-04-21 06:16:05+00:00

Document:
The Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (FIFRA or Act), 7 U.S.C. § 136 et seq., was primarily a pesticide licensing and labeling law until 1972, when it was transformed by Congress into a comprehensive regulatory statute. Among other things, the 1972 amendments significantly strengthened the preexisting registration and labeling standards, specified that FIFRA regulates pesticide use, as well as sales and labeling, and granted increased enforcement authority to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). Regarding state and local authorities, FIFRA, as amended, includes provisions requiring pesticide manufacturers to produce records for inspection "upon request of any officer or employee . . . of any State or political subdivision," § 136f(b); directing the EPA to cooperate with "any appropriate agency of any state or any political subdivision thereof . . . in securing uniformity of regulations," § 136t(b); and specifying that "[a] State" may regulate pesticide sale or use so long as such regulation does not permit a sale or use prohibited by the Act, § 136v(a). Pursuant to its statutory police power, petitioner town adopted an ordinance that, inter alia, requires a permit for certain applications of pesticides to private lands. After the town issued a decision unfavorable to respondent Mortier on his application for a permit to spray a portion of his land, he brought a declaratory judgment action in county court, claiming, among other things, that the ordinance was preempted by FIFRA. The court granted summary judgment for Mortier, and the Wisconsin Supreme Court affirmed, finding preemption on the ground that the Act's text and legislative history demonstrate a clearly manifest congressional intent to prohibit any regulation of pesticides by local governmental units.
Held: FIFRA does not preempt local governmental regulation of pesticide use. Pp. 501 U. S. 604-616.
assumed to preclude enforcement of state laws on the same subject. Even where Congress has not chosen to occupy a particular field, preemption may occur to the extent that state and federal law actually conflict, as when compliance with both is a physical impossibility, or when the state law stands as an obstacle to the accomplishment of Congress' purposes and objectives. Pp. 501 U. S. 604-605.
(b) FIFRA nowhere expressly supersedes local regulation. Neither the Act's language nor the legislative history relied on by the court below, whether read together or separately, suffices to establish preemption. The fact that § 136v(a) expressly refers only to "[a] State" as having the authority to regulate pesticide use, and the Act's failure to include political subdivisions in its § 136(aa) definition of "State," are wholly inadequate to demonstrate the requisite clear and manifest congressional intent. Mere silence is insufficient in this context. Rice v. Santa Fe Elevator Corp., 331 U. S. 218, 331 U. S. 230. And the exclusion of local governments cannot be inferred from the express authorization to "State[s]," because that term is not self-limiting; political subdivisions are merely subordinate components of the very entity the statute empowers. Cf., e.g., Sailors v. Board of Education of Kent County, 387 U. S. 105, 387 U. S. 108. Indeed, the more plausible reading of the express authorization leaves the allocation of regulatory authority to the absolute discretion of the States themselves, including the options of specific redelegation or leaving local regulation of pesticides in the hands of local authorities under existing state laws. Nor is there any merit to Mortier's contention that the express references in §§ 136t(b) and 136f(b) to "political subdivision[s]" show that Congress made a clear distinction between nonregulatory authority, which may be exercised by such subdivisions, and the regulatory authority reserved to the "State[s]" in § 136v(a). Furthermore, the legislative history is, at best, ambiguous, reflecting a disagreement between the responsible congressional committees as to whether the provision that would become § 136v preempted local regulation. Pp. 501 U. S. 606-610.
comprehensive statute that occupied the entire pesticide regulation field, and that certain provisions, including § 136v(a), reopened certain portions of the field to the States, but not to political subdivisions, is unpersuasive. Section 136v itself undercuts any inference of field preemption, since § 136v(b) prohibits States from enacting or imposing labeling or packaging requirements that conflict with those required under FIFRA. This language would be pure surplusage if Congress had already occupied the entire field. Nor does FIFRA otherwise imply preemption. While the 1972 amendments turned the Act into a comprehensive regulatory statute, substantial portions of the field are still left vacant, including the area at issue in this case. FIFRA nowhere seeks to establish an affirmative permit scheme for the actual use of pesticides or to occupy the field of local use permitting. Thus, the specific grant of authority in § 136v(a) must be read not as an exclusion of municipalities, but as an act ensuring that the States could continue to regulate use and sales even where, such as with regard to the banning of mislabeled products, a narrow preemptive overlap might occur. Pp. 501 U. S. 611-614.
(d) There is no actual conflict either between FIFRA or the ordinance at issue or between the Act and local regulation generally. Compliance with both the ordinance and FIFRA is not a physical impossibility. Moreover, Mortier's assertions that the ordinance stands as an obstacle to the Act's goals of promoting pesticide regulation that is coordinated solely at the federal and state levels, that rests upon some degree of technical expertise, and that does not unduly burden interstate commerce are based on little more than snippets of legislative history and policy speculations, and are unpersuasive. As is evidenced by § 136t(b), FIFRA implies a regulatory partnership between federal, state, and local governments. There is no indication that any coordination which the statute seeks to promote extends beyond the matters with which it expressly deals, or does so strongly enough to compel the conclusion that an independently enacted ordinance that falls outside the statute's reach frustrates its purpose. Nor is there any indication in FIFRA that Congress felt that local ordinances necessarily rest on insufficient expertise and burden commerce. Pp. 501 U. S. 614-616.
154 Wis.2d 18, 452 N.W.2d 555 (1990), reversed and remanded.
WHITE, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which REHNQUIST, C.J., and MARSHALL, BLACKMUN, STEVENS, O'CONNOR, KENNEDY, and SOUTER, JJ., joined. SCALIA, J., filed an opinion concurring in the judgment, post, p. 501 U. S. 616.
This case requires us to consider whether the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act, (FIFRA), 61 Stat. 163, as amended, 7 U.S.C. § 136 et seq. preempts the regulation of pesticides by local governments. We hold that it does not.
"regulated the use, as well as the sale and labeling, of pesticides; regulated pesticides produced and sold in both intrastate and interstate commerce; [and] provided for review, cancellation, and suspension of registration."
Ruckleshaus, supra, at 467 U. S. 991-992. An additional change was the grant of increased enforcement authority to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), which had been charged with federal oversight of pesticides since 1970. See Reorganization Plan No. 3 of 1970, 35 Fed.Reg. 15623 (1970), 5 U.S.C.App. p. 1343. In this fashion, the 1972 amendments "transformed FIFRA from a labeling law into a comprehensive regulatory statute." 467 U.S. at 467 U. S. 991.
"upon request of any officer or employee of the Environmental Protection Agency or of any State or political subdivision, duly designated by the Administrator."
FIFRA further directs the EPA Administrator to cooperate with "any appropriate agency of any State or any political subdivision thereof." § 136t(b). Of particular relevance to this case, § 24(a) specifies that States may regulate the sale or use of pesticides so long as the state regulation does not permit a sale or use prohibited by the Act. § 136v(a).
"deny the permit, grant the permit, or grant the permit with . . . any reasonable conditions on a permitted application related to the protection of the health, safety and welfare of the residents of the Town of Casey."
§ 1.3(3), id. at 11-12. After an initial decision, the applicant or any town resident may obtain a hearing to provide additional information regarding the proposed application. §§ 1.3(4), (5), id. at 12-14. When a permit is granted, or granted with conditions, the ordinance further requires the permittee to post placards giving notice of the pesticide use and of any label information prescribing a safe reentry time. § 1.3(7), id. at 14-16. Persons found guilty of violating the ordinance are subject to fines of up to $5,000 for each violation. § 1.3(7)(c), id. at 16.
ordinance was preempted both by FIFRA and by state statute, §§ 94.67-94.71; 2 App. to Pet. for Cert. 14.
The Supreme Court of Wisconsin affirmed in a 4-to-3 decision. Mortier v. Casey, 154 Wis.2d 18, 452 N.W.2d 555 (1990). Declining to address the issue of state law preemption, the court concluded that FIFRA preempted the town of Casey's ordinance because the statute's text and legislative history demonstrated a clearly manifest congressional intent to prohibit "any regulation of pesticides by local units of government." Id. at 20, n. 2, and 30, 452 N.W.2d at 555, n. 2, 560. The court's decision accorded with the judgments of two Federal Courts of Appeals. Professional Lawn Care Association v. Milford, 909 F.2d 929 (CA6 1990); Maryland Pest Control Association v. Montgomery County, 822 F.2d 55 (CA4 1987), summarily aff'g 646 F.Supp. 109 (D.Md.1986). Two separate dissents concluded that neither FIFRA's language nor its legislative history expressed an intent to preempt local regulation. Casey, supra, 154 Wis.2d at 33, 452 N.W.2d at 561 (Abrahamson, J., dissenting); 154 Wis.2d at 45, 452 N.W.2d at 566 (Steinmetz, J. dissenting). The dissenters' conclusion in part relied on decisions reached by two State Supreme Courts. Central Maine Power Co. v. Lebanon, 571 A.2d 1189 (Me.1990); People ex rel. Deukmejian v. County of Mendocino, 36 Cal.3d 476, 204 Cal.Rptr. 897, 683 P.2d 1150 (1984). Given the importance of the issue and the conflict of authority, we granted certiorari. 498 U.S. 1045 (1991). We now reverse.
"the Act of Congress . . . touch[es] a field in which the federal interest is so dominant that the federal system will be assumed to preclude enforcement of state laws on the same subject,"
Rice, supra, 331 U.S. at 331 U. S. 230.
Even when Congress has not chosen to occupy a particular field, preemption may occur to the extent that state and federal law actually conflict. Such a conflict arises when "compliance with both federal and state regulations is a physical impossibility," Florida Lime & Avocado Growers, Inc. v. Paul, 373 U. S. 132, 373 U. S. 142-143 (1963), or when a state law "stands as an obstacle to the accomplishment and execution of the full purposes and objectives of Congress," Hines v. Davidowitz, 312 U. S. 52 (1941).
It is, finally, axiomatic that, "for the purposes of the Supremacy Clause, the constitutionality of local ordinances is analyzed in the same way as that of statewide laws." Hillsborough v. Automated Medical Laboratories, Inc., 471 U. S. 707, 471 U. S. 713 (1985). See, e.g., City of Burbank v. Lockheed Air Terminal, Inc., 411 U. S. 624 (1973).
Applying these principles, we conclude that FIFRA does not preempt the town's ordinance either explicitly, implicitly, or by virtue of an actual conflict.
"(a) . . . A State may regulate the sale or use of any federally registered pesticide or device in the State, but only if and to the extent the regulation does not permit any sale or use prohibited by this subchapter."
"(b) . . . Such State shall not impose or continue in effect any requirements for labeling or packaging in addition to or different from those required under this subchapter."
"a State, the District of Columbia, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, Guam, the Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands, and American Samoa."
"that the statutory language [§§ 136v and 136(aa)] alone evince[d] congress' manifest intent to deprive political subdivisions of authority to regulate pesticides."
rested on both §§ 136v and 136(aa) and their legislative history; neither the language nor the legislative history would have sufficed alone. There was no suggestion that, absent the two critical sections, FIFRA was a sufficiently comprehensive statute to justify an inference that Congress had occupied the field to the exclusion of the States. Nor have the respondents argued in this Court to that effect. On the other hand, it is sufficiently clear that, under the opinion announced by the court below, the State would have been precluded from permitting local authorities to regulate pesticides.
We agree that neither the language of the statute nor its legislative history, standing alone, would suffice to preempt local regulation. But it is also our view that, even when considered together, the language and the legislative materials relied on below are insufficient to demonstrate the necessary congressional intent to preempt. As for the statutory language, it is wholly inadequate to convey an express preemptive intent on its own. Section 136v plainly authorizes the "States" to regulate pesticides, and just as plainly is silent with reference to local governments. Mere silence, in this context, cannot suffice to establish a "clear and manifest purpose" to preempt local authority. Rice, 331 U.S. at 331 U. S. 230. Even if FIFRA's express grant of regulatory authority to the States could not be read as applying to municipalities, it would not follow that municipalities were left with no regulatory authority. Rather, it would mean that localities could not claim the regulatory authority explicitly conferred upon the States that might otherwise have been preempted through actual conflicts with Federal law. At a minimum, localities would still be free to regulate subject to the usual principles of preemption.
entrusted to them' . . . in [its] absolute discretion.""
Sailors v. Board of Education of Kent County, 387 U. S. 105, 387 U. S. 108 (1967), quoting Reynolds v. Sims, 377 U. S. 533, 377 U. S. 575 (1964), quoting Hunter v. City of Pittsburgh, 207 U. S. 161, 207 U. S. 178 (1907). The exclusion of political subdivisions cannot be inferred from the express authorization to the "State[s]," because political subdivisions are components of the very entity the statute empowers. Indeed, the more plausible reading of FIFRA's authorization to the States leaves the allocation of regulatory authority to the "absolute discretion" of the States themselves, including the option of leaving local regulation of pesticides in the hands of local authorities.
Certainly no other textual basis for preemption exists. Mortier, building upon the decision below, contends that other provisions show that Congress made a clear distinction between nonregulatory authority, which it delegated to the States or their political subdivisions, and regulatory authority, which it expressly delegated to the "State[s]" alone. The provisions on which he relies, however, undercut his contention. Section 136t(b), for example, mandates that the EPA Administrator cooperate with "any appropriate agency of any State or any political subdivision thereof, in carrying out the provisions of this subchapter." As an initial matter, the section does not limit "the provisions of the subchapter" which localities are authorized to carry out to "nonregulatory" provisions. Moreover, to read this provision as preempting localities would also require the anomalous result of preempting the actions of any agency to the extent it exercised state-delegated powers that included pesticide regulation. Likewise, § 136f(b) requires manufacturers to produce records for the inspection upon the request of any employee of the EPA "or of any State or political subdivision, duly designated by the Administrator." Section 136u(a)(1), however, authorizes the Administrator to "delegate to any State . . . the authority to cooperate in the enforcement of this [Act] through the use of its personnel." If the use of "State"
in FIFRA impliedly excludes subdivisions, it is unclear why the one provision would allow the designation of local officials for enforcement purposes, while the other would prohibit local enforcement authority altogether.
"rejected a proposal which would have permitted political subdivisions to further regulate pesticides on the grounds that the 50 States and the Federal Government should provide an adequate number of regulatory jurisdictions."
"considered the decision of the House Committee to deprive political subdivisions of States and other local authorities of any authority or jurisdiction over pesticides, and concurs with the decision of the House of Representatives."
S.Rep. No. 92-838, p. 16 (1972), U.S.Code Cong. & Admin.News 1972, pp. 3993, 4008.
pesticides in any manner. Many local governments now regulate pesticides to meet their own specific needs, which they are often better able to perceive than are State and Federal regulators."
S.Rep. No. 92-970, p. 27 (1972), U.S.Code Cong. & Admin.News 1972, p. 4111. To counter the language in the Agriculture and Forestry Committee Report, the Commerce Committee proposed an amendment expressly authorizing local regulation among numerous other, unrelated proposals. This amendment was rejected after negotiations between the two Committees. See 118 Cong.Rec. 32251 (1972); H.R.Conf. Rep. No. 92-1540, p. 33 (1972), U.S.Code Cong. & Admin.News 1972, p. 3993.
over pesticide regulation impliedly. In particular, we reject the position of some courts, but not the court below, that the 1972 amendments transformed FIFRA into a comprehensive statute that occupied the field of pesticide regulation, and that certain provisions opened specific portions of the field to state regulation and much smaller portions to local regulation. See Professional Lawn Care, 909 F.2d at 933-934; Maryland Pest Control, 646 F.Supp. at 110-111; see also, Brief for National Pest Control Association et al. as Amici Curiae 6-16; Brief for Washington Legal Foundation as Amicus Curiae 18. On this assumption, it has been argued, § 136v(a) could be viewed as opening the field of general pesticide regulation to the States, yet leaving it closed to political subdivisions.
This reasoning is unpersuasive. As an initial matter, it would still have to be shown under ordinary canons of construction that FIFRA's delegation of authority to "State[s]" would not therefore allow the States in turn to redelegate some of this authority to their political subdivisions, either specifically or by leaving undisturbed their existing statutes that would otherwise provide local government with ample authority to regulate. We have already noted that § 136v(a) can be plausibly read to contemplate precisely such redelegation. The term "State" is not self-limiting, since political subdivisions are merely subordinate components of the whole. The scattered mention of political subdivisions elsewhere in FIFRA does not require their exclusion here. The legislative history is complex and ambiguous.
More importantly, field preemption cannot be inferred. In the first place, § 136v itself undercuts such an inference.
"[s]uch State shall not impose or continue in effect any requirements for labeling and packaging in addition to or different from those required under"
FIFRA. 7 U.S.C. § 136v(b). This language would be pure surplusage if Congress had intended to occupy the entire field of pesticide regulation. Taking such preemption as the premise, § 136v(a) would thus grant States the authority to regulate the "sale or use" of pesticides, while § 136v(b) would superfluously add that States did not have the authority to regulate "labeling or packaging," an addition that would have been doubly superfluous, given FIFRA's historic focus on labeling to begin with. See Monsanto, 467 U.S. at 467 U. S. 991.
and labeling requirements with a general approval to apply pesticides throughout the Nation without regard to regional and local factors like climate, population, geography, and water supply. Whatever else FIFRA may supplant, it does not occupy the field of pesticide regulation in general or the area of local use permitting in particular.
"'only by federal permission, subject to federal inspection, in the hands of federally certified personnel and under an intricate system of federal commands.'"
City of Burbank v. Lockheed Air Terminal, 411 U.S. at 411 U. S. 634, quoting Northwest Airlines v. Minnesota, 322 U. S. 292, 322 U. S. 303 (1944) (Jackson, J., concurring). The specific grant of authority in § 136v(a) consequently does not serve to hand back to the States powers that the statute had impliedly usurped. Rather, it acts to ensure that the States could continue to regulate use and sales even where, such as with regard to the banning of mislabeled products, a narrow preemptive overlap might occur. As noted in our discussion of express preemption, it is doubtful that Congress intended to exclude localities from the scope of § 136v(a)'s authorization, but however this may be, the type of local regulation at issue here would not fall within any impliedly preempted field.
unduly burden interstate commerce. Each one of these assertions rests on little more than snippets of legislative history and policy speculations. None of them is convincing.
"shall cooperate with . . . any appropriate agency of any State or any political subdivision thereof, in carrying out the provisions of this [Act] and in securing uniformity of regulations."
Nor does FIFRA suggest that any goal of coordination precludes local use ordinances because they were enacted independent of specific state or federal oversight. As we have also made plain, local use permit regulations -- unlike labeling or certification -- do not fall within an area that FIFRA's "program" preempts, or even plainly addresses. There is no indication that any coordination which the statute seeks to promote extends beyond the matters with which it deals, or does so strongly enough to compel the conclusion that an independently enacted ordinance that falls outside the statute's reach frustrates its purpose.
expertise or maintaining unfettered interstate commerce. Once more, isolated passages of legislative history that were themselves insufficient to establish a preemptive congressional intent do not by themselves establish legislative goals with preemptive effect. See, e.g., S.Rep. No. 92-838, at 16, U.S.Code Cong. & Admin.News 1972, p. 4007. Mortier nonetheless asserts that local ordinances necessarily rest on insufficient expertise and burden commerce by allowing, among other things, large-scale crop infestation. As with the specter of the gypsy moth, Congress is free to find that local regulation does wreak such havoc and enact legislation with the purpose of preventing it. We are satisfied, however, that Congress has not done so yet.
We hold that FIFRA does not preempt the town of Casey's ordinance regulating the use of pesticides. The judgment of the Wisconsin Supreme Court is reversed, and the case is remanded for proceedings not inconsistent with this opinion.
The town has a population of from 400 to 500 persons, large enough to enact the ordinance at issue in this case. See Washburn County Directory 1982-83, Brief for Respondents 4, n. 4; Tr. Oral Arg. 12.
"Except as otherwise provided by law, the village board shall have the management and control of the village property, finances, highways, streets, navigable waters, and the public service, and shall have power to act for the government and good order of the village, for its commercial benefit and for the health, safety, welfare, and convenience of the public, and may carry its powers into effect by license, regulation, suppression, borrowing, taxation, special assessment, appropriation, fine, imprisonment, and other necessary or convenient means. The powers hereby conferred shall be in addition to all other grants and shall be limited only by express language."
"For the purpose of giving to villages the largest measure of self-government in accordance with the spirit of article XI, section 3, of the [Wisconsin] constitution it is hereby declared that this chapter shall be liberally construed in favor of the rights, powers and privileges of villages to promote the general welfare, peace, good order and prosperity of such villages and the inhabitants thereof."
The coalition is an unincorporated, nonprofit association of individual businesses and other associations whose members use pesticides.
JUSTICE SCALIA's foray into legislative history runs into several problems. For one, his concurrence argues that the House Agriculture Committee made it clear that it wanted localities "out of the picture," because its report specifies as grounds for rejecting a proposal permitting the localities to regulate pesticides the observation that the Federal Government and the 50 States provided an adequate number of regulatory jurisdictions. Post at 501 U. S. 617. But the only way to infer that the Committee opposed not only a direct grant of regulatory authority upon localities but also state delegation of authority to regulate would be to suppose that the term "regulatory jurisdictions" meant regulatory for the purposes of exercising any authority at all as opposed to exercising authority derived from a direct Federal grant. H.R.Rep. No. 92-511, p. 16 (1971). The language of the Report does not answer this question one way or another.
The concurrence further contends that the Senate Agriculture Committee unequivocally expressed its view that § 136v should be read to deprive localities of regulatory authority over pesticides. This may be true, but it is hardly dispositive. Even if § 136v were sufficiently ambiguous to justify reliance on legislative history, the meaning a committee puts forward must, at a minimum, be within the realm of meanings that the provision, fairly read, could bear. Here the Report clearly states that § 136v should be read as a prohibition, but it is just as clear that the provision is written exclusively in terms of a grant. No matter how clearly its report purports to do so, a committee of Congress cannot take language that could only cover "flies" or "mosquitoes" and tell the courts that it really covers "ducks."
"while the Agriculture Committee bill does not specifically prohibit local governments from regulating, the report of that committee states explicitly that local governments cannot regulate in any matter."
S.Rep. No. 90-970, p. 27 (1972) U.S.Code Cong. & Admin.News 1972, p. 4111 (emphasis added). The Commerce Committee, indeed, went on to assert its policy differences with its Agriculture counterpart. It did this by attempting to strike at the root of the problem through changing the language of the provision itself. Far from showing agreement with its rival, the Commerce Committee's words and actions show a body that first, conceded no ground on the meaning of the disputed language and then second, raised the stakes by seeking to insure that the language could go only its way. On both the existence and the desirability of a prohibition on local regulation, there can be no doubt that the Commerce and Agriculture Committees stood on the opposite sides of the Senate debate.
As for the propriety of using legislative history at all, common sense suggests that inquiry benefits from reviewing additional information, rather than ignoring it. As Chief Justice Marshall put it, "[w]here the mind labours to discover the design of the legislature, it seizes everything from which aid can be derived." Fisher v. Blight, 2 Cranch 358, 6 U. S. 386 (1805). Legislative history materials are not generally so misleading that jurists should never employ them in a good faith effort to discern legislative intent. Our precedents demonstrate that the Court's practice of utilizing legislative history reaches well into its past. See, e.g., 31 U. S. Parker, 6 Pet. 680, 31 U. S. 687-690 (1832). We suspect that the practice will likewise reach well into the future.
I agree with the Court that FIFRA does not preempt local regulation, because I agree that the terms of the statute do not alone manifest a preemption of the entire field of pesticide regulation. Ante at 501 U. S. 611-614. If there were field preemption, 7 U.S.C. § 136v would be understood not as restricting certain types of state regulation (for which purpose, it makes little sense to restrict States, but not their subdivisions), but as authorizing certain types of state regulation (for which purpose, it makes eminent sense to authorize States, but not their subdivisions). But the field preemption question is certainly a close one. Congress' selective use of "State" and "State and political subdivisions thereof" would suggest the authorizing, rather than restricting, meaning of § 136v, were it not for the inconsistent usage pointed to in 501 U. S.
As the Court today recognizes, see ante at 501 U. S. 606-607, the Wisconsin Justices agreed with me on this point, and would have come out the way that I and the Court do but for the Committee Reports contained in FIFRA's legislative history. I think they were entirely right about the tenor of those reports. Their only mistake was failing to recognize how unreliable Committee Reports are -- not only as a genuine indicator of congressional intent, but as a safe predictor of judicial construction. We use them when it is convenient, and ignore them when it is not.
"The Committee rejected a proposal which would have permitted political subdivisions to further regulate pesticides on the grounds that the 50 States and the Federal Government should provide an adequate number of regulatory jurisdictions."
H.R.Rep. No. 92-511, p. 16 (1971).
Had the grounds for the rejection not been specified, it would be possible to entertain the Court's speculation, ante at 501 U. S. 609, that the Committee might have been opposing only direct conferral upon localities of authority to regulate, in contrast to state delegation of authority to regulate. But once it is specified that an excessive number of regulatory jurisdictions is the problem -- that "50 States and the Federal Government" are enough -- then it becomes clear that the Committee wanted localities out of the picture, and thought that its bill placed them there.
foregoing interpretation of the House Committee Report and clearly endorses the disposition that interpretation produces.
"[We have] considered the decision of the House Committee to deprive political subdivisions of States and other local authorities of any authority or jurisdiction over pesticides and concurs with the decision of the House of Representatives. Clearly, the fifty States and the Federal Government provide sufficient jurisdictions to properly regulate pesticides. Moreover, few, if any, local authorities whether towns, counties, villages, or municipalities have the financial wherewithal to provide necessary expert regulation comparable with that provided by the State and Federal Governments. On this basis and on the basis that permitting such regulation would be an extreme burden on interstate commerce, it is the intent that section [136v], by not providing any authority to political subdivisions and other local authorities of or in the States, should be understood as depriving such local authorities and political subdivisions of any and all jurisdiction and authority over pesticides and the regulation of pesticides."
S.Rep. No. 92-838, pp. 16-17 (1972), U.S. Code Cong. & Admin.News 1972, p. 4008 (emphasis added). Clearer committee language "directing" the courts how to interpret a statute of Congress could not be found, and if such a direction had any binding effect, the question of interpretation in this case would be no question at all.
"While the Agriculture Committee bill does not specifically prohibit local governments from regulating pesticides, the report of that committee states explicitly that local governments cannot regulate pesticides in any manner. Many local governments now regulate pesticides to meet their own specific needs, which they are often better able to perceive than are State and Federal regulators."
"the two principal committees responsible for the bill [were] in disagreement over whether it preempted pesticide regulation by political subdivisions."
"giv[e] local governments the authority to regulate the sale or use of a pesticide beyond the requirements imposed by State and Federal authorities."
Court would have it) that the two principal Senate committees disagreed about whether H.R. 10729 preempted local regulation, but that they were in complete accord that it did, and in disagreement over whether it ought to.
Commerce Committee, by asking for recommittal and proposing 15 amendments, was being a troublemaker; or because three different minorities (enough to make a majority) had each of these respective reasons. We have no way of knowing; indeed, we have no way of knowing that they had any rational motive at all.
All we know for sure is that the full Senate adopted the text that we have before us here, as did the full House, pursuant to the procedures prescribed by the Constitution; and that that text, having been transmitted to the President and approved by him, again pursuant to the procedures prescribed by the Constitution, became law. On the important question before us today, whether that law denies local communities throughout the Nation significant powers of self-protection, we should try to give the text its fair meaning, whatever various committees might have had to say -- thereby affirming the proposition that we are a Government of laws, not of committee reports. That is, at least, the way I prefer to proceed.
If I believed, however, that the meaning of a statute is to be determined by committee reports, I would have to conclude that a meaning opposite to our judgment has been commanded three times over -- not only by one committee in each house, but by two committees in one of them. Today's decision reveals that, in their judicial application, committee reports are a forensic, rather than an interpretive, device, to be invoked when they support the decision and ignored when they do not. To my mind that is infinitely better than honestly giving them dispositive effect. But it would be better still to stop confusing the Wisconsin Supreme Court, and not to use committee reports at all.
"a general acquiescence in the doctrine that debates in Congress are not appropriate sources of information from which to discover the meaning of the language of a statute passed by that body."
United States v. Trans-Missouri Freight Assn., 166 U. S. 290, 166 U. S. 318. And even as late as 1953, the practice of using legislative history in that fashion was novel enough that Justice Jackson could dismiss it as a "psychoanalysis of Congress," and a "weird endeavor." United States v. Public Utilities Comm'n, 345 U. S. 295, 345 U. S. 319 (Jackson, J., concurring). It is, in short, almost entirely a phenomenon of this century -- and in its extensive use a very recent phenomenon. See, e.g., Carro & Brann, Use of Legislative Histories by the United States Supreme Court: A Statistical Analysis, 9 J.Legis. 282 (1982); Wald, Some Observations on the Use of Legislative History in the 1981 Supreme Court Term, 68 Iowa L.Rev.195, 196-197 (1983).
I am depressed if the Court is predicting that the use of legislative history for the purpose I have criticized "will . . .
reach well into the future." But if it is, and its prediction of the future is as accurate as its perception that it is continuing a "practice . . . reach[ing] well into [our] past," I may have nothing to fear.

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