Opinion ID: 2191418
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 19

Heading: III-B-4 Qualified Immunity.

Text: Section 1681h(e) of the Federal Act states: no consumer may bring any action or proceeding in the nature of defamation, invasion of privacy, or negligence with respect to the reporting of information against any consumer reporting agency, any user of information, or any person who furnishes information to a consumer reporting agency, based on information disclosed pursuant to section 1681g, 1681h, or 1681m of this title, except as to false information furnished with malice or willful intent to injure such consumer. The three sections specifically referred to have the following scope. Section 1681g outlines the substantive content of the disclosure to be made to consumers; Section 1681h generally delineates the procedures by which the information is to be disclosed; and Section 1681m imposes disclosure requirements on users in particular circumstances. The disclosure provisions of the Maine Act are generally patterned after those of the Federal Act, the objective of each Act being to have full disclosure to the consumer of all information required to be disclosed. However, the Maine Act goes beyond the Federal Act in the procedures established for disclosure. Whereas the Federal Act merely requires that consumer reporting agencies disclose the nature and substance of all information, [25] 15 U.S.C. § 1681g(a)(1), the Maine Act goes further in prescribing means to ensure full disclosure, by requiring: (1) that a consumer reporting agency disclose all information [except medical information which is subject to special disclosure rules] in its files on the consumer at the time of the request, 10 M.R. S.A. § 1315(1)(A); (2) that a consumer be permitted a personal visual inspection of his file, 10 M.R.S.A. § 1316(2)(A); (3) that upon request, the consumer shall be furnished copies of any investigative consumer reports, 10 M.R.S.A. § 1316(2)(A); and (4) that a consumer may receive a copy of [his] file through the mail, after a written request with proper identification. Section 1316(2)(C). The other difference in this regard between the Maine and Federal Acts is that the Maine Act fails to confer the qualified immunity given by the Federal Act as to any action or proceeding in the nature of defamation, invasion of privacy, or negligence with respect to the reporting of information. The Maine legislature had considered amending the Maine Act to incorporate such a provision, but such an amendment was not enacted. See Legislative Record, 108th Legislature, 616-617 (March 16, 1978). We decide that, consistently with the supremacy clause of the federal Constitution, the Maine Act's withholding of the qualified immunity conferred by the Federal Act may stand. We so conclude because the Maine Act resorts to an adequate alternative methodology of achieving the basic objective the Federal Act seeks to accomplish through the mechanism of qualified immunity, and thus it is in harmony with the Federal Act. We therefore distinguish, at once, Retail Credit Co. v. Dade County, supra, on the ground that its holding rested on a virtual identity between the disclosure provisions of the Dade County Ordinance and those of the Federal Act, except that the Dade County Ordinance omitted the provision for qualified immunity. By contrast, although tending to follow the pattern of the Federal Act, the provisions of the Maine Act established requirements of disclosure to consumers not found in the Federal Act but which serve the dominant purpose furthered by the Federal Act's grant of qualified immunity. That purpose, which the Federal Act shares in common with the Maine Act, is to assure the full disclosure to consumers of all information about them that is being communicated through consumer agency reports, thereby to allow consumers not only to be aware of, but also to participate in the process of reviewing, refining, and correcting for accuracy the body of information that is so likely to underly important economic decisions affecting them. The legislative history of the Federal Act reveals that Congress regarded qualified immunity as the quid pro quo for full disclosure. 115 Cong.Rec. 13908 (November 6, 1969). To encourage agencies or users voluntarily to make the fullest possible disclosure to consumers of information on file, including all the adverse information, Congress concluded that they should be given a qualified immunity from liability in actions that may be brought against them for defamation, invasion of privacy or negligence in the reporting or use of information. The Maine Act substitutes for this federal approach geared to stimulating voluntary disclosure an approach relying on compulsion. The Maine Act goes beyond the Federal Act's directive that the consumer be given a summary of the nature and substance of the information and requires that consumers shall have complete and direct access to the files and shall receive copies of the investigative consumer reports (although sources of information may be withheld, see Section 1315(1)(B). We conclude that this alternative technique utilized by the Maine Act to achieve fullness of disclosure to consumers sufficiently serves, without thwarting in any material respect, the foundational purpose of the Federal Act's grant of qualified immunity. [26] For this reason, then, the entirety of disclosure regulation by the Maine Act, an incidental aspect of which is the omission to confer qualified immunity, is not inconsistent with the Federal Act.