Opinion ID: 2191418
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 15

Heading: III-B The Supremacy Clause Challenges.

Text: Plaintiffs contend that the regulatory scheme and purposes of the Federal Act cannot be reconciled with divergent provisions of the Maine Act listed as follows. 1-The original Section 1317(4)(C), which required that upon the discovery of erroneous information in a report, a consumer reporting agency shall notify all those who received said report within a two year period preceding the discovery. The corresponding Federal Act provision requires such notification only at the request of the consumer. 15 U.S.C. § 1681i(d). 2-Section 1315(1)(A) in the original and amended Maine Act, which places limitations on the disclosure of medical information. The Federal Act specifically excludes medical information from disclosure limitations. 3-Section 1319(2) of the Maine Act, which mandates that all investigative consumer reports be written whereas the Federal Act allows reports to be oral. 15 U.S.C. § 1681a(d), (e). 4-The omission of the Maine Act to confer the qualified immunity that the Federal Act affords to consumer reporting agencies, users, or sources of information against liability in actions in the nature of defamation, invasion of privacy, and negligence in the reporting of information. 15 U.S.C. § 1681h(e). 5-The Maine Act fails expressly to authorize limited disclosure of information to a governmental agency whereas the Federal Act contains such an express authorization. 15 U.S.C. § 1681f. Plaintiffs maintain that under the Supremacy clause of Article VI of the Constitution of the United States, the aforementioned Maine Act provisions must yield to those of the Federal Act. The Federal Act expressly provides in Section 1681t that it does not annul, alter, affect, or exempt any person subject to the provisions of this subchapter from complying with the laws of any State with respect to the collection, distribution, or use of any information on consumers, except to the extent that those laws are inconsistent with any provision of this subchapter, and then only to the extent of the inconsistency. Section 1681t thus manifests the Congressional intendment as to the scope of regulation left open to the states. The key inquiry relates to the meaning of inconsistent. The defendant Attorney General says that in view of the legislative history of Section 1681t, inconsistent should be held to mean less protective of consumers. He argues on this basis that any state regulation affording consumers a greater protection than is given by the Federal Act cannot be inconsistent regulation, no matter what may be the impact upon consumer reporting agencies of such enhanced protection to consumers. Congressional legislative history lends a degree of support to this contention. For example, Congresswoman Leonor Sullivan, who sponsored the House version of the Federal Act, HR16340, and chaired the Subcommittee on Consumer Affairs of the House Committee on Banking and Currency, suggested a concept of inconsistency as follows: State laws which are inconsistent with the Federal law would be pre-empted only to the extent of inconsistency. No state law, however, would be pre-empted unless compliance with that law would entail a violation of the Federal law. In short, state laws requiring additional duties should not be affected by the passage of this law.  166 Cong.Rec. 36573 (1970) (emphasis added) Despite this suggestion as to Congressional intendment, we must reject the Attorney General's contention. We regard as too simplistic the criterion he proposes. It would make one, albeit an important, objective of 1681t of the Federal Act-the protection of consumers-the absolutely controlling objective, denigrating all of the other objectives implicit not only in the express statement of findings in Section 1681(a) but also in other provisions of the Federal Act. Indeed, the textual concept of inconsistency in Section 1681t tends to suggest that it embodies the decisional law on the general subject of federal preemption by virtue of the supremacy clause. The case law delineation of the inconsistency giving rise to federal preemption is that the state law frustrates, or stands as an obstacle to, the accomplishment of the  full purposes and objectives of Congress. Hines v. Davidowitz, 312 U.S. 52, 67, 61 S.Ct. 399, 404, 85 L.Ed. 581 (1941) (emphasis added). See Jones v. Rath Packing Company, 430 U.S. 519, 525, 97 S.Ct. 1305, 1309, 51 L.Ed.2d 604 (1977). Furthermore, the entirety of the inconsistency phrasing in Section 1681t, to the extent that those laws are inconsistent with any provision of this subchapter, and then only to the extent of the inconsistency  (emphasis added), discloses that Congress expected that state regulation would mesh closely with the Federal Act. Thus, the determination whether state law frustrates any particular provision of the Federal Act necessitates a comparison of specific requirements not only in terms of their particular content vis-a-vis each other but also in relation to the inquiry whether the  full purposes and objectives of Congress are being thwarted. Since the sum total of purposes and objectives of the Federal Act cannot be reduced to the simple formula of absolute protection for the consumer, we cannot say that a state retains unbridled authority to expand consumer protections while frustrating other objectives of the Federal Act. See Retail Credit Co. v. Dade County, Florida, 393 F.Supp. 577 (S.D.Fla. 1975).