Court Opinion

ID: 9490200
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 13:35:42.968575+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:53:56.842055
License: Public Domain

VAN SICKLE, District Judge,
dissenting:
Introduction
I would affirm the District Court’s denial of the defendant-appellant’s motion for partial summary judgment, and hold that as a matter of law, state tort claims are not preempted by either the Safety Act or Standard 208. I disagree with the majority’s assertion that a primary objective of the Safety Act was to create national uniformity in safety standards, particularly where, as here, it would conflict with the Act’s undisputed purpose of improving and enhancing motor vehicle safety. My analysis of the Act’s text, framework, structure and purpose lead me to conclude that it was designed to achieve improved motor vehicle safety by establishing minimum safety standards.
Analysis of the Statement of Purpose in the Text of the Safety Act
The text of the Safety Act reveals no intention of achieving uniformity, except as a method of establishing minimum safety standards. Congress was explicit about the purpose of the Safety Act. It was designed to promote vehicle safety by establishing federal standards, and the text reveals no other purpose.
15 U.S.C. § 1381 Congressional Declaration of Purpose
Congress hereby declares that the purpose of this chapter is to reduce traffic accidents and deaths and injuries to persons resulting from traffic accidents. Therefore, Congress determines that it is necessary to establish motor vehicle safety standards for motor vehicles1 and equipment in interstate commerce; to undertake and support necessary safety research and development; and to expand the national driver register.
This section (as recodified and amended in 1994) at 49 U.S.C. § 30101 entitled Purpose and Policy reads: “The purpose of this chapter is to reduce traffic accidents and deaths and injuries resulting from traffic accidents.” Congress has never chosen to list uniformity as a separate purpose, even though by 1994, the issue of pre-emption of common law “no air bag” claims had been raised numerous times.
The subsidiary goals of uniformity, and flexibility for manufacturers, revealed in the legislative history, are clearly objectives only to the extent that they support the primary goal of increasing safety. The record of the legislative history supports this interpretation:
The centralized, mass production, high volume character of the motor vehicle manufacturing industry in the United States requires that motor vehicle safety standards not only be strong and adequately enforced, but that they be uniform throughout the country____ Accordingly, State standards are preempted only if they differ from Federal standards applicable to the particular aspect of the vehicle or item of vehicle equipment. The States are also permitted to set more stringent requirements for their own procurement. Moreover, the Federal minimum safety standards need not be interpreted as restricting State common law standards of care. Compliance with such standards would thus not necessarily shield any person from product liability at common law.
S. Rep. 89-1301, 1966 WL 4351, at 12 (emphasis added).
In addition, Standard 208 states only that: “The purpose of this standard is to reduce *1417the number of deaths of vehicle occupants, and the severity of injuries, by specifying vehicle crashworthiness requirements in terms of forces and accelerations measured on anthropomorphic dummies in test crashes, and by specifying equipment requirements for active and passive restraint systems.” 49 C.F.R. § 571.208CS2) (1995). Standard 208 makes no mention of uniformity as a goal, let alone as a primary goal rivaling safety in significance, or as the only method by which safety is to be ensured. The majority cites descriptions in other circuit court decisions of the long and agonized history of Standard 208. This history is not relevant, however, in determining Congress’ statutory purpose. What, for example, a particular individual administrator may have believed or said about what sort of regulation was necessary to achieve the Safety Act’s objectives simply cannot serve to trump the clear language of the Safety Act itself.
National uniformity of motor vehicle safety standards is at most an ancillary goal, subordinate to the primary goal of improved motor vehicle safety. Indeed, Congress has chosen to articulate uniformity as a principal goal where it has been an important purpose behind a statute. See e.g., CSX Transportation, Inc. v. Easterwood, 507 U.S. 658, 662, 113 S.Ct. 1732, 1736-37, 123 L.Ed.2d 387 (1993)(quoting the provision of the Federal Railway Safety Act which elaborates on national uniformity as a goal). Appellant does not seriously contest that airbags enhance safety. It is convoluted to argue that state common law which might impose liability for failure to install airbags, and thus advance the Safety Act’s primary purpose, should be preempted to satisfy an implicit ancillary objective.
When deference to the Safety Act’s primary objective is combined with the historically strong presumption against preemption-particularly in areas of traditional state authority — such as tort law,2 and with the clear broad language of the savings clause, I cannot agree that state common law claims are preempted,
Analysis of the Savings Clause of the Safe-tyAct
The language of the savings clause of the Safety Act, given its plain meaning and examined in light of the Safety Act’s only express goal, shows Congress intended to preserve common law claims. In the face of a contentious, litigious and longstanding debate over airbags, Congress has not seen fit to revise or ‘clarify’ the language of the savings clause. Yet, the majority’s joint reading of the two clauses is that the express preemption clause eliminates all state law claims, and that the savings clause merely prevents an absolute defense of compliance with federal law. There is no reason to suppose that Congress intended to preserve only state law claims of, for example, defective manufacture or design in areas not regulated by the federal government, while eliminating all claims which touch on areas regulated by the Safety Act. If that was the intended result, why use such sweeping language? The savings clause refers simply to “the common law”3 with no restriction to a subset of that law, or to particular causes of action. Further, the Supreme Court in Medtronic, supra, — U.S. at---, 116 S.Ct. at 2249-50, held that the presumption against the preemption of state police power regulations should be applied not only to determine whether Congress intended any preemption, but also to determine the scope of any express preemption. The presumption against preemption supports a narrow interpretation of even an express preemption clause and is “consistent with both federalism concerns *1418and the historie primacy of state regulation of matters of health and safety.” Id.
Conclusion
There is not a sufficient basis to assume that Congress did not understand what it was doing when it passed the Safety Act, or that it could not express itself clearly when it did so. The preservation of common law claims and/*the allowance for states to set higher standards in their own procurement processes were to be the twin exceptions to national uniformity. To ignore the savings clause, or to impose a convoluted reading on it, is to supplant the meaning Congress intended, with a divergent meaning this court prefers. Because I cannot agree with the majority on the primacy of uniformity, and the proper interpretation of the savings clause, I must respectfully dissent.

. In fact, 15 U.S.C. § 1391(2) states: " 'Motor vehicle safety standards' means a minimum standard for motor vehicle performance, or motor vehicle equipment performance, which is practicable, which meets the need for motor vehicle safety and which provides objective criteria.” The 1994 recodification is nearly identical. 49 U.S.C. § 30102(9).

. Cipollone v. Liggett Group, Inc., 505 U.S. 504, 516, 112 S.Ct. 2608, 2617, 120 L.Ed.2d 407 (1992); Medtronic, Inc. v. Lohr, - U.S. -, ---, 116 S.Ct. 2240, 2249-50, 135 L.Ed.2d 700 (1996).

. Black's Law Dictionary defines common law:
as distinguished from statutory law created by the enactment of legislatures, the common law comprises the body of those principles and rules of action, relating to the government and security of persons and property, which derive their authority solely from usages and customs of immemorial antiquity, or from the judgments and decrees of the courts recognizing, affirming, and enforcing such usages and customs ... In general it is a body of law that develops and derives through judicial decisions, as distinguished from legislative enactments.
Blacks Law Dictionary 276 (6th ed., 1990).