Court Opinion

ID: 9646121
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 12:49:35.24632+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:11:34.463953
License: Public Domain

RAKER, Judge,
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent. I would affirm the judgment of the Circuit Court for Baltimore City on the grounds set forth by the trial judge, namely, that all of the plaintiffs claims are preempted by federal law.
On the question of whether this action is exempt from federal preemption, the Circuit Court stated the following:
“This court is convinced that to permit [appellants] to thwart the admitted preemption of the relevant law solely because of a general reference to Maryland law, flies in the face of common sense and contract interpretation. When the parties mentioned Subtitle 9 of the Maryland Code and ‘applicable federal law1 as governing law, they did not incorporate the protections of a Maryland regulatory scheme into the agreement. Had they meant to do that, they could have done so in clear-cut terms. As the Chaires case makes clear, they could not waive federal preemption and could only have intended that state law apply as ‘governing law5 should ‘federal law5 not apply. There is no basis for claiming that they entered into a private agreement incorporating a complex and detailed state regulatory scheme.”
The Circuit Court got it right. See Chaires v. Chevy Chase Bank, 131 Md.App. 64, 748 A.2d 34 (2000); Fidelity Fed. Sav. & Loan Ass’n v. de la Cuesta, 458 U.S. 141, 102 S.Ct. 3014, 73 L.Ed.2d 664 (1982).