Court Opinion

ID: 9428685
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:24:26.508507+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:23:14.682252
License: Public Domain

Justice Marshall,
with whom Justice Brennan joins,
concurring in the judgment.
I agree with the Court that the Rock Island Railroad Transition and Employee Assistance Act (RITA) violates the uniformity requirement of the Bankruptcy Clause. I write separately, however, because the Court accords a broader scope to that requirement than the Clause’s language, its history, and the Court’s cases justify. In particular, I am concerned that the Court’s rationale may unduly restrict Congress’ power to legislate with respect to the distinctive needs of a *474particular railroad or its employees. I conclude that the Clause permits such legislation if Congress finds that the application of the law to a single debtor (or limited class of debtors) serves a national interest apart from the economic interests of that debtor or class, and if the identified national interest justifies Congress’ failure to apply the law to other debtors. However, because RITA does not satisfy this more stringent test, I agree that RITA is unconstitutional.
The Court argues that the uniformity requirement forbids Congress to enact any bankruptcy law affecting a single debtor. But I do not believe that uniformity invariably requires that a bankruptcy law apply to a multiplicity of debtors. The term “uniform” does not necessarily imply either that the law must avoid specifying the debtors to which it applies or that the law must affect more than a single debtor. As we have noted in different contexts, a named individual may constitute a “legitimate class of one.” Nixon v. Administrator of General Services, 433 U. S. 425, 472 (1977) (rejecting claim that statute applying, and referring by name, only to a single former President is a bill of attainder). Cf. Morey v. Doud, 354 U. S. 457 (1957) (invalidating a statute expressly exempting the American Express Co. by name), overruled in New Orleans v. Dukes, 427 U. S. 297 (1976) (per curiam).
In reviewing the scanty history of the Clause, the Court notes that one principal purpose was to avoid conflict between state laws concerning debtor insolvency. That concern, of course, is satisfied simply by uniform interstate application of federal bankruptcy laws under the Supremacy Clause. Another purpose, according to the Court, may have been to prevent the passage of private Acts to relieve individual debtors. However, the references to private Acts contained in the debates may have been intended only as examples of the first problem, in that other States failed to give credit to such Acts. To the extent that the Framers were concerned about the passage of private Acts, the question re*475mains whether they intended to prohibit all such Acts, and thus to disable Congress from enacting legislation applying to a specified debtor but promoting more general national policies than the simple economic interests of the debtor.
Our cases do not support the Court’s view that any bankruptcy law applying to a single named debtor is unconstitutional. In the most relevant case, Regional Rail Reorganization Act Cases, 419 U. S. 102 (1974) (SR Act Cases), this Court held that the Regional Rail Reorganization Act did not violate the Uniformity Clause even though it applied only to eight railroads in a specified geographic region. The Court squarely rejected the argument that the geographic nonuni-formity of the Rail Act violated the Bankruptcy Clause. “The argument has a certain surface appeal but is without merit because it overlooks the flexibility inherent in the constitutional provision.” Id., at 158. Reviewing earlier cases, the Court emphasized Congress’ power to recognize geographic differences and “to fashion legislation to resolve geographically isolated problems.” Id., at 159. The Court also noted that no other railroad was in reorganization during the time that the Act applied. The Court concluded that the Act satisfies the uniformity requirement because it is “designed to solve ‘the evil to be remedied.’ ” Id., at 161, quoting Head Money Cases, 112 U. S. 580, 595 (1884).
The Court’s analysis in this case, too, “has a certain surface appeal.” If a law applies to one debtor, it is invalid; if it applies to more than one debtor, it is valid if it satisfies the SR Act Cases test, i. e., if it was designed to solve an identified evil. But there is nothing magical about a law that specifies only one object. I discern no principled ground for refusing to apply the same test without regard to the number of businesses regulated by the law.1
*476I would apply the SR Act Cases test in every instance. Congress may specify what debtors, or (which is often the same thing) what portion of the country, will be subject to bankruptcy legislation. The constraint of uniformity, however, requires Congress to legislate uniformly with respect to an identified “evil.” In the Regional Rail Reorganization Act, Congress imposed certain requirements on all railroads in reorganization; all were deemed to present the same “evil.” If Congress has legislated pursuant to its bankruptcy power, furthering federal bankruptcy policies, and if the specificity of the legislation is defensible in terms of those policies, then, but only then, has Congress satisfied the uniformity requirement. Where, as here, the law subjects one named debtor to special treatment, I would require especially clear findings to justify the narrowness of the law.
Although the question is close, I conclude that Congress did not justify the spécificity of RITA in terms of national policy. Rather, the legislative history indicates an attempt simply to protect employees of a single railroad from the consequences of bankruptcy. No explanation for the specificity of the law is given that would justify such narrow application. In its statutory findings, Congress stated that “uninterrupted continuation of services over Rock Island lines is dependent on adequate employee protection provisions,” and that a cessation of services would seriously affect certain state economies and the shipping public. 45 U. S. C. § 1001 (1976 ed., Supp. IV). The findings explicitly refer, however, only to the Rock Island Railroad. To be sure, in the legislative history Congress did recite more general purposes. Congressional Reports advert to the need for labor protection in “bankruptcy proceedings involving major rail carriers,” H. R. Conf. Rep. No. 96-1430, p. 139 (1980), and the need “to avoid disruption of rail service and undue displacement of employees.” H. R. Conf. Rep. No. 96-1041, p. 26 (1980). See S. Rep. No. 96-614, p. 5 (1980). But recitation of a general purpose does not justify narrow application to a *477single debtor where, as here, that purpose does not explain the nonuniform treatment of other comparable railroads that are now, or may be, in reorganization. See ante, at 470, n. 11. With respect to such railroads, reorganization will result in the same displacement of employees and disruption of service — the same “evil” — that Congress purported to address in RITA. Because Congress’ findings fail to demonstrate that the narrowness of RITA is addressed to a particular kind of problem, the law does not satisfy the uniformity requirement.
I agree with the Court that “[t]he employee protection provisions of RITA cover neither a defined class of debtors nor a particular type of problem, but a particular problem of one bankrupt railroad.” Ante, at 470-471. I do not agree that Congress may not legislate with respect to a single debtor, even if only that debtor presents “a particular type of problem.” If, for example, Consolidated Rail Corp. were to fail, I cannot believe that Congress would be prohibited from enacting legislation addressed to the peculiar problems created by the bankruptcy of one of the Nation’s principal freight carriers.2
For the foregoing reasons, I concur in the result reached by the Court.

 The Court implies that a law which is general in its terms but in operation applies only to a single debtor might satisfy the uniformity requirement. Again, such a formalistic requirement is not a principled reason for striking down congressional legislation.

 It is indeed ironic that under the Court’s approach, bankruptcy legislation respecting Conrail might be invalid. Conrail was created by the 3R Act, which reorganized eight bankrupt railroads into a single viable system operated by a private, for profit corporation. It is difficult to understand why legislation affecting the eight railroads passed constitutional muster in the SR Act Cases, 419 U. S., at 156 — 161, yet legislation affecting their successor might not.