Court Opinion

ID: 9430374
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:29:36.301999+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:23:24.234491
License: Public Domain

Justice Brennan,
dissenting.
Since Parker v. Brown, 317 U. S. 341 (1943), the Court has wrestled with the question of the degree to which federal antitrust laws prohibit state and local governments from imposing anticompetitive restraints on trade. Laws which impose such restraints have been held to be exempt from antitrust scrutiny if they constitute action of the State itself in its sovereign capacity, or state-authorized municipal action in furtherance or implementation of clearly articulated and affirmatively expressed state policy. See Community Communications Co. v. Boulder, 455 U. S. 40, 52 (1982). Today, the Court holds that a municipality’s price-fixing scheme is not pre-empted by the federal antitrust laws whether or not the scheme is state-authorized, or furthers or implements a clearly articulated and affirmatively expressed state policy. Because today’s decision discards over 40 years of carefully considered precedent, I respectfully dissent.
I
A
Rent Stabilization Ordinance (hereafter Ordinance) effectively fixes prices for rental units in the city of Berkeley. In Rice v. Norman Williams Co., 458 U. S. 654, 661 (1982), we held that a state statute
“may be condemned under the antitrust laws only if it mandates or authorizes conduct that necessarily constitutes a violation of the antitrust laws in all cases, or if it places irresistible pressure on a private party to violate the antitrust laws in order to comply with the statute. Such condemnation will follow under § 1 of the Sherman Act when the conduct contemplated by the statute is in all cases a per se violation.”
*275In this case, by declaring maximum prices landlords may charge, Berkeley’s Ordinance irresistibly pressures landlords to fix prices for their rental units. Thus, the Ordinance “facially conflict[s] with the Sherman Act because it mandate[s] [price fixing], an activity that has long been regarded as a per se violation of the Sherman Act.” Id., at 659-660 (emphasis in original).
The Court recognizes that the Ordinance imposes anti-competitive restraints on trade, and that it has the same effect on the housing market as would a conspiracy by landlords to fix rental prices. Ante, at 266. Despite this, the Court holds that the Ordinance is not pre-empted by the Sherman Act because prices are fixed “unilaterally” by the city, rather than by “contract, combination, or conspiracy.” I do not read our decisions necessarily to require proof of such concerted action as a prerequisite to a finding of preemption. Certainly, nothing we said in Rice supports such a narrow view of pre-emption.1 Our other decisions have found statutes in conflict with the Sherman Act because they eliminated price competition in the relevant market.
In California Retail Liquor Dealers Assn. v. Midcal Aluminum, Inc., 445 U. S. 97 (1980), a wine wholesaler sought to enjoin enforcement of a California statute which effectively *276required it to sell wines at prices set by producers. The Court focused on the fact that the statute eliminated price competition, and held that the wine-pricing system constituted resale price maintenance in violation of the Sherman Act. The Midcal decision squarely controls the result here. Just as the statute challenged in Midcal compelled wine wholesalers to charge prices set by wine producers, Berkeley’s Ordinance compels landlords to charge prices set by the city. The city “holds the power to prevent price competition by dictating the prices charged” by landlords. Id., at 103. “[S]uch vertical control destroys horizontal competition as effectively as if [landlords] ‘formed a combination and endeavored to establish the same restrictions ... by agreement with each other.’” Ibid. (quoting Dr. Miles Medical Co. v. John D. Park & Sons Co., 220 U. S. 373, 408 (1911)).
Schwegmann Bros. v. Calvert Distillers Corp., 341 U. S. 384 (1951), is also directly on point. In Schwegmann, a Louisiana statute authorized liquor distributors to enforce agreements fixing minimum retail prices on their products against retailers who had not agreed to the price restrictions. The Court held that the statutory scheme amounted to resale price maintenance, in violation of the Sherman Act. To paraphrase the Court in Schwegmann, “when [the city] compels [landlords] to follow a parallel price policy, it demands private conduct which the Sherman Act forbids.” Id., at 389. “[W]hen [landlords] are forced to abandon price competition, they are driven into a compact in violation of the spirit of the proviso which forbids ‘horizontal’ price fixing.” Ibid. (emphasis in original).
B
Even if I accepted the Court’s analysis of the antitrust preemption issue, I would find a functional “combination” in this case between the city of Berkeley and its officials, on the one hand, and the landlords on the other — a combination that operates to fix prices for rental units in Berkeley. To reach a contrary result, the Court simply states a conclusion — that *277“[a] restraint imposed unilaterally by government does not become concerted action within the meaning of the statute simply because it has a coercive effect upon parties who must obey the law.” Ante, at 267. The Court doesn’t explain why this is so — it simply baldly asserts that “[t]he ordinary relationship between the government and those who must obey its regulatory commands whether they wish to or not is not enough to establish a conspiracy.” Ibid. The best I can make of this is that the Court apparently would interpret the Sherman Act to forbid only privately arranged price-fixing schemes. See ante, at 267-269. That interpretation would be plainly misguided.
Section 1 of the Sherman Act declares illegal restraints of trade resulting from any “contract, combination ... , or conspiracy.” 15 U. S. C. § 1. Understandably, that wording has led the Court to draw a “basic distinction” between concerted and independent action, and to hold that “[independent action is not proscribed” by § 1. Monsanto Co. v. Spray-Rite Service Corp., 465 U. S. 752, 761 (1984). However, until today we have not held, or indeed even suggested, that government-imposed restraints on economic actions cannot constitute concerted action. Rather, both Schwegmann and Midcal held that state statutes which “had a coercive effect upon parties who must obey the law” violated § l.2
*278If the Ordinance allowed the individual landlords ultimately to set their own rental prices, I might understand the Court’s conclusion that any resulting price restraints did not necessarily result from collective action. Cf. Monsanto Co. v. Spray-Rite Service Corp., supra, at 761. However, because the Ordinance has the force of law, the city can compel landlords to do what the Sherman Act plainly forbids — to fix prices for rental units in Berkeley. Regardless of whether the landlords “agree” to the prices charged, the circumstances here clearly “exclude the possibility that the [city and the landlords] were acting independently.” 465 U. S., at 764. The Ordinance eliminates price competition more effectively than any private “agreement” ever could, and is therefore pre-empted by the Sherman Act. The Court’s contrary conclusion does not further, as it argues, but rather distorts “traditional antitrust analysis.” Ante, at 264.
II
Ultimately, the Court is holding that a municipality’s authority to protect the public welfare should not be constrained by the Sherman Act. That holding excludes a broad range of local government anticompetitive activities from the reach of the antitrust laws. This flies in the face of the fact that Congress has not enacted such a broad antitrust exemption for municipalities. See Community Communications Co. v. Boulder, 455 U. S. 40 (1982); Lafayette v. Louisiana Power & Light Co., 435 U. S. 389 (1978); cf. 15 U. S. C. § 35(a) (1982 ed., Supp. II) (immunizing local governments *279only from liability for damages for violations of the antitrust laws). “In light of the serious economic dislocation which could result if cities were free to place their own parochial interests above the Nation’s economic goals reflected in the antitrust laws, ... we [have been] especially unwilling to presume that Congress intended to exclude anticompetitive municipal action from their reach.” Lafayette, supra, at 412-413 (plurality opinion). “The Parker state-action exemption reflects Congress’ intention to embody in the Sherman Act the federalism principle that the States possess a significant measure of sovereignty under our Constitution. But this principle contains its own limitation: Ours is a ‘dual system of government,’ Parker, 317 U. S., at 351 (emphasis added), which has no place for sovereign cities.” Community Communications Co. v. Boulder, supra, at 53. Of course, our decisions do not foreclose municipalities from enacting anticompetitive measures in the public interest, but only require that such actions be state-authorized and be implemented pursuant to a clearly articulated and affirmatively expressed state policy to displace competition with regulation or monopoly service. See 455 U. S., at 52. Berkeley’s Ordinance plainly is not exempt from antitrust scrutiny under this standard.
Appellees suggest that three considerations support their argument that the Ordinance implements a clearly articulated and affirmatively expressed state policy authorizing municipalities to enact rent control measures: (1) the state legislature’s 1972 ratification of a city rent control charter amendment; (2) the California Supreme Court’s decision in Birkenfeld v. City of Berkeley, 17 Cal. 3d 129, 550 P. 2d 1001 (1976), which ultimately invalidated that amendment; and (3) the city’s state-law obligation to provide affordable housing. None of these considerations support appellees’ position.
First, in 1972, Berkeley adopted a rent control charter amendment, which was approved by concurrent resolution of *280both houses of the state legislature.3 There are serious doubts that this purely proforma approval would qualify the amendment for the Parker exemption. See Cantor v. Detroit Edison Co., 428 U. S. 579 (1976). In any event, that amendment was subsequently invalidated by the California Supreme Court, and the legislature’s actions respecting its passage afford no support for the claimed exemption of the current Ordinance from antitrust scrutiny.
Second, the Birkenfeld decision, while invalidating Berkeley’s rent control amendment, found state authority for such measures in constitutional provisions conferring upon cities the power to “make and enforce ... all local, police, sanitary, and other ordinances and regulations not in conflict with general laws.” 17 Cal. 3d, at 140, 550 P. 2d, at 1009-1010. But we have made clear that such general grants of authority do not constitute the required mandate to engage in conduct that necessarily constitutes a violation of the antitrust laws. See Community Communications Co., 455 U. S., at 55. “Acceptance of such a proposition . . . would wholly eviscerate the concepts of ‘clear articulation and affirmative expression’ that our precedents require.” Id., at 56.
Third, state law requires cities to “make adequate provision for the housing needs of all economic .segments of the community.” Cal. Govt. Code Ann. § 65580(d) (West 1983). But, although appellees argue that rent control measures are a “foreseeable result” of these statutory obligations, see Hallie v. Eau Claire, 471 U. S. 34 (1985), those laws are expressly neutral with respect to a city’s authority to impose rent controls. California Govt. Code Ann. § 65589(b) (West 1983) expressly provides that “nothing in this article shall be construed to be a grant of authority or a repeal of any authority which may exist of a local government to impose rent con*281trols.” See also Cal. Health & Safety Code Ann. § 50202 (West Supp. 1986) (“[N]othing in this division shall authorize the imposition of rent regulations or controls”). The requirement of “ ‘clear articulation and affirmative expression’ is not satisfied when the State’s position is one of mere neutrality respecting the municipal actions challenged as anti-competitive.” Community Communications Co., supra, at 55 (emphasis in original). Plainly, by that standard the Ordinance does not qualify for the Parker exemption from antitrust liability.
Ill
Finally, appellees suggest that a finding of pre-emption in this case will severely restrict a municipality’s authority to enact a variety of measures in the public interest. “But this argument is simply an attack upon the wisdom of the longstanding congressional commitment to the policy of free markets and open competition embodied in the antitrust laws.” Community Communications Co., supra, at 56. Congress may ultimately agree with appellees’ argument, and may choose to amend the antitrust laws to grant municipalities broad discretion to enact anticompetitive measures in the public interest. Pending such amendment, however, only a clearly articulated and affirmatively expressed state policy will exempt ordinances like this from the reach of the Sherman Act.

 Rice held that a “state statute is not pre-empted by the federal antitrust laws simply because the state scheme might have an anticompetitive effect.” 458 U. S., at 659. Rice involved a challenge to a California statute which effectively allowed liquor distillers to control distribution of their products in the State. The Court concluded that because such vertical nonprice restraints are not per se illegal under the Sherman Act, see Continental T. V., Inc. v. GTE Sylvania Inc., 433 U. S. 36 (1977), the statute was not pre-empted. 458 U. S., at 661; see also Exxon Corp. v. Governor of Maryland, 437 U. S. 117 (1978); Joseph E. Seagram & Sons, Inc. v. Hostetler, 384 U. S. 35 (1966). In contrast, Berkeley’s Rent Stabilization Board fixes prices for rental units in the city. Unlike nonprice restraints, price fixing has traditionally been held to be per se illegal under the Sherman Act. See Dr. Miles Medical Co. v. John D. Park & Sons Co., 220 U. S. 373 (1911).

 The Court would distinguish Schwegmann and Midcal based on the role of private parties in setting prices. Ante, at 268-269. The Court characterizes the statutory restraints imposed in those cases as “hybrid, in that nonmarket mechanisms merely enforce private marketing decisions.” Ante, at 267. In this ease, the Court argues, Berkeley’s landlords have no control over the prices they charge. Ibid.
True, in both cases private parties, rather than the State, were largely responsible for setting the prices that retailers had to adhere to. However, the lack of state supervision over price-fixing activities was only relevant to whether the challenged statutes were immune from antitrust liability under Parker v. Brown, 317 U. S. 341 (1943), see Midcal, 445 U. S., at 105; neither decision drew the distinction the Court today creates between “unilateral” and “hybrid” governmental restraints. In both eases the chai-*278lenged statute was found invalid simply because it compelled private parties to charge fixed prices for their products, conduct which the Sherman Act forbids. See Schwegmann, 341 U. S., at 389; Midcal, supra, at 103. The Court’s “distinction” ignores the fact that price fixing has the same deleterious effect upon the competitive market whether prices are set by an administrative body or by private parties. Thus, regardless of whether Berkeley’s landlords have some role in setting the prices they must charge, the coercive effect of the city’s Ordinance results in concerted action vio-lative of the Sherman Act.

 At that time, the State Constitution required the legislature to approve city charter amendments. See Birkenfeld v. City of Berkeley, 17 Cal. 3d, 129, 137, n. 2, 550 P. 2d, 1001, 1007, n. 2 (1976). In 1974, the State Constitution was amended to eliminate this requirement.