1 Part I: Interpretive Theories & Methods: Background History, Ongoing Debates 1 Part I: Interpretive Theories & Methods: Background History, Ongoing Debates

1.1 WEEK 1: History and Major Approaches to Statutory Interpretation 1.1 WEEK 1: History and Major Approaches to Statutory Interpretation

1.1.1 Church of the Holy Trinity v. United States 1.1.1 Church of the Holy Trinity v. United States

143 U.S. 457 (1892)

CHURCH OF THE HOLY TRINITY
v.
UNITED STATES.

No. 143.

Supreme Court of United States.

Argued and submitted January 7, 1892.
Decided February 29, 1892.

ERROR TO THE CIRCUIT COURT OF THE UNITED STATES FOR THE SOUTHERN DISTRICT OF NEW YORK.

Mr. Seaman Miller for plaintiff in error.

Mr. Assistant Attorney General Maury for defendant in error submitted on his brief.

MR. JUSTICE BREWER delivered the opinion of the court.

Plaintiff in error is a corporation, duly organized and incorporated as a religious society under the laws of the State of New York. E. Walpole Warren was, prior to September, [458] 1887, an alien residing in England. In that month the plaintiff in error made a contract with him, by which he was to remove to the city of New York and enter into its service as rector and pastor; and in pursuance of such contract, Warren did so remove and enter upon such service. It is claimed by the United States that this contract on the part of the plaintiff in error was forbidden by the act of February 26, 1885, 23 Stat. 332, c. 164, and an action was commenced to recover the penalty prescribed by that act. The Circuit Court held that the contract was within the prohibition of the statute, and rendered judgment accordingly, (36 Fed. Rep. 303;) and the single question presented for our determination is whether it erred in that conclusion.

The first section describes the act forbidden, and is in these words:

"Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That from and after the passage of this act it shall be unlawful for any person, company, partnership, or corporation, in any manner whatsoever, to prepay the transportation, or in any way assist or encourage the importation or migration of any alien or aliens, any foreigner or foreigners, into the United States, its Territories, or the District of Columbia, under contract or agreement, parol or special, express or implied, made previous to the importation or migration of such alien or aliens, foreigner or foreigners, to perform labor or service of any kind in the United States, its Territories, or the District of Columbia."

It must be conceded that the act of the corporation is within the letter of this section, for the relation of rector to his church is one of service, and implies labor on the one side with compensation on the other. Not only are the general words labor and service both used, but also, as it were to guard against any narrow interpretation and emphasize a breadth of meaning, to them is added "of any kind;" and, further, as noticed by the Circuit Judge in his opinion, the fifth section, which makes specific exceptions, among them professional actors, artists, lecturers, singers and domestic [459] servants, strengthens the idea that every other kind of labor and service was intended to be reached by the first section. While there is great force to this reasoning, we cannot think Congress intended to denounce with penalties a transaction like that in the present case. It is a familiar rule, that a thing may be within the letter of the statute and yet not within the statute, because not within its spirit, nor within the intention of its makers. This has been often asserted, and the reports are full of cases illustrating its application. This is not the substitution of the will of the judge for that of the legislator, for frequently words of general meaning are used in a statute, words broad enough to include an act in question, and yet a consideration of the whole legislation, or of the circumstances surrounding its enactment, or of the absurd results which follow from giving such broad meaning to the words, makes it unreasonable to believe that the legislator intended to include the particular act. As said in Plowden, 205: "From which cases, it appears that the sages of the law heretofore have construed statutes quite contrary to the letter in some appearance, and those statutes which comprehend all things in the letter they have expounded to extend to but some things, and those which generally prohibit all people from doing such an act they have interpreted to permit some people to do it, and those which include every person in the letter, they have adjudged to reach to some persons only, which expositions have always been founded upon the intent of the legislature; which they have collected sometimes by considering the cause and necessity of making the act, sometimes by comparing one part of the act with another, and sometimes by foreign circumstances."

In Margate Pier Co. v. Hannam, 3 B. & Ald. 266, 270, Abbott, C.J. quotes from Lord Coke as follows: "Acts of Parliament are to be so construed as no man that is innocent or free from injury or wrong be, by a literal construction, punished or endamaged." In the case of the State v. Clark, 5 Dutcher, (29 N.J. Law) 96, 98, 99, it appeared that an act had been passed making it a misdemeanor to wilfully break down a fence in the possession of another person. Clark was indicted [460] under that statute. The defence was that the act of breaking down the fence, though wilful, was in the exercise of a legal right to go upon his own lands. The trial court rejected the testimony offered to sustain the defence, and the Supreme Court held that this ruling was error. In its opinion the court used this language: "The act of 1855, in terms, makes the wilful opening, breaking down or injuring of any fences belonging to or in the possession of any other person a misdemeanor. In what sense is the term wilful used? In common parlance, wilful is used in the sense of intentional, as distinguished from accidental or involuntary. Whatever one does intentionally he does wilfully. Is it used in that sense in this act? Did the legislature intend to make the intentional opening of a fence for the purpose of going upon the land of another indictable, if done by permission or for a lawful purpose? ... We cannot suppose such to have been the actual intent. To adopt such a construction would put a stop to the ordinary business of life. The language of the act, if construed literally, evidently leads to an absurd result. If a literal construction of the words of a statute be absurd, the act must be so construed as to avoid the absurdity. The court must restrain the words. The object designed to be reached by the act must limit and control the literal import of the terms and phrases employed." In United States v. Kirby, 7 Wall. 482, 486, the defendants were indicted for the violation of an act of Congress, providing "that if any person shall knowingly and wilfully obstruct or retard the passage of the mail, or of any driver or carrier, or of any horse or carriage carrying the same, he shall, upon conviction, for every such offence pay a fine not exceeding one hundred dollars." The specific charge was that the defendants knowingly and wilfully retarded the passage of one Farris, a carrier of the mail, while engaged in the performance of his duty, and also in like manner retarded the steamboat General Buell, at that time engaged in carrying the mail. To this indictment the defendants pleaded specially that Farris had been indicted for murder by a court of competent authority in Kentucky; that a bench warrant had been issued and [461] placed in the hands of the defendant Kirby, the sheriff of the county, commanding him to arrest Farris and bring him before the court to answer to the indictment; and that in obedience to this warrant, he and the other defendants, as his posse, entered upon the steamboat General Buell and arrested Farris, and used only such force as was necessary to accomplish that arrest. The question as to the sufficiency of this plea was certified to this court, and it was held that the arrest of Farris upon the warrant from the state court was not an obstruction of the mail, or the retarding of the passage of a carrier of the mail, within the meaning of the act. In its opinion the court says: "All laws should receive a sensible construction. General terms should be so limited in their application as not to lead to injustice, oppression or an absurd consequence. It will always, therefore, be presumed that the legislature intended exceptions to its language which would avoid results of this character. The reason of the law in such cases should prevail over its letter. The common sense of man approves the judgment mentioned by Puffendorf, that the Bolognian law which enacted `that whoever drew blood in the streets should be punished with the utmost severity,' did not extend to the surgeon who opened the vein of a person that fell down in the street in a fit. The same common sense accepts the ruling, cited by Plowden, that the statute of 1st Edward II., which enacts that a prisoner who breaks prison shall be guilty of felony, does not extend to a prisoner who breaks out when the prison is on fire, `for he is not to be hanged because he would not stay to be burnt.' And we think that a like common sense will sanction the ruling we make, that the act of Congress which punishes the obstruction or retarding of the passage of the mail, or of its carrier, does not apply to a case of temporary detention of the mail caused by the arrest of the carrier upon an indictment for murder." The following cases may also be cited. Henry v. Tilson, 17 Vermont, 479; Ryegate v. Wardsboro, 30 Vermont, 746; Ex parte Ellis, 11 California, 222; Ingraham v. Speed, 30 Mississippi, 410; Jackson v. Collins, 3 Cowen, 89; People v. Insurance Company, 15 Johns. 358; Burch v. Newbury, 10 N.Y. 374; People v. N.Y. [462] Commissioners of Taxes, 95 N.Y. 554, 558; People v. Lacombe, 99 N.Y. 43, 49; Canal Co. v. Railroad Co., 4 G. & J., 1, 152; Osgood v. Breed, 12 Mass. 525, 530; Wilbur v. Crane, 13 Pick. 284; Oates v. National Bank, 100 U.S. 239.

Among other things which may be considered in determining the intent of the legislature is the title of the act. We do not mean that it may be used to add to or take from the body of the statute, Hadden v. The Collector, 5 Wall. 107, but it may help to interpret its meaning. In the case of United States v. Fisher, 2 Cranch, 358, 386, Chief Justice Marshall said: "On the influence which the title ought to have in construing the enacting clauses much has been said; and yet it is not easy to discern the point of difference between the opposing counsel in this respect. Neither party contends that the title of an act can control plain words in the body of the statute; and neither denies that, taken with other parts, it may assist in removing ambiguities. Where the intent is plain, nothing is left to construction. Where the mind labors to discover the design of the legislature, it seizes everything from which aid can be derived; and in such case the title claims a degree of notice, and will have its due share of consideration." And in the case of United States v. Palmer, 3 Wheat. 610, 631, the same judge applied the doctrine in this way: "The words of the section are in terms of unlimited extent. The words `any person or persons' are broad enough to comprehend every human being. But general words must not only be limited to cases within the jurisdiction of the State, but also to those objects to which the legislature intended to apply them. Did the legislature intend to apply these words to the subjects of a foreign power, who in a foreign ship may commit murder or robbery on the high seas? The title of an act cannot control its words, but may furnish some aid in showing what was in the mind of the legislature. The title of this act is, `An act for the punishment of certain crimes against the United States.' It would seem that offences against the United States, not offences against the human race, were the crimes which the legislature intended by this law to punish."

[463] It will be seen that words as general as those used in the first section of this act were by that decision limited, and the intent of Congress with respect to the act was gathered partially, at least, from its title. Now, the title of this act is, "An act to prohibit the importation and migration of foreigners and aliens under contract or agreement to perform labor in the United States, its Territories and the District of Columbia." Obviously the thought expressed in this reaches only to the work of the manual laborer, as distinguished from that of the professional man. No one reading such a title would suppose that Congress had in its mind any purpose of staying the coming into this country of ministers of the gospel, or, indeed, of any class whose toil is that of the brain. The common understanding of the terms labor and laborers does not include preaching and preachers; and it is to be assumed that words and phrases are used in their ordinary meaning. So whatever of light is thrown upon the statute by the language of the title indicates an exclusion from its penal provisions of all contracts for the employment of ministers, rectors and pastors.

Again, another guide to the meaning of a statute is found in the evil which it is designed to remedy; and for this the court properly looks at contemporaneous events, the situation as it existed, and as it was pressed upon the attention of the legislative body. United States v. Union Pacific Railroad, 91 U.S. 72, 79. The situation which called for this statute was briefly but fully stated by Mr. Justice Brown when, as District Judge, he decided the case of United States v. Craig, 28 Fed. Rep. 795, 798: "The motives and history of the act are matters of common knowledge. It had become the practice for large capitalists in this country to contract with their agents abroad for the shipment of great numbers of an ignorant and servile class of foreign laborers, under contracts, by which the employer agreed; upon the one hand, to prepay their passage, while, upon the other hand, the laborers agreed to work after their arrival for a certain time at a low rate of wages. The effect of this was to break down the labor market, and to reduce other laborers engaged in like occupations to the level [464] of the assisted immigrant. The evil finally became so flagrant that an appeal was made to Congress for relief by the passage of the act in question, the design of which was to raise the standard of foreign immigrants, and to discountenance the migration of those who had not sufficient means in their own hands, or those of their friends, to pay their passage."

It appears, also, from the petitions, and in the testimony presented before the committees of Congress, that it was this cheap unskilled labor which was making the trouble, and the influx of which Congress sought to prevent. It was never suggested that we had in this country a surplus of brain toilers, and, least of all, that the market for the services of Christian ministers was depressed by foreign competition. Those were matters to which the attention of Congress, or of the people, was not directed. So far, then, as the evil which was sought to be remedied interprets the statute, it also guides to an exclusion of this contract from the penalties of the act.

A singular circumstance, throwing light upon the intent of Congress, is found in this extract from the report of the Senate Committee on Education and Labor, recommending the passage of the bill: "The general facts and considerations which induce the committee to recommend the passage of this bill are set forth in the Report of the Committee of the House. The committee report the bill back without amendment, although there are certain features thereof which might well be changed or modified, in the hope that the bill may not fail of passage during the present session. Especially would the committee have otherwise recommended amendments, substituting for the expression `labor and service,' whenever it occurs in the body of the bill, the words `manual labor' or `manual service,' as sufficiently broad to accomplish the purposes of the bill, and that such amendments would remove objections which a sharp and perhaps unfriendly criticism may urge to the proposed legislation. The committee, however, believing that the bill in its present form will be construed as including only those whose labor or service is manual in character, and being very desirous that the bill become a law before the adjournment, have reported the bill without [465] change." 6059, Congressional Record, 48th Congress. And, referring back to the report of the Committee of the House, there appears this language: "It seeks to restrain and prohibit the immigration or importation of laborers who would have never seen our shores but for the inducements and allurements of men whose only object is to obtain labor at the lowest possible rate, regardless of the social and material well-being of our own citizens and regardless of the evil consequences which result to American laborers from such immigration. This class of immigrants care nothing about our institutions, and in many instances never even heard of them; they are men whose passage is paid by the importers; they come here under contract to labor for a certain number of years; they are ignorant of our social condition, and that they may remain so they are isolated and prevented from coming into contact with Americans. They are generally from the lowest social stratum, and live upon the coarsest food and in hovels of a character before unknown to American workmen. They, as a rule, do not become citizens, and are certainly not a desirable acquisition to the body politic. The inevitable tendency of their presence among us is to degrade American labor, and to reduce it to the level of the imported pauper labor." Page 5359, Congressional Record, 48th Congress.

We find, therefore, that the title of the act, the evil which was intended to be remedied, the circumstances surrounding the appeal to Congress, the reports of the committee of each house, all concur in affirming that the intent of Congress was simply to stay the influx of this cheap unskilled labor.

But beyond all these matters no purpose of action against religion can be imputed to any legislation, state or national, because this is a religious people. This is historically true. From the discovery of this continent to the present hour, there is a single voice making this affirmation. The commission to Christopher Columbus, prior to his sail westward, is from "Ferdinand and Isabella, by the grace of God, King and Queen of Castile," etc., and recites that "it is hoped that by God's assistance some of the continents and islands in the [466] ocean will be discovered," etc. The first colonial grant, that made to Sir Walter Raleigh in 1584, was from "Elizabeth, by the grace of God, of England, Fraunce and Ireland, queene, defender of the faith," etc.; and the grant authorizing him to enact statutes for the government of the proposed colony provided that "they be not against the true Christian faith nowe professed in the Church of England." The first charter of Virginia, granted by King James I in 1606, after reciting the application of certain parties for a charter, commenced the grant in these words: "We, greatly commending, and graciously accepting of, their Desires for the Furtherance of so noble a Work, which may, by the Providence of Almighty God, hereafter tend to the Glory of his Divine Majesty, in propagating of Christian Religion to such People, as yet live in Darkness and miserable Ignorance of the true Knowledge and Worship of God, and may in time bring the Infidels and Savages, living in those parts, to human Civility, and to a settled and quiet Government; DO, by these our Letters-Patents, graciously accept of, and agree to, their humble and well-intended Desires."

Language of similar import may be found in the subsequent charters of that colony, from the same king, in 1609 and 1611; and the same is true of the various charters granted to the other colonies. In language more or less emphatic is the establishment of the Christian religion declared to be one of the purposes of the grant. The celebrated compact made by the Pilgrims in the Mayflower, 1620, recites: "Having undertaken for the Glory of God, and Advancement of the Christian Faith, and the Honour of our King and Country, a Voyage to plant the first Colony in the northern Parts of Virginia; Do by these Presents, solemnly and mutually, in the Presence of God and one another, covenant and combine ourselves together into a civil Body Politick, for our better Ordering and Preservation, and Furtherance of the Ends aforesaid."

The fundamental orders of Connecticut, under which a provisional government was instituted in 1638-1639, commence with this declaration: "Forasmuch as it hath pleased the All-mighty God by the wise disposition of his diuyne pruidence [467] so to Order and dispose of things that we the Inhabitants and Residents of Windsor, Hartford and Wethersfield are now cohabiting and dwelling in and vppon the River of Conectecotte and the Lands thereunto adioyneing; And well knowing where a people are gathered togather the word of God requires that to mayntayne the peace and vnion of such a people there should be an orderly and decent Gouerment established according to God, to order and dispose of the affayres of the people at all seasons as occation shall require; doe therefore assotiate and conioyne our selues to be as one Publike State or Comonwelth; and doe, for our selues and our Successors and such as shall be adioyned to vs att any tyme hereafter, enter into Combination and Confederation togather, to mayntayne and presearue the liberty and purity of the gospell of our Lord Jesus wch we now prfesse, as also the disciplyne of the Churches, wch according to the truth of the said gospell is now practised amongst vs."

In the charter of privileges granted by William Penn to the province of Pennsylvania, in 1701, it is recited: "Because no People can be truly happy, though under the greatest Enjoyment of Civil Liberties, if abridged of the Freedom of their Consciences, as to their Religious Profession and Worship; And Almighty God being the only Lord of Conscience, Father of Lights and Spirits; and the Author as well as Object of all divine Knowledge, Faith and Worship, who only doth enlighten the Minds, and persuade and convince the Understandings of People, I do hereby grant and declare," etc.

Coming nearer to the present time, the Declaration of Independence recognizes the presence of the Divine in human affairs in these words: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness." "We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare," etc.; "And for the support [468] of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the Protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor."

If we examine the constitutions of the various States we find in them a constant recognition of religious obligations. Every constitution of every one of the forty-four States contains language which either directly or by clear implication recognizes a profound reverence for religion and an assumption that its influence in all human affairs is essential to the well being of the community This recognition may be in the preamble, such as is found in the constitution of Illinois, 1870: "We, the people of the State of Illinois, grateful to Almighty God for the civil, political and religious liberty which He hath so long permitted us to enjoy, and looking to Him for a blessing upon our endeavors to secure and transmit the same unimpaired to succeeding generations," etc.

It may be only in the familiar requisition that all officers shall take an oath closing with the declaration "so help me God." It may be in clauses like that of the constitution of Indiana, 1816, Article XI, section 4: "The manner of administering an oath or affirmation shall be such as is most consistent with the conscience of the deponent, and shall be esteemed the most solemn appeal to God." Or in provisions such as are found in Articles 36 and 37 of the Declaration of Rights of the Constitution of Maryland, 1867: "That as it is the duty of every man to worship God in such manner as he thinks most acceptable to Him, all persons are equally entitled to protection in their religious liberty; wherefore, no person ought, by any law, to be molested in his person or estate on account of his religious persuasion or profession, or for his religious practice, unless, under the color of religion, he shall disturb the good order, peace or safety of the State, or shall infringe the laws of morality, or injure others in their natural, civil or religious rights; nor ought any person to be compelled to frequent or maintain or contribute, unless on contract, to maintain any place of worship, or any ministry; nor shall any person, otherwise competent, be deemed incompetent as a witness, or juror, on account of his religious belief: Provided, He [469] believes in the existence of God, and that, under His dispensation, such person will be held morally accountable for his acts, and be rewarded or punished therefor, either in this world or the world to come. That no religious test ought ever to be required as a qualification for any office of profit or trust in this State other than a declaration of belief in the existence of God; nor shall the legislature prescribe any other oath of office than the oath prescribed by this constitution." Or like that in Articles 2 and 3, of Part 1st, of the Constitution of Massachusetts, 1780: "It is the right as well as the duty of all men in society publicly and at stated seasons, to worship the Supreme Being, the great Creator and Preserver of the universe... . As the happiness of a people and the good order and preservation of civil government essentially depend upon piety, religion and morality, and as these cannot be generally diffused through a community but by the institution of the public worship of God and of public instructions in piety, religion and morality: Therefore, to promote their happiness and to secure the good order and preservation of their government, the people of this commonwealth have a right to invest their legislature with power to authorize and require, and the legislature shall, from time to time, authorize and require, the several towns, parishes, precincts and other bodies-politic or religious societies to make suitable provision, at their own expense, for the institution of the public worship of God and for the support and maintenance of public Protestant teachers of piety, religion and morality in all cases where such provision shall not be made voluntarily." Or as in sections 5 and 14 of Article 7, of the constitution of Mississippi, 1832: "No person who denies the being of a God, or a future state of rewards and punishments, shall hold any office in the civil department of this State... . Religion, morality and knowledge being necessary to good government, the preservation of liberty, and the happiness of mankind, schools and the means of education, shall forever be encouraged in this State." Or by Article 22 of the constitution of Delaware, 1776, which required all officers, besides an oath of allegiance, to make and subscribe the following declaration: "I, A.B., do profess [470] faith in God the Father, and in Jesus Christ His only Son, and in the Holy Ghost, one God, blessed for evermore; and I do acknowledge the Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testament to be given by divine inspiration."

Even the Constitution of the United States, which is supposed to have little touch upon the private life of the individual, contains in the First Amendment a declaration common to the constitutions of all the States, as follows: "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof," etc. And also provides in Article 1, section 7, (a provision common to many constitutions,) that the Executive shall have ten days (Sundays excepted) within which to determine whether he will approve or veto a bill.

There is no dissonance in these declarations. There is a universal language pervading them all, having one meaning; they affirm and reaffirm that this is a religious nation. These are not individual sayings, declarations of private persons: they are organic utterances; they speak the voice of the entire people. While because of a general recognition of this truth the question has seldom been presented to the courts, yet we find that in Updegraph v. The Commonwealth, 11 S. & R. 394, 400, it was decided that, "Christianity, general Christianity, is, and always has been, a part of the common law of Pennsylvania; ... not Christianity with an established church, and tithes, and spiritual courts; but Christianity with liberty of conscience to all men." And in The People v. Ruggles, 8 Johns. 290, 294, 295, Chancellor Kent, the great commentator on American law, speaking as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of New York, said: "The people of this State, in common with the people of this country, profess the general doctrines of Christianity, as the rule of their faith and practice; and to scandalize the author of these doctrines is not only, in a religious point of view, extremely impious, but, even in respect to the obligations due to society, is a gross violation of decency and good order... . The free, equal and undisturbed enjoyment of religious opinion, whatever it may be, and free and decent discussions on any religious [471] subject, is granted and secured; but to revile, with malicious and blasphemous contempt, the religion professed by almost the whole community; is an abuse of that right. Nor are we bound, by any expressions in the Constitution as some have strangely supposed, either not to punish at all, or to punish indiscriminately, the like attacks upon the religion of Mahomet or of the Grand Lama; and for this plain reason; that the case assumes that we are a Christian people, and the morality of the country is deeply ingrafted upon Christianity, and not upon the doctrines or worship of those impostors." And in the famous case of Vidal v. Girard's Executors, 2 How. 127, 198, this court, while sustaining the will of Mr. Girard, with its provision for the creation of a college into which no minister should be permitted to enter, observed: "It is also said, and truly, that the Christian religion is a part of the common law of Pennsylvania."

If we pass beyond these matters to a view of American life as expressed by its laws, its business, its customs and its society, we find everywhere a clear recognition of the same truth Among other matters note the following: The form of oath universally prevailing, concluding with an appeal to the Almighty; the custom of opening sessions of all deliberative bodies and most conventions with prayer; the prefatory words of all wills, "In the name of God, amen;" the laws respecting the observance of the Sabbath, with the general cessation of all secular business, and the closing of courts, legislatures, and other similar public assemblies on that day; the churches and church organizations which abound in every city, town and hamlet; the multitude of charitable organizations existing everywhere under Christian auspices; the gigantic missionary associations, with general support, and aiming to establish Christian missions in every quarter of the globe. These, and many other matters which might be noticed, add a volume of unofficial declarations to the mass of organic utterances that this is a Christian nation. In the face of all these, shall it be believed that a Congress of the United States intended to make it a misdemeanor for a church of this country to contract for the services of a Christian minister residing in another nation?

[472] Suppose in the Congress that passed this act some member had offered a bill which in terms declared that, if any Roman Catholic church in this country should contract with Cardinal Manning to come to this country and enter into its service as pastor and priest; or any Episcopal church should enter into a like contract with Canon Farrar; or any Baptist church should make similar arrangements with Rev. Mr. Spurgeon; or any Jewish synagogue with some eminent Rabbi, such contract should be adjudged unlawful and void, and the church making it be subject to prosecution and punishment, can it be believed that it would have received a minute of approving thought or a single vote? Yet it is contended that such was in effect the meaning of this statute. The construction invoked cannot be accepted as correct. It is a case where there was presented a definite evil, in view of which the legislature used general terms with the purpose of reaching all phases of that evil, and thereafter, unexpectedly, it is developed that the general language thus employed is broad enough to reach cases and acts which the whole history and life of the country affirm could not have been intentionally legislated against. It is the duty of the courts, under those circumstances, to say that, however broad the language of the statute may be, the act, although within the letter, is not within the intention of the legislature, and therefore cannot be within the statute.

The judgment will be reversed, and the case remanded for further proceedings in accordance with this opinion.

1.1.4 Required Readings 1.1.4 Required Readings

1.2 WEEK 2: Foundational Interpretive Debates: Textualism vs. Purposivism 1.2 WEEK 2: Foundational Interpretive Debates: Textualism vs. Purposivism

1.2.1 Yates v. United States 1.2.1 Yates v. United States

Opinion [Link]

Argument [Link]

(Slip Opinion) OCTOBER TERM, 2014 1
Syllabus
NOTE: Where it is feasible, a syllabus (headnote) will be released, as is
being done in connection with this case, at the time the opinion is issued.
The syllabus constitutes no part of the opinion of the Court but has been
prepared by the Reporter of Decisions for the convenience of the reader.
See United States v. Detroit Timber & Lumber Co., 200 U. S. 321, 337.


SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES


Syllabus


YATES v. UNITED STATES


CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR
THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT


No. 13–7451. Argued November 5, 2014—Decided February 25, 2015


While conducting an offshore inspection of a commercial fishing vessel
in the Gulf of Mexico, a federal agent found that the ship’s catch contained undersized red grouper, in violation of federal conservation
regulations. The officer instructed the ship’s captain, petitioner
Yates, to keep the undersized fish segregated from the rest of the
catch until the ship returned to port. After the officer departed,
Yates instead told a crew member to throw the undersized fish overboard. For this offense, Yates was charged with destroying, concealing, and covering up undersized fish to impede a federal investigation, in violation of 18 U. S. C. §1519. That section provides that a
person may be fined or imprisoned for up to 20 years if he “knowingly
alters, destroys, mutilates, conceals, covers up, falsifies, or makes a
false entry in any record, document, or tangible object with the intent
to impede, obstruct, or influence” a federal investigation. At trial,
Yates moved for a judgment of acquittal on the §1519 charge. Pointing to §1519’s origin as a provision of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002,
a law designed to protect investors and restore trust in financial
markets following the collapse of Enron Corporation, Yates argued
that §1519’s reference to “tangible object” subsumes objects used to
store information, such as computer hard drives, not fish. The District Court denied Yates’s motion, and a jury found him guilty of violating §1519. The Eleventh Circuit affirmed the conviction, concluding that §1519 applies to the destruction or concealment of fish
because, as objects having physical form, fish fall within the dictionary definition of “tangible object.”

Held: The judgment is reversed, and the case is remanded.
733 F. 3d 1059, reversed and remanded. 

 

JUSTICE GINSBURG, joined by THE CHIEF JUSTICE, JUSTICE BREYER,
and JUSTICE SOTOMAYOR, concluded that a “tangible object” within
§1519’s compass is one used to record or preserve information. Pp. 6–
20.
(a) Although dictionary definitions of the words “tangible” and “object” bear consideration in determining the meaning of “tangible object” in §1519, they are not dispositive. Whether a statutory term is
unambiguous “is determined [not only] by reference to the language
itself, [but also by] the specific context in which that language is
used, and the broader context of the statute as a whole.” Robinson v.
Shell Oil Co., 519 U. S. 337, 341. Identical language may convey
varying content when used in different statutes, sometimes even in
different provisions of the same statute. See, e.g., FAA v. Cooper, 566
U. S. ___, ___. Pp. 7–10.
(b) Familiar interpretive guides aid the construction of “tangible
object.” Though not commanding, §1519’s heading—“Destruction, alteration, or falsification of records in Federal investigations and
bankruptcy”—conveys no suggestion that the section prohibits spoliation of any and all physical evidence, however remote from records.
Section 1519’s position within Title 18, Chapter 73, further signals
that §1519 was not intended to serve as a cross-the-board ban on the
destruction of physical evidence. Congress placed §1519 at the end of
Chapter 73 following immediately after pre-existing specialized provisions expressly aimed at corporate fraud and financial audits.
The contemporaneous passage of §1512(c)(1), which prohibits a
person from “alter[ing], destroy[ing], mutilat[ing], or conceal[ing] a
record, document, or other object . . . with the intent to impair the object’s integrity or availability for use in an official proceeding,” is also
instructive. The Government argues that §1512(c)(1)’s reference to
“other object” includes any and every physical object. But if §1519’s
reference to “tangible object” already included all physical objects, as
the Government also contends, then Congress had no reason to enact
§1512(c)(1). Section 1519 should not be read to render superfluous an
entire provision passed in proximity as part of the same Act. See
Marx v. General Revenue Corp., 568 U. S. ___, ___.
The words immediately surrounding “tangible object” in §1519—
“falsifies, or makes a false entry in any record [or] document”—also
cabin the contextual meaning of that term. Applying the canons
noscitur a sociis and ejusdem generis, “tangible object,” as the last in
a list of terms that begins “any record [or] document,” is appropriately read to refer, not to any tangible object, but specifically to the subset of tangible objects used to record or preserve information. This
moderate interpretation accords with the list of actions §1519 proscribes; the verbs “falsif[y]” and “mak[e] a false entry in” typically take as grammatical objects records, documents, or things used to
record or preserve information, such as logbooks or hard drives. See
Gustafson v. Alloyd Co., 513 U. S. 561, 575.
Use of traditional tools of statutory interpretation to examine
markers of congressional intent within the Sarbanes-Oxley Act and
§1519 itself thus call for rejection of an aggressive interpretation of
“tangible object.”
Furthermore, the meaning of “record, document, or thing” in a provision of the 1962 Model Penal Code (MPC) that has been interpreted
to prohibit tampering with any kind of physical evidence is not a reliable indicator of the meaning Congress assigned to “record, document, or tangible object” in §1519. There are significant differences
between the offense described by the MPC provision and the offense
created by §1519. Pp. 10–18.
(c) Finally, if recourse to traditional tools of statutory construction
leaves any doubt about the meaning of “tangible object” in §1519, it
would be appropriate to invoke the rule of lenity. Pp. 18–19.
JUSTICE ALITO concluded that traditional rules of statutory construction confirm that Yates has the better argument. Title 18
U. S. C. §1519’s list of nouns, list of verbs, and title, when combined,
tip the case in favor of Yates. Applying the canons noscitur a sociis
and ejusdem generis to the list of nouns—“any record, document, or
tangible object”—the term “tangible object” should refer to something
similar to records or documents. And while many of §1519’s verbs—
“alters, destroys, mutilates, conceals, covers up, falsifies, or makes a
false entry in”—could apply to far-flung nouns such as salamanders
or sand dunes, the term “makes a false entry in” makes no sense outside of filekeeping. Finally, §1519’s title—“Destruction, alteration, or
falsification of records in Federal investigations and bankruptcy”—
also points toward filekeeping rather than fish. Pp. 1–4.
GINSBURG, J., announced the judgment of the Court and delivered an
opinion, in which ROBERTS, C. J., and BREYER and SOTOMAYOR, JJ.,
joined. ALITO, J., filed an opinion concurring in the judgment. KAGAN,
J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which SCALIA, KENNEDY, and THOMAS,
JJ., joined. 


_________________


Opinion of GINSBURG, J.
NOTICE: This opinion is subject to formal revision before publication in the
preliminary print of the United States Reports. Readers are requested to
notify the Reporter of Decisions, Supreme Court of the United States, Washington, D. C. 20543, of any typographical or other formal errors, in order
that corrections may be made before the preliminary print goes to press.


SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES


No. 13–7451


JOHN L. YATES, PETITIONER v. UNITED STATES
ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF
APPEALS FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT

[February 25, 2015]


 JUSTICE GINSBURG announced the judgment of the
Court and delivered an opinion, in which THE CHIEF
JUSTICE, JUSTICE BREYER, and JUSTICE SOTOMAYOR join.
John Yates, a commercial fisherman, caught undersized
red grouper in federal waters in the Gulf of Mexico. To
prevent federal authorities from confirming that he had
harvested undersized fish, Yates ordered a crew member
to toss the suspect catch into the sea. For this offense, he
was charged with, and convicted of, violating 18 U. S. C.
§1519, which provides:
“Whoever knowingly alters, destroys, mutilates,
conceals, covers up, falsifies, or makes a false entry in
any record, document, or tangible object with the intent to impede, obstruct, or influence the investigation
or proper administration of any matter within the jurisdiction of any department or agency of the United
States or any case filed under title 11, or in relation to
or contemplation of any such matter or case, shall be
fined under this title, imprisoned not more than 20
years, or both.”
Yates was also indicted and convicted under §2232(a),
which provides: 

 “DESTRUCTION OR REMOVAL OF PROPERTY TO
PREVENT SEIZURE.—Whoever, before, during, or after
any search for or seizure of property by any person
authorized to make such search or seizure, knowingly
destroys, damages, wastes, disposes of, transfers, or
otherwise takes any action, or knowingly attempts to
destroy, damage, waste, dispose of, transfer, or otherwise take any action, for the purpose of preventing or
impairing the Government’s lawful authority to take
such property into its custody or control or to continue
holding such property under its lawful custody and
control, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned
not more than 5 years, or both.”
Yates does not contest his conviction for violating
§2232(a), but he maintains that fish are not trapped
within the term “tangible object,” as that term is used in
§1519.
Section 1519 was enacted as part of the Sarbanes-Oxley
Act of 2002, 116 Stat. 745, legislation designed to protect
investors and restore trust in financial markets following
the collapse of Enron Corporation. A fish is no doubt an
object that is tangible; fish can be seen, caught, and
handled, and a catch, as this case illustrates, is vulnerable
to destruction. But it would cut §1519 loose from its
financial-fraud mooring to hold that it encompasses any
and all objects, whatever their size or significance, destroyed with obstructive intent. Mindful that in SarbanesOxley, Congress trained its attention on corporate and
accounting deception and cover-ups, we conclude that a
matching construction of §1519 is in order: A tangible
object captured by §1519, we hold, must be one used to
record or preserve information.


I.
On August 23, 2007, the Miss Katie, a commercial fishing boat, was six days into an expedition in the Gulf of Mexico. Her crew numbered three, including Yates, the
captain. Engaged in a routine offshore patrol to inspect
both recreational and commercial vessels, Officer John
Jones of the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission decided to board the Miss Katie to check on the
vessel’s compliance with fishing rules. Although the Miss
Katie was far enough from the Florida coast to be in exclusively federal waters, she was nevertheless within Officer
Jones’s jurisdiction. Because he had been deputized as a
federal agent by the National Marine Fisheries Service,
Officer Jones had authority to enforce federal, as well as
state, fishing laws.
Upon boarding the Miss Katie, Officer Jones noticed
three red grouper that appeared to be undersized hanging
from a hook on the deck. At the time, federal conservation
regulations required immediate release of red grouper less
than 20 inches long. 50 CFR §622.37(d)(2)(ii) (effective
April 2, 2007). Violation of those regulations is a civil
offense punishable by a fine or fishing license suspension.
See 16 U. S. C. §§1857(1)(A), (G), 1858(a), (g).
Suspecting that other undersized fish might be on
board, Officer Jones proceeded to inspect the ship’s catch,
setting aside and measuring only fish that appeared to
him to be shorter than 20 inches. Officer Jones ultimately
determined that 72 fish fell short of the 20-inch mark. A
fellow officer recorded the length of each of the undersized
fish on a catch measurement verification form. With few
exceptions, the measured fish were between 19 and 20
inches; three were less than 19 inches; none were less
than 18.75 inches. After separating the fish measuring
below 20 inches from the rest of the catch by placing them
in wooden crates, Officer Jones directed Yates to leave the
fish, thus segregated, in the crates until the Miss Katie
returned to port. Before departing, Officer Jones issued
Yates a citation for possession of undersized fish.
Four days later, after the Miss Katie had docked in Cortez, Florida, Officer Jones measured the fish contained in the wooden crates. This time, however, the measured
fish, although still less than 20 inches, slightly exceeded
the lengths recorded on board. Jones surmised that the
fish brought to port were not the same as those he had
detected during his initial inspection. Under questioning,
one of the crew members admitted that, at Yates’s direction, he had thrown overboard the fish Officer Jones had
measured at sea, and that he and Yates had replaced the
tossed grouper with fish from the rest of the catch.
For reasons not disclosed in the record before us, more
than 32 months passed before criminal charges were
lodged against Yates. On May 5, 2010, he was indicted for
destroying property to prevent a federal seizure, in violation of §2232(a), and for destroying, concealing, and covering up undersized fish to impede a federal investigation, in
violation of §1519.1 By the time of the indictment, the
minimum legal length for Gulf red grouper had been
lowered from 20 inches to 18 inches. See 50 CFR
§622.37(d)(2)(iv) (effective May 18, 2009). No measured
fish in Yates’s catch fell below that limit. The record does
not reveal what civil penalty, if any, Yates received for his
possession of fish undersized under the 2007 regulation.
See 16 U. S. C. §1858(a).
Yates was tried on the criminal charges in August 2011.
At the end of the Government’s case in chief, he moved for
a judgment of acquittal on the §1519 charge. Pointing to
§1519’s title and its origin as a provision of the SarbanesOxley Act, Yates argued that the section sets forth “a
documents offense” and that its reference to “tangible
object[s]” subsumes “computer hard drives, logbooks, [and]
things of that nature,” not fish. App. 91–92. Yates
——————
1Yates was also charged with making a false statement to federal law
enforcement officers, in violation of 18 U. S. C. §1001(a)(2). That
charge, on which Yates was acquitted, is not relevant to our analysis. 


acknowledged that the Criminal Code contains “sections
that would have been appropriate for the [G]overnment to
pursue” if it wished to prosecute him for tampering with
evidence. App. 91. Section 2232(a), set out supra, at 1–2,
fit that description. But §1519, Yates insisted, did not.
The Government countered that a “tangible object”
within §1519’s compass is “simply something other than a
document or record.” App. 93. The trial judge expressed
misgivings about reading “tangible object” as broadly as
the Government urged: “Isn’t there a Latin phrase [about]
construction of a statute . . . . The gist of it is . . . you take
a look at [a] line of words, and you interpret the words
consistently. So if you’re talking about documents, and
records, tangible objects are tangible objects in the nature
of a document or a record, as opposed to a fish.” Ibid. The
first-instance judge nonetheless followed controlling Eleventh Circuit precedent. While recognizing that §1519 was
passed as part of legislation targeting corporate fraud, the
Court of Appeals had instructed that “the broad language
of §1519 is not limited to corporate fraud cases, and ‘Congress is free to pass laws with language covering areas
well beyond the particular crisis du jour that initially
prompted legislative action.’” No. 2:10–cr–66–FtM–
29SPC (MD Fla., Aug. 8, 2011), App. 116 (quoting United
States v. Hunt, 526 F. 3d 739, 744 (CA11 2008)). Accordingly, the trial court read “tangible object” as a term “independent” of “record” or “document.” App. 116. For
violating §1519 and §2232(a), the court sentenced Yates to
imprisonment for 30 days, followed by supervised release
for three years. App. 118–120. For life, he will bear the
stigma of having a federal felony conviction.
On appeal, the Eleventh Circuit found the text of §1519
“plain.” 733 F. 3d 1059, 1064 (2013). Because “tangible
object” was “undefined” in the statute, the Court of Appeals gave the term its “ordinary or natural meaning,” i.e.,
its dictionary definition, “[h]aving or possessing physical form.” Ibid. (quoting Black’s Law Dictionary 1592 (9th ed.
2009)).
We granted certiorari, 572 U. S. ___ (2014), and now
reverse the Eleventh Circuit’s judgment.


II.
The Sarbanes-Oxley Act, all agree, was prompted by the
exposure of Enron’s massive accounting fraud and revelations that the company’s outside auditor, Arthur Andersen
LLP, had systematically destroyed potentially incriminating documents. The Government acknowledges that
§1519 was intended to prohibit, in particular, corporate
document-shredding to hide evidence of financial wrongdoing. Brief for United States 46. Prior law made it an
offense to “intimidat[e], threate[n], or corruptly persuad[e]
another person” to shred documents. §1512(b) (emphasis
added). Section 1519 cured a conspicuous omission by
imposing liability on a person who destroys records himself. See S. Rep. No. 107–146, p. 14 (2002) (describing
§1519 as “a new general anti shredding provision” and
explaining that “certain current provisions make it a
crime to persuade another person to destroy documents,
but not a crime to actually destroy the same documents
yourself ”). The new section also expanded prior law by
including within the provision’s reach “any matter within
the jurisdiction of any department or agency of the United
States.” Id., at 14–15.
In the Government’s view, §1519 extends beyond the
principal evil motivating its passage. The words of §1519,
the Government argues, support reading the provision as
a general ban on the spoliation of evidence, covering all
physical items that might be relevant to any matter under
federal investigation.
Yates urges a contextual reading of §1519, tying “tangible object” to the surrounding words, the placement of the
provision within the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, and related 
Cite as: 574 U. S. ____ (2015) 7
Opinion of GINSBURG, J.
provisions enacted at the same time, in particular §1520
and §1512(c)(1), see infra, at 10, 12–13. Section 1519, he
maintains, targets not all manner of evidence, but records,
documents, and tangible objects used to preserve them,
e.g., computers, servers, and other media on which information is stored.
We agree with Yates and reject the Government’s unrestrained reading. “Tangible object” in §1519, we conclude,
is better read to cover only objects one can use to record or
preserve information, not all objects in the physical world.


A.
The ordinary meaning of an “object” that is “tangible,”
as stated in dictionary definitions, is “a discrete . . . thing,”
Webster’s Third New International Dictionary 1555
(2002), that “possess[es] physical form,” Black’s Law Dictionary 1683 (10th ed. 2014). From this premise, the
Government concludes that “tangible object,” as that term
appears in §1519, covers the waterfront, including fish
from the sea.
Whether a statutory term is unambiguous, however,
does not turn solely on dictionary definitions of its component words. Rather, “[t]he plainness or ambiguity of
statutory language is determined [not only] by reference to
the language itself, [but as well by] the specific context in
which that language is used, and the broader context of
the statute as a whole.” Robinson v. Shell Oil Co., 519
U. S. 337, 341 (1997). See also Deal v. United States, 508
U. S. 129, 132 (1993) (it is a “fundamental principle of
statutory construction (and, indeed, of language itself)
that the meaning of a word cannot be determined in isolation, but must be drawn from the context in which it is
used”). Ordinarily, a word’s usage accords with its dictionary definition. In law as in life, however, the same
words, placed in different contexts, sometimes mean different things. We have several times affirmed that identical language
may convey varying content when used in different statutes, sometimes even in different provisions of the same
statute. See, e.g., FAA v. Cooper, 566 U. S. ___, ___–___
(2012), (slip op., at 6–7) (“actual damages” has different
meanings in different statutes); Wachovia Bank, N. A. v.
Schmidt, 546 U. S. 303, 313–314 (2006) (“located” has
different meanings in different provisions of the National
Bank Act); General Dynamics Land Systems, Inc. v. Cline,
540 U. S. 581, 595–597 (2004) (“age” has different meanings in different provisions of the Age Discrimination in
Employment Act of 1967); United States v. Cleveland
Indians Baseball Co., 532 U. S. 200, 213 (2001) (“wages
paid” has different meanings in different provisions of
Title 26 U. S. C.); Robinson, 519 U. S., at 342–344 (“employee” has different meanings in different sections of
Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964); Merrell Dow
Pharmaceuticals Inc. v. Thompson, 478 U. S. 804, 807–808
(1986) (“arising under” has different meanings in U. S.
Const., Art. III, §2, and 28 U. S. C. §1331); District of
Columbia v. Carter, 409 U. S. 418, 420–421 (1973) (“State
or Territory” has different meanings in 42 U. S. C. §1982
and §1983); Atlantic Cleaners & Dyers, Inc. v. United
States, 286 U. S. 427, 433–437 (1932) (“trade or commerce”
has different meanings in different sections of the Sherman Act). As the Court observed in Atlantic Cleaners &
Dyers, 286 U. S., at 433:
“Most words have different shades of meaning and
consequently may be variously construed . . . . Where
the subject matter to which the words refer is not the
same in the several places where [the words] are used,
or the conditions are different, or the scope of the legislative power exercised in one case is broader than
that exercised in another, the meaning well may vary
to meet the purposes of the law, to be arrived at by a consideration of the language in which those purposes
are expressed, and of the circumstances under which
the language was employed.”2
In short, although dictionary definitions of the words
“tangible” and “object” bear consideration, they are not
dispositive of the meaning of “tangible object” in §1519.
Supporting a reading of “tangible object,” as used in
§1519, in accord with dictionary definitions, the Government points to the appearance of that term in Federal
Rule of Criminal Procedure 16. That Rule requires the
prosecution to grant a defendant’s request to inspect
“tangible objects” within the Government’s control that
have utility for the defense. See Fed. Rule Crim. Proc.
16(a)(1)(E).
Rule 16’s reference to “tangible objects” has been interpreted to include any physical evidence. See 5 W. LaFave,
J. Israel, N. King, & O. Kerr, Criminal Procedure §20.3(g),
pp. 405–406, and n. 120 (3d ed. 2007). Rule 16 is a discovery rule designed to protect defendants by compelling the
prosecution to turn over to the defense evidence material
to the charges at issue. In that context, a comprehensive
construction of “tangible objects” is fitting. In contrast,
§1519 is a penal provision that refers to “tangible object”
not in relation to a request for information relevant to a
specific court proceeding, but rather in relation to federal
investigations or proceedings of every kind, including
those not yet begun.3 See Commissioner v. National Carbide Corp., 167 F. 2d 304, 306 (CA2 1948) (Hand, J.)
——————
2The dissent assiduously ignores all this, post, at 11–12, in insisting
that Congress wrote §1519 to cover, along with shredded corporate
documents, red grouper slightly smaller than the legal limit. 3For the same reason, we do not think the meaning of “tangible objects” (or “tangible things,” see Fed. Rule Civ. Proc. 26(b)) in other
discovery prescriptions cited by the Government leads to the conclusion
that “tangible object” in §1519 encompasses any and all physical
evidence existing on land or in the sea. 


(“words are chameleons, which reflect the color of their
environment”). Just as the context of Rule 16 supports
giving “tangible object” a meaning as broad as its dictionary definition, the context of §1519 tugs strongly in favor
of a narrower reading.


B.


Familiar interpretive guides aid our construction of the
words “tangible object” as they appear in §1519.
We note first §1519’s caption: “Destruction, alteration,
or falsification of records in Federal investigations and
bankruptcy.” That heading conveys no suggestion that the
section prohibits spoliation of any and all physical evidence, however remote from records. Neither does the
title of the section of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act in which
§1519 was placed, §802: “Criminal penalties for altering
documents.” 116 Stat. 800. Furthermore, §1520, the only
other provision passed as part of §802, is titled “Destruction of corporate audit records” and addresses only that
specific subset of records and documents. While these
headings are not commanding, they supply cues that
Congress did not intend “tangible object” in §1519 to
sweep within its reach physical objects of every kind,
including things no one would describe as records, documents, or devices closely associated with them. See
Almendarez-Torres v. United States, 523 U. S. 224, 234
(1998) (“[T]he title of a statute and the heading of a section are tools available for the resolution of a doubt about
the meaning of a statute.” (internal quotation marks
omitted)). If Congress indeed meant to make §1519 an allencompassing ban on the spoliation of evidence, as the
dissent believes Congress did, one would have expected a
clearer indication of that intent.
Section 1519’s position within Chapter 73 of Title 18
further signals that §1519 was not intended to serve as a
cross-the-board ban on the destruction of physical evidence of every kind. Congress placed §1519 (and its companion provision §1520) at the end of the chapter, following immediately after the pre-existing §1516, §1517, and
§1518, each of them prohibiting obstructive acts in specific
contexts. See §1516 (audits of recipients of federal funds);
§1517 (federal examinations of financial institutions);
§1518 (criminal investigations of federal health care offenses). See also S. Rep. No. 107–146, at 7 (observing that
§1517 and §1518 “apply to obstruction in certain limited
types of cases, such as bankruptcy fraud, examinations of
financial institutions, and healthcare fraud”).
But Congress did not direct codification of the SarbanesOxley Act’s other additions to Chapter 73 adjacent to these
specialized provisions. Instead, Congress directed placement of those additions within or alongside retained provisions that address obstructive acts relating broadly to
official proceedings and criminal trials: Section 806, “Civil
Action to protect against retaliation in fraud cases,” was
codified as §1514A and inserted between the pre-existing
§1514, which addresses civil actions to restrain harassment of victims and witnesses in criminal cases, and
§1515, which defines terms used in §1512 and §1513.
Section 1102, “Tampering with a record or otherwise
impeding an official proceeding,” was codified as §1512(c)
and inserted within the pre-existing §1512, which addresses tampering with a victim, witness, or informant to
impede any official proceeding. Section 1107, “Retaliation
against informants,” was codified as §1513(e) and inserted
within the pre-existing §1513, which addresses retaliation
against a victim, witness, or informant in any official
proceeding. Congress thus ranked §1519, not among the
broad proscriptions, but together with specialized provisions expressly aimed at corporate fraud and financial
audits. This placement accords with the view that Congress’ conception of §1519’s coverage was considerably more limited than the Government’s.4
The contemporaneous passage of §1512(c)(1), which was
contained in a section of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act discrete
from the section embracing §1519 and §1520, is also instructive. Section 1512(c)(1) provides:
“(c) Whoever corruptly—
“(1) alters, destroys, mutilates, or conceals a record,
document, or other object, or attempts to do so, with
the intent to impair the object’s integrity or availability for use in an official proceeding
. . . . .
“shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more
than 20 years, or both.”
The legislative history reveals that §1512(c)(1) was drafted
and proposed after §1519. See 148 Cong. Rec. 12518,
13088–13089 (2002). The Government argues, and Yates
does not dispute, that §1512(c)(1)’s reference to “other
object” includes any and every physical object. But if
§1519’s reference to “tangible object” already included all
physical objects, as the Government and the dissent contend, then Congress had no reason to enact §1512(c)(1):
Virtually any act that would violate §1512(c)(1) no doubt
would violate §1519 as well, for §1519 applies to “the
——————
4The dissent contends that nothing can be drawn from the placement
of §1519 because, before and after Sarbanes-Oxley, “all of Chapter 73
was ordered chronologically.” Post, at 9. The argument might have
some force if the factual premise were correct. In Sarbanes-Oxley,
Congress directed insertion of §1514A before §1518, then the last
section in Chapter 73. If, as the dissent argues, Congress adopted
§1519 to fill out §1512, post, at 6–7, it would have made more sense for
Congress to codify the substance of §1519 within §1512 or in a new
§1512A, rather than placing §1519 among specialized provisions.
Notably, in Sarbanes-Oxley, Congress added §1512(c)(1), “a broad ban
on evidence-spoliation,” cf. post, at 9, n. 2, to §1512, even though
§1512’s preexisting title and provisions all related to witnesstampering. 

investigation or proper administration of any matter
within the jurisdiction of any department or agency of the
United States . . . or in relation to or contemplation of any
such matter,” not just to “an official proceeding.”5
The Government acknowledges that, under its reading,
§1519 and §1512(c)(1) “significantly overlap.” Brief for
United States 49. Nowhere does the Government explain
what independent function §1512(c)(1) would serve if the
Government is right about the sweeping scope of §1519.
We resist a reading of §1519 that would render superfluous an entire provision passed in proximity as part of the
same Act.6 See Marx v. General Revenue Corp., 568 U. S.
___, ___ (2013) (slip op., at 14) (“[T]he canon against surplusage is strongest when an interpretation would render
superfluous another part of the same statutory scheme.”).
The words immediately surrounding “tangible object” in
§1519—“falsifies, or makes a false entry in any record [or]
——————
5Despite this sweeping “in relation to” language, the dissent remarkably suggests that §1519 does not “ordinarily operate in th[e] context
[of] federal court[s],” for those courts are not “department[s] or
agenc[ies].” Post, at 10. That suggestion, which, as one would expect,
lacks the Government’s endorsement, does not withstand examination.
The Senate Committee Report on §1519, on which the dissent elsewhere relies, see post, at 6, explained that an obstructive act is within
§1519’s scope if “done ‘in contemplation’ of or in relation to a matter or
investigation.” S. Rep. 107–146, at 15. The Report further informed
that §1519 “is . . . meant to do away with the distinctions, which some
courts have read into obstruction statutes, between court proceedings,
investigations, regulatory or administrative proceedings (whether
formal or not), and less formal government inquiries, regardless of their
title.” Ibid. If any doubt remained about the multiplicity of contexts in
which §1519 was designed to apply, the Report added, “[t]he intent of
the provision is simple; people should not be destroying, altering, or
falsifying documents to obstruct any government function.” Ibid. 6Furthermore, if “tangible object” in §1519 is read to include any
physical object, §1519 would prohibit all of the conduct proscribed by
§2232(a), which imposes a maximum penalty of five years in prison for
destroying or removing “property” to prevent its seizure by the Government. See supra, at 1–2. 


document”—also cabin the contextual meaning of that
term. As explained in Gustafson v. Alloyd Co., 513 U. S.
561, 575 (1995), we rely on the principle of noscitur a
sociis—a word is known by the company it keeps—to
“avoid ascribing to one word a meaning so broad that it is
inconsistent with its accompanying words, thus giving
unintended breadth to the Acts of Congress.” (internal
quotation marks omitted). See also United States v. Williams, 553 U. S. 285, 294 (2008) (“a word is given more
precise content by the neighboring words with which it is
associated”). In Gustafson, we interpreted the word
“communication” in §2(10) of the Securities Act of 1933 to
refer to a public communication, rather than any communication, because the word appeared in a list with other
words, notably “notice, circular, [and] advertisement,”
making it “apparent that the list refer[red] to documents
of wide dissemination.” 513 U. S., at 575–576. And we did
so even though the list began with the word “any.”
The noscitur a sociis canon operates in a similar manner
here. “Tangible object” is the last in a list of terms that
begins “any record [or] document.” The term is therefore
appropriately read to refer, not to any tangible object, but
specifically to the subset of tangible objects involving
records and documents, i.e., objects used to record or
preserve information. See United States Sentencing
Commission, Guidelines Manual §2J1.2, comment., n. 1
(Nov. 2014) (“‘Records, documents, or tangible objects’
includes (A) records, documents, or tangible objects that
are stored on, or that are, magnetic, optical, digital, other
electronic, or other storage mediums or devices; and (B)
wire or electronic communications.”).
This moderate interpretation of “tangible object” accords
with the list of actions §1519 proscribes. The section
applies to anyone who “alters, destroys, mutilates, conceals, covers up, falsifies, or makes a false entry in any
record, document, or tangible object” with the requisite 
Cite as: 574 U. S. ____ (2015) 15
Opinion of GINSBURG, J.
obstructive intent. (Emphasis added.) The last two verbs,
“falsif[y]” and “mak[e] a false entry in,” typically take as
grammatical objects records, documents, or things used to
record or preserve information, such as logbooks or hard
drives. See, e.g., Black’s Law Dictionary 720 (10th ed.
2014) (defining “falsify” as “[t]o make deceptive; to counterfeit, forge, or misrepresent; esp., to tamper with (a
document, record, etc.)”). It would be unnatural, for example, to describe a killer’s act of wiping his fingerprints
from a gun as “falsifying” the murder weapon. But it
would not be strange to refer to “falsifying” data stored on
a hard drive as simply “falsifying” a hard drive. Furthermore, Congress did not include on §1512(c)(1)’s list of
prohibited actions “falsifies” or “makes a false entry in.”
See §1512(c)(1) (making it unlawful to “alte[r], destro[y],
mutilat[e], or concea[l] a record, document, or other object”
with the requisite obstructive intent). That contemporaneous omission also suggests that Congress intended
“tangible object” in §1519 to have a narrower scope than
“other object” in §1512(c)(1).7
A canon related to noscitur a sociis, ejusdem generis,
counsels: “Where general words follow specific words in a
——————
7The dissent contends that “record, document, or tangible object” in
§1519 should be construed in conformity with “record, document, or
other object” in §1512(c)(1) because both provisions address “the same
basic problem.” Post, at 11–12. But why should that be so when
Congress prohibited in §1519 additional actions, specific to paper and
electronic documents and records, actions it did not prohibit in
§1512(c)(1)? When Congress passed Sarbanes-Oxley in 2002, courts
had already interpreted the phrase “alter, destroy, mutilate, or conceal
an object” in §1512(b)(2)(B) to apply to all types of physical evidence.
See, e.g., United States v. Applewhaite, 195 F. 3d 679, 688 (CA3 1999)
(affirming conviction under §1512(b)(2)(B) for persuading another
person to paint over blood spatter). Congress’ use of a formulation in
§1519 that did not track the one used in §1512(b)(2)(B) (and repeated in
§1512(c)(1)) suggests that Congress designed §1519 to be interpreted
apart from §1512, not in lockstep with it. 


statutory enumeration, the general words are [usually]
construed to embrace only objects similar in nature to
those objects enumerated by the preceding specific words.”
Washington State Dept. of Social and Health Servs. v.
Guardianship Estate of Keffeler, 537 U. S. 371, 384 (2003)
(internal quotation marks omitted). In Begay v. United
States, 553 U. S. 137, 142–143 (2008), for example, we
relied on this principle to determine what crimes were
covered by the statutory phrase “any crime . . . that . . . is
burglary, arson, or extortion, involves use of explosives, or
otherwise involves conduct that presents a serious potential risk of physical injury to another,” 18 U. S. C.
§924(e)(2)(B)(ii). The enumeration of specific crimes, we
explained, indicates that the “otherwise involves” provision covers “only similar crimes, rather than every crime
that ‘presents a serious potential risk of physical injury to
another.’” 553 U. S., at 142. Had Congress intended the
latter “all encompassing” meaning, we observed, “it is hard
to see why it would have needed to include the examples
at all.” Ibid. See also CSX Transp., Inc. v. Alabama Dept.
of Revenue, 562 U. S. 277, ___ (2011) (slip op., at 16) (“We
typically use ejusdem generis to ensure that a general
word will not render specific words meaningless.”). Just
so here. Had Congress intended “tangible object” in §1519
to be interpreted so generically as to capture physical
objects as dissimilar as documents and fish, Congress
would have had no reason to refer specifically to “record”
or “document.” The Government’s unbounded reading of
“tangible object” would render those words misleading
surplusage.
Having used traditional tools of statutory interpretation
to examine markers of congressional intent within the
Sarbanes-Oxley Act and §1519 itself, we are persuaded
that an aggressive interpretation of “tangible object” must
be rejected. It is highly improbable that Congress would
have buried a general spoliation statute covering objects of any and every kind in a provision targeting fraud in financial record-keeping.
The Government argues, however, that our inquiry
would be incomplete if we failed to consider the origins of
the phrase “record, document, or tangible object.” Congress drew that phrase, the Government says, from a 1962
Model Penal Code (MPC) provision, and reform proposals
based on that provision. The MPC provision and proposals prompted by it would have imposed liability on
anyone who “alters, destroys, mutilates, conceals, or removes a record, document or thing.” See ALI, MPC
§241.7(1), p. 175 (1962). Those proscriptions were understood to refer to all physical evidence. See MPC §241.7,
Comment 3, at 179 (1980) (provision “applies to any physical object”). Accordingly, the Government reasons, and
the dissent exuberantly agrees, post, at 4–5, Congress
must have intended §1519 to apply to the universe of
physical evidence.
The inference is unwarranted. True, the 1962 MPC
provision prohibited tampering with any kind of physical
evidence. But unlike §1519, the MPC provision did not
prohibit actions that specifically relate to records, documents, and objects used to record or preserve information.
The MPC provision also ranked the offense as a misdemeanor and limited liability to instances in which the
actor “believ[es] that an official proceeding or investigation
is pending or about to be instituted.” MPC §241.7(1), at
175. Yates would have had scant reason to anticipate a
felony prosecution, and certainly not one instituted at a
time when even the smallest of the fish he caught came
within the legal limit. See supra, at 4; cf. Bond v. United
States, 572 U. S. ___, ___ (2014), (slip op., at 14) (rejecting
“boundless reading” of a statutory term given “deeply
serious consequences” that reading would entail). A proposed federal offense in line with the MPC provision,
advanced by a federal commission in 1971, was similarly qualified. See Final Report of the National Commission
on Reform of Federal Criminal Laws §1323, pp. 116–117
(1971).
Section 1519 conspicuously lacks the limits built into
the MPC provision and the federal proposal. It describes
not a misdemeanor, but a felony punishable by up to 20
years in prison. And the section covers conduct intended
to impede any federal investigation or proceeding, including one not even on the verge of commencement. Given
these significant differences, the meaning of “record,
document, or thing” in the MPC provision and a kindred
proposal is not a reliable indicator of the meaning Congress assigned to “record, document, or tangible object” in
§1519. The MPC provision, in short, tells us neither “what
Congress wrote [nor] what Congress wanted,” cf. post, at
15, concerning Yates’s small fish as the subject of a federal
felony prosecution.


C.


Finally, if our recourse to traditional tools of statutory
construction leaves any doubt about the meaning of “tangible object,” as that term is used in §1519, we would
invoke the rule that “ambiguity concerning the ambit of
criminal statutes should be resolved in favor of lenity.”
Cleveland v. United States, 531 U. S. 12, 25 (2000) (quoting Rewis v. United States, 401 U. S. 808, 812 (1971)).
That interpretative principle is relevant here, where the
Government urges a reading of §1519 that exposes individuals to 20-year prison sentences for tampering with any
physical object that might have evidentiary value in any
federal investigation into any offense, no matter whether
the investigation is pending or merely contemplated, or
whether the offense subject to investigation is criminal or
civil. See Liparota v. United States, 471 U. S. 419, 427
(1985) (“Application of the rule of lenity ensures that
criminal statutes will provide fair warning concerning conduct rendered illegal and strikes the appropriate balance between the legislature, the prosecutor, and the court
in defining criminal liability.”). In determining the meaning of “tangible object” in §1519, “it is appropriate, before
we choose the harsher alternative, to require that Congress should have spoken in language that is clear and
definite.” See Cleveland, 531 U. S., at 25 (quoting United
States v. Universal C. I. T. Credit Corp., 344 U. S. 218, 222
(1952)). See also Jones v. United States, 529 U. S. 848,
858–859 (2000) (rule of lenity “reinforces” the conclusion
that arson of an owner-occupied residence is not subject to
federal prosecution under 18 U. S. C. §844(i) because such
a residence does not qualify as property “used in” commerce or commerce-affecting activity).8
——————
8The dissent cites United States v. McRae, 702 F. 3d 806, 834–838
(CA5 2012), United States v. Maury, 695 F. 3d 227, 243–244 (CA3
2012), and United States v. Natal, 2014 U. S. Dist. LEXIS 108852, *24–
*26 (Conn., Aug. 7, 2014), as cases that would not be covered by §1519
as we read it. Post, at 18–19. Those cases supply no cause for concern
that persons who commit “major” obstructive acts, id. at 18, will go
unpunished. The defendant in McRae, a police officer who seized a car
containing a corpse and then set it on fire, was also convicted for that
conduct under 18 U. S. C. §844(h) and sentenced to a term of 120
months’ imprisonment for that offense. See 702 F. 3d, at 817–818, 839–
840. The defendant in Natal, who repainted a van to cover up evidence
of a fatal arson, was also convicted of three counts of violating 18
U. S. C. §3 and sentenced to concurrent terms of 174 months’ imprisonment. See Judgment in United States v. Morales, No. 3:12–cr–164
(Conn., Jan. 12, 2015). And the defendant in Maury, a company convicted under §1519 of concealing evidence that a cement mixer’s safety
lock was disabled when a worker’s fingers were amputated, was also
convicted of numerous other violations, including three counts of
violating 18 U. S. C. §1505 for concealing evidence of other worker
safety violations. See 695 F. 3d, at 244–245. See also United States v.
Atlantic States Cast Iron Pipe Co., 2007 WL 2282514, *70 (NJ, Aug. 2,
2007) (setting forth charges against the company). For those violations,
the company was fined millions of dollars and ordered to operate under
the supervision of a court-appointed monitor. See 695 F. 3d, at 246. 


* * *
For the reasons stated, we resist reading §1519 expansively to create a coverall spoliation of evidence statute,
advisable as such a measure might be. Leaving that
important decision to Congress, we hold that a “tangible
object” within §1519’s compass is one used to record or
preserve information. The judgment of the U. S. Court of
Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit is therefore reversed, and
the case is remanded for further proceedings.
It is so ordered. 


_________________

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
No. 13–7451
JOHN L. YATES, PETITIONER v. UNITED STATES
ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF
APPEALS FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT

[February 25, 2015]
 JUSTICE ALITO, concurring in the judgment.


This case can and should be resolved on narrow
grounds. And though the question is close, traditional
tools of statutory construction confirm that John Yates has
the better of the argument. Three features of 18 U. S. C.
§1519 stand out to me: the statute’s list of nouns, its list of
verbs, and its title. Although perhaps none of these features by itself would tip the case in favor of Yates, the
three combined do so.
Start with the nouns. Section 1519 refers to “any record, document, or tangible object.” The noscitur a sociis
canon instructs that when a statute contains a list, each
word in that list presumptively has a “similar” meaning.
See, e.g., Gustafson v. Alloyd Co., 513 U. S. 561, 576
(1995). A related canon, ejusdem generis teaches that
general words following a list of specific words should
usually be read in light of those specific words to mean
something “similar.” See, e.g., Christopher v. SmithKline
Beecham Corp., 567 U. S. ___, ___ (2012) (slip op., at 18).
Applying these canons to §1519’s list of nouns, the term
“tangible object” should refer to something similar to
records or documents. A fish does not spring to mind—nor
does an antelope, a colonial farmhouse, a hydrofoil, or an
oil derrick. All are “objects” that are “tangible.” But who
wouldn’t raise an eyebrow if a neighbor, when asked to
identify something similar to a “record” or “document,” said “crocodile”?
This reading, of course, has its shortcomings. For instance, this is an imperfect ejusdem generis case because
“record” and “document” are themselves quite general.
And there is a risk that “tangible object” may be made
superfluous—what is similar to a “record” or “document”
but yet is not one? An e-mail, however, could be such a
thing. See United States Sentencing Commission, Guidelines Manual §2J1.2 and comment. (Nov. 2003) (reading
“records, documents, or tangible objects” to “includ[e]” what
is found on “magnetic, optical, digital, other electronic,
or other storage mediums or devices”). An e-mail, after
all, might not be a “document” if, as was “traditionally” so,
a document was a “piece of paper with information on it,”
not “information stored on a computer, electronic storage
device, or any other medium.” Black’s Law Dictionary
587–588 (10th ed. 2014). E-mails might also not be “records” if records are limited to “minutes” or other formal
writings “designed to memorialize [past] events.” Id., at
1465. A hard drive, however, is tangible and can contain
files that are precisely akin to even these narrow definitions. Both “record” and “document” can be read more
expansively, but adding “tangible object” to §1519 would
ensure beyond question that electronic files are included.
To be sure, “tangible object” presumably can capture more
than just e-mails; Congress enacts “catchall[s]” for “known
unknowns.” Republic of Iraq v. Beaty, 556 U. S. 848, 860
(2009). But where noscitur a sociis and ejusdem generis
apply, “known unknowns” should be similar to known
knowns, i.e., here, records and documents. This is especially true because reading “tangible object” too broadly
could render “record” and “document” superfluous.
Next, consider §1519’s list of verbs: “alters, destroys,
mutilates, conceals, covers up, falsifies, or makes a false
entry in.” Although many of those verbs could apply to
nouns as far-flung as salamanders, satellites, or sand dunes, the last phrase in the list—“makes a false entry in”—makes no sense outside of filekeeping. How does one
make a false entry in a fish? “Alters” and especially “falsifies” are also closely associated with filekeeping. Not one
of the verbs, moreover, cannot be applied to filekeeping—
certainly not in the way that “makes a false entry in” is
always inconsistent with the aquatic.
Again, the Government is not without a response. One
can imagine Congress trying to write a law so broadly that
not every verb lines up with every noun. But failure to
“line up” may suggest that something has gone awry in
one’s interpretation of a text. Where, as here, each of a
statute’s verbs applies to a certain category of nouns, there
is some reason to think that Congress had that category in
mind. Categories, of course, are often underinclusive or
overinclusive—§1519, for instance, applies to a bombthreatening letter but not a bomb. But this does not mean
that categories are not useful or that Congress does not
enact them. See, e.g., Vance v. Bradley, 440 U. S. 93, 108–
109 (1979). Here, focusing on the verbs, the category of
nouns appears to be filekeeping. This observation is not
dispositive, but neither is it nothing. The Government
also contends that §1519’s verbs cut both ways because it
is unnatural to apply “falsifies” to tangible objects, and
that is certainly true. One does not falsify the outside
casing of a hard drive, but one could falsify or alter data
physically recorded on that hard drive.
Finally, my analysis is influenced by §1519’s title: “Destruction, alteration, or falsification of records in Federal
investigations and bankruptcy.” (Emphasis added.) This
too points toward filekeeping, not fish. Titles can be useful devices to resolve “‘doubt about the meaning of a statute.’” Porter v. Nussle, 534 U. S. 516, 527–528 (2002)
(quoting Almendarez-Torres v. United States, 523 U. S.
224, 234 (1998)); see also Lawson v. FMR LLC, 571 U. S.
___, ___–___ (2014) (SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting) (slip op., at 4–6). The title is especially valuable here because it
reinforces what the text’s nouns and verbs independently
suggest—that no matter how other statutes might be read,
this particular one does not cover every noun in the universe with tangible form.
Titles, of course, are also not dispositive. Here, if the
list of nouns did not already suggest that “tangible object”
should mean something similar to records or documents,
especially when read in conjunction with §1519’s peculiar
list of verbs with their focus on filekeeping, then the title
would not be enough on its own. In conjunction with those
other two textual features, however, the Government’s
argument, though colorable, becomes too implausible to
accept. See, e.g., Washington State Dept. of Social and
Health Servs. v. Guardianship Estate of Keffeler, 537 U. S.
371, 384–385 (2003) (focusing on the “product of [two]
canons of construction” which was “confirmed” by other
interpretative evidence); cf. Al-Adahi v. Obama, 613 F. 3d
1102, 1105–1106 (CADC 2010) (aggregating evidence). 


_________________________


SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
No. 13–7451
JOHN L. YATES, PETITIONER v. UNITED STATES
ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF
APPEALS FOR THE ELEVENTH CIRCUIT

[February 25, 2015]
 JUSTICE KAGAN, with whom JUSTICE SCALIA, JUSTICE
KENNEDY, and JUSTICE THOMAS join, dissenting.


A criminal law, 18 U. S. C. §1519, prohibits tampering
with “any record, document, or tangible object” in an
attempt to obstruct a federal investigation. This case
raises the question whether the term “tangible object”
means the same thing in §1519 as it means in everyday
language—any object capable of being touched. The answer should be easy: Yes. The term “tangible object” is
broad, but clear. Throughout the U. S. Code and many
States’ laws, it invariably covers physical objects of all
kinds. And in §1519, context confirms what bare text
says: All the words surrounding “tangible object” show
that Congress meant the term to have a wide range. That
fits with Congress’s evident purpose in enacting §1519: to
punish those who alter or destroy physical evidence—any
physical evidence—with the intent of thwarting federal
law enforcement.
The plurality instead interprets “tangible object” to
cover “only objects one can use to record or preserve information.” Ante, at 7. The concurring opinion similarly,
if more vaguely, contends that “tangible object” should
refer to “something similar to records or documents”—and
shouldn’t include colonial farmhouses, crocodiles, or fish.
Ante, at 1 (ALITO, J., concurring in judgment). In my view,
conventional tools of statutory construction all lead to a more conventional result: A “tangible object” is an object
that’s tangible. I would apply the statute that Congress
enacted and affirm the judgment below.


I.


While the plurality starts its analysis with §1519’s
heading, see ante, at 10 (“We note first §1519’s caption”), I
would begin with §1519’s text. When Congress has not
supplied a definition, we generally give a statutory term
its ordinary meaning. See, e.g., Schindler Elevator Corp.
v. United States ex rel. Kirk, 563 U. S. ___, ___ (2011) (slip
op., at 5). As the plurality must acknowledge, the ordinary meaning of “tangible object” is “a discrete thing that
possesses physical form.” Ante, at 7 (punctuation and
citation omitted). A fish is, of course, a discrete thing that
possesses physical form. See generally Dr. Seuss, One
Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish (1960). So the ordinary
meaning of the term “tangible object” in §1519, as no
one here disputes, covers fish (including too-small red
grouper).
That interpretation accords with endless uses of the
term in statute and rule books as construed by courts.
Dozens of federal laws and rules of procedure (and hundreds of state enactments) include the term “tangible
object” or its first cousin “tangible thing”—some in association with documents, others not. See, e.g., 7 U. S. C.
§8302(2) (referring to “any material or tangible object that
could harbor a pest or disease”); 15 U. S. C. §57b–1(c)
(authorizing investigative demands for “documentary
material or tangible things”); 18 U. S. C. §668(a)(1)(D)
(defining “museum” as entity that owns “tangible objects
that are exhibited to the public”); 28 U. S. C. §2507(b)
(allowing discovery of “relevant facts, books, papers, documents or tangible things”).1 To my knowledge, no court
——————
1From Alabama and Alaska through Wisconsin and Wyoming (and 

has ever read any such provision to exclude things that
don’t record or preserve data; rather, all courts have adhered to the statutory language’s ordinary (i.e., expansive)
meaning. For example, courts have understood the
phrases “tangible objects” and “tangible things” in the
Federal Rules of Criminal and Civil Procedure to cover
everything from guns to drugs to machinery to . . . animals. See, e.g., United States v. Obiukwu, 17 F. 3d 816,
819 (CA6 1994) (per curiam) (handgun); United States v.
Acarino, 270 F. Supp. 526, 527–528 (EDNY 1967) (heroin);
In re Newman, 782 F. 2d 971, 972–975 (CA Fed. 1986)
(energy generation system); Martin v. Reynolds Metals
Corp., 297 F. 2d 49, 56–57 (CA9 1961) (cattle). No surprise, then, that—until today—courts have uniformly
applied the term “tangible object” in §1519 in the same
way. See, e.g., United States v. McRae, 702 F. 3d 806,
834–838 (CA5 2012) (corpse); United States v. Maury, 695
F. 3d 227, 243–244 (CA3 2012) (cement mixer).
That is not necessarily the end of the matter; I agree
with the plurality (really, who does not?) that context
matters in interpreting statutes. We do not “construe the
meaning of statutory terms in a vacuum.” Tyler v. Cain,
533 U. S. 656, 662 (2001). Rather, we interpret particular
words “in their context and with a view to their place in
the overall statutory scheme.” Davis v. Michigan Dept. of
Treasury, 489 U. S. 803, 809 (1989). And sometimes that
——————
trust me—in all that come between), States similarly use the terms
“tangible objects” and “tangible things” in statutes and rules of all
sorts. See, e.g., Ala. Code §34–17–1(3) (2010) (defining “landscape
architecture” to include the design of certain “tangible objects and
features”); Alaska Rule Civ. Proc. 34(a)(1) (2014) (allowing litigants to
“inspect, copy, test, or sample any tangible things” that constitute or
contain discoverable material); Wis. Stat. §804.09(1) (2014) (requiring
the production of “designated tangible things” in civil proceedings);
Wyo. Rule Crim. Proc. 41(h) (2014) (defining “property” for purposes of
a search-and-seizure statute to include “documents, books, papers and
any other tangible objects”). 


means, as the plurality says, that the dictionary definition
of a disputed term cannot control. See, e.g., Bloate v.
United States, 559 U. S. 196, 205, n. 9 (2010). But this is
not such an occasion, for here the text and its context
point the same way. Stepping back from the words “tangible object” provides only further evidence that Congress
said what it meant and meant what it said.
Begin with the way the surrounding words in §1519
reinforce the breadth of the term at issue. Section 1519
refers to “any” tangible object, thus indicating (in line with
that word’s plain meaning) a tangible object “of whatever
kind.” Webster’s Third New International Dictionary 97
(2002). This Court has time and again recognized that
“any” has “an expansive meaning,” bringing within a
statute’s reach all types of the item (here, “tangible object”) to which the law refers. Department of Housing and
Urban Development v. Rucker, 535 U. S. 125, 131 (2002);
see, e.g., Republic of Iraq v. Beaty, 556 U. S. 848, 856
(2009); Ali v. Federal Bureau of Prisons, 552 U. S. 214,
219–220 (2008). And the adjacent laundry list of verbs in
§1519 (“alters, destroys, mutilates, conceals, covers up,
falsifies, or makes a false entry”) further shows that Congress wrote a statute with a wide scope. Those words are
supposed to ensure—just as “tangible object” is meant to—
that §1519 covers the whole world of evidence-tampering,
in all its prodigious variety. See United States v. Rodgers,
466 U. S. 475, 480 (1984) (rejecting a “narrow, technical
definition” of a statutory term when it “clashes strongly”
with “sweeping” language in the same sentence).
Still more, “tangible object” appears as part of a threenoun phrase (including also “records” and “documents”)
common to evidence-tampering laws and always understood to embrace things of all kinds. The Model Penal
Code’s evidence-tampering section, drafted more than 50
years ago, similarly prohibits a person from “alter[ing],
destroy[ing], conceal[ing] or remov[ing] any record, document or thing” in an effort to thwart an official investigation or proceeding. ALI, Model Penal Code §241.7(1),
p. 175 (1962) (emphasis added). The Code’s commentary
emphasizes that the offense described in that provision is
“not limited to conduct that [alters] a written instrument.”
Id., §241.7, Comment 3, at 179. Rather, the language
extends to “any physical object.” Ibid. Consistent with
that statement—and, of course, with ordinary meaning—
courts in the more than 15 States that have laws based on
the Model Code’s tampering provision apply them to all
tangible objects, including drugs, guns, vehicles and . . .
yes, animals. See, e.g., State v. Majors, 318 S. W. 3d 850,
859–861 (Tenn. 2010) (cocaine); Puckett v. State, 328 Ark.
355, 357–360, 944 S. W. 2d 111, 113–114 (1997) (gun);
State v. Bruno, 236 Conn. 514, 519–520, 673 A. 2d 1117,
1122–1123 (1996) (bicycle, skeleton, blood stains); State v.
Crites, 2007 Mont. Dist. LEXIS 615, *5–*7 (Dec. 21, 2007)
(deer antlers). Not a one has limited the phrase’s scope to
objects that record or preserve information.
The words “record, document, or tangible object” in
§1519 also track language in 18 U. S. C. §1512, the federal
witness-tampering law covering (as even the plurality
accepts, see ante, at 12) physical evidence in all its forms.
Section 1512, both in its original version (preceding §1519)
and today, repeatedly uses the phrase “record, document,
or other object”—most notably, in a provision prohibiting
the use of force or threat to induce another person to
withhold any of those materials from an official proceeding. §4(a) of the Victim and Witness Protection Act of
1982, 96 Stat. 1249, as amended, 18 U. S. C. §1512(b)(2).
That language, which itself likely derived from the Model
Penal Code, encompasses no less the bloody knife than the
incriminating letter, as all courts have for decades agreed.
See, e.g., United States v. Kellington, 217 F. 3d 1084, 1088
(CA9 2000) (boat); United States v. Applewhaite, 195 F. 3d
679, 688 (CA3 1999) (stone wall). And typically “only the most compelling evidence” will persuade this Court that
Congress intended “nearly identical language” in provisions dealing with related subjects to bear different meanings. Communication Workers v. Beck, 487 U. S. 735, 754
(1988); see A. Scalia & B. Garner, Reading Law: The
Interpretation of Legal Texts 252 (2012). Context thus
again confirms what text indicates.
And legislative history, for those who care about it, puts
extra icing on a cake already frosted. Section 1519, as the
plurality notes, see ante, at 2, 6, was enacted after the
Enron Corporation’s collapse, as part of the SarbanesOxley Act of 2002, 116 Stat. 745. But the provision began
its life in a separate bill, and the drafters emphasized that
Enron was “only a case study exposing the shortcomings
in our current laws” relating to both “corporate and criminal” fraud. S. Rep. No. 107–146, pp. 2, 11 (2002). The
primary “loophole[]” Congress identified, see id., at 14,
arose from limits in the part of §1512 just described: That
provision, as uniformly construed, prohibited a person
from inducing another to destroy “record[s], document[s],
or other object[s]”—of every type—but not from doing so
himself. §1512(b)(2); see supra, at 5. Congress (as even
the plurality agrees, see ante, at 6) enacted §1519 to close
that yawning gap. But §1519 could fully achieve that goal
only if it covered all the records, documents, and objects
§1512 did, as well as all the means of tampering with
them. And so §1519 was written to do exactly that—“to
apply broadly to any acts to destroy or fabricate physical
evidence,” as long as performed with the requisite intent.
S. Rep. No. 107–146, at 14. “When a person destroys
evidence,” the drafters explained, “overly technical legal
distinctions should neither hinder nor prevent prosecution.” Id., at 7. Ah well: Congress, meet today’s Court,
which here invents just such a distinction with just such
an effect. See United States v. Philadelphia Nat. Bank,
374 U. S. 321, 343 (1963) (“[C]reat[ing] a large loophole in a statute designed to close a loophole” is “illogical and
disrespectful of . . . congressional purpose”).
As Congress recognized in using a broad term, giving
immunity to those who destroy non-documentary evidence
has no sensible basis in penal policy. A person who hides
a murder victim’s body is no less culpable than one who
burns the victim’s diary. A fisherman, like John Yates,
who dumps undersized fish to avoid a fine is no less
blameworthy than one who shreds his vessel’s catch log
for the same reason. Congress thus treated both offenders
in the same way. It understood, in enacting §1519, that
destroying evidence is destroying evidence, whether or not
that evidence takes documentary form.


II.

A.


The plurality searches far and wide for anything—
anything—to support its interpretation of §1519. But its
fishing expedition comes up empty.
The plurality’s analysis starts with §1519’s title: “Destruction, alteration, or falsification of records in Federal
investigations and bankruptcy.” See ante, at 10; see also
ante, at 3–4 (opinion of ALITO, J.). That’s already a sign
something is amiss. I know of no other case in which we
have begun our interpretation of a statute with the title,
or relied on a title to override the law’s clear terms. Instead, we have followed “the wise rule that the title of a
statute and the heading of a section cannot limit the plain
meaning of the text.” Trainmen v. Baltimore & Ohio
R. Co., 331 U. S. 519, 528–529 (1947).
The reason for that “wise rule” is easy to see: A title is,
almost necessarily, an abridgment. Attempting to mention every term in a statute “would often be ungainly as
well as useless”; accordingly, “matters in the text . . . are
frequently unreflected in the headings.” Id., at 528. Just
last year, this Court observed that two titles in a nearby 
section of Sarbanes-Oxley serve as “but a short-hand
reference to the general subject matter” of the provision at
issue, “not meant to take the place of the detailed provisions of the text.” Lawson v. FMR LLC, 571 U. S. ___, ___
(2014) (slip op., at 16) (quoting Trainmen, 331 U. S., at
528). The “under-inclusiveness” of the headings, we stated,
was “apparent.” Lawson, 571 U. S., at ___ (slip op., at
16). So too for §1519’s title, which refers to “destruction,
alteration, or falsification” but not to mutilation, concealment, or covering up, and likewise mentions “records” but
not other documents or objects. Presumably, the plurality
would not refuse to apply §1519 when a person only conceals evidence rather than destroying, altering, or falsifying it; instead, the plurality would say that a title is just a
title, which cannot “undo or limit” more specific statutory
text. Ibid. (quoting Trainmen, 331 U. S., at 529). The
same holds true when the evidence in question is not a
“record” but something else whose destruction, alteration,
etc., is intended to obstruct justice.
The plurality next tries to divine meaning from §1519’s
“position within Chapter 73 of Title 18.” Ante, at 10. But
that move is yet odder than the last. As far as I can tell,
this Court has never once suggested that the section number assigned to a law bears upon its meaning. Cf. Scalia,
supra, at xi–xvi (listing more than 50 interpretive principles and canons without mentioning the plurality’s new
number-in-the-Code theory). And even on its own terms,
the plurality’s argument is hard to fathom. The plurality
claims that if §1519 applied to objects generally, Congress
would not have placed it “after the pre-existing §1516,
§1517, and §1518” because those are “specialized provisions.” Ante, at 11. But search me if I can find a better
place for a broad ban on evidence-tampering. The plurality seems to agree that the law properly goes in Chapter
73—the criminal code’s chapter on “obstruction of justice.”
But the provision does not logically fit into any of that chapter’s pre-existing sections. And with the first 18
numbers of the chapter already taken (starting with §1501
and continuing through §1518), the law naturally took the
19th place. That is standard operating procedure. Prior
to the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002, all of Chapter 73 was
ordered chronologically: Section 1518 was later enacted
than §1517, which was later enacted than §1516, which
was . . . well, you get the idea. And after Sarbanes-Oxley,
Congress has continued in the same vein. Section 1519 is
thus right where you would expect it (as is the contemporaneously passed §1520)—between §1518 (added in 1996)
and §1521 (added in 2008).2
The plurality’s third argument, relying on the surplusage canon, at least invokes a known tool of statutory
construction—but it too comes to nothing. Says the plurality: If read naturally, §1519 “would render superfluous”
§1512(c)(1), which Congress passed “as part of the same
act.” Ante, at 13. But that is not so: Although the two
provisions significantly overlap, each applies to conduct
the other does not. The key difference between the two is
that §1519 protects the integrity of “matter[s] within the
jurisdiction of any [federal] department or agency” whereas
§1512(c)(1) safeguards “official proceeding[s]” as defined
in §1515(a)(1)(A). Section 1519’s language often applies
more broadly than §1512(c)(1)’s, as the plurality notes.
——————
2The lonesome exception to Chapter 73’s chronological order is
§1514A, added in Sarbanes-Oxley to create a civil action to protect
whistleblowers. Congress decided to place that provision right after the
only other section in Chapter 73 to authorize a civil action (that one to
protect victims and witnesses). The plurality, seizing on the §1514
example, says it likewise “would have made more sense for Congress to
codify the substance of §1519 within §1512 or in a new §1512A.” Ante,
at 12, n. 4. But §1512 is titled “Tampering with a witness, victim, or an
informant,” and its provisions almost all protect witnesses from intimidation and harassment. It makes perfect sense that Congress wanted a
broad ban on evidence-spoliation to stand on its own rather than as
part of—or an appendage to—a witness-tampering provision. 


For example, an FBI investigation counts as a matter
within a federal department’s jurisdiction, but falls outside the statutory definition of “official proceeding” as
construed by courts. See, e.g., United States v. Gabriel,
125 F. 3d 89, 105, n. 13 (CA2 1997). But conversely,
§1512(c)(1) sometimes reaches more widely than §1519.
For example, because an “official proceeding” includes any
“proceeding before a judge or court of the United States,”
§1512(c)(1) prohibits tampering with evidence in federal
litigation between private parties. See §1515(a)(1)(A);
United States v. Burge, 711 F. 3d 803, 808–810 (CA7
2013); United States v. Reich, 479 F. 3d 179, 185–187 (CA2
2007) (Sotomayor, J.). By contrast, §1519 wouldn’t ordinarily operate in that context because a federal court isn’t
a “department or agency.” See Hubbard v. United States,
514 U. S. 695, 715 (1995).3 So the surplusage canon
doesn’t come into play.4 Overlap—even significant overlap—abounds in the criminal law. See Loughrin v. United
——————
3The plurality’s objection to this statement is difficult to understand.
It cannot take issue with Hubbard’s holding that “a federal court is
neither a ‘department’ nor an ‘agency’ ” in a statute referring, just as
§1519 does, to “any matter within the jurisdiction of any department or
agency of the United States.” 514 U. S., at 698, 715. So the plurality
suggests that the phrase “in relation to . . . any such matter” in §1519
somehow changes Hubbard’s result. See ante, at 12–13, and n. 5. But
that phrase still demands that evidence-tampering relate to a “matter
within the jurisdiction of any department or agency”—excluding courts,
as Hubbard commands. That is why the federal government, as far as
I can tell, has never once brought a prosecution under §1519 for
evidence-tampering in litigation between private parties. It instead uses
§1512(c)(1) for that purpose. 4Section 1512(c)(1) also applies more broadly than §1519 in proceedings relating to insurance regulation. The term “official proceeding” in
§1512(c)(1) is defined to include “proceeding[s] involving the business of
insurance whose activities affect interstate commerce before any
insurance regulatory official or agency.” §1515(a)(1)(D). But §1519
wouldn’t usually apply in that context because state, not federal,
agencies handle most insurance regulation. 
Cite as: 574 U. S. ___ (2015) 11
KAGAN, J., dissenting
States, 573 U. S. ___, ___ – ___, n. 4 (2014) (slip op., at 6–7,
n. 4). This Court has never thought that of such ordinary
stuff surplusage is made. See ibid.; Connecticut Nat. Bank
v. Germain, 503 U. S. 249, 253 (1992).
And the legislative history to which the plurality appeals, see ante, at 6, only cuts against it because those
materials show that lawmakers knew that §1519 and
§1512(c)(1) share much common ground. Minority Leader
Lott introduced the amendment that included §1512(c)(1)
(along with other criminal and corporate fraud provisions)
late in the legislative process, explaining that he did so at
the specific request of the President. See 148 Cong. Rec.
12509, 12512 (2002) (remarks of Sen. Lott). Not only Lott
but several other Senators noted the overlap between the
President’s package and provisions already in the bill,
most notably §1519. See id., at 12512 (remarks of Sen.
Lott); id., at 12513 (remarks of Sen. Biden); id., at 12517
(remarks of Sens. Hatch and Gramm). The presence of
both §1519 and §1512(c)(1) in the final Act may have
reflected belt-and-suspenders caution: If §1519 contained
some flaw, §1512(c)(1) would serve as a backstop. Or the
addition of §1512(c)(1) may have derived solely from legislators’ wish “to satisfy audiences other than courts”—that
is, the President and his Justice Department. Gluck &
Bressman, Statutory Interpretation from the Inside, 65
Stan. L. Rev. 901, 935 (2013) (emphasis deleted). Whichever the case, Congress’s consciousness of overlap between
the two provisions removes any conceivable reason to cast
aside §1519’s ordinary meaning in service of preventing
some statutory repetition.
Indeed, the inclusion of §1512(c)(1) in Sarbanes-Oxley
creates a far worse problem for the plurality’s construction
of §1519 than for mine. Section 1512(c)(1) criminalizes the
destruction of any “record, document, or other object”;
§1519 of any “record, document, or tangible object.” On
the plurality’s view, one “object” is really an object, where-as the other is only an object that preserves or stores
information. But “[t]he normal rule of statutory construction assumes that identical words used in different parts
of the same act,” passed at the same time, “are intended to
have the same meaning.” Sorenson v. Secretary of Treasury, 475 U. S. 851, 860 (1986) (internal quotation marks
omitted). And that is especially true when the different
provisions pertain to the same subject. See supra, at 5–6.
The plurality doesn’t—really, can’t—explain why it instead interprets the same words used in two provisions of
the same Act addressing the same basic problem to mean
fundamentally different things.
Getting nowhere with surplusage, the plurality switches
canons, hoping that noscitur a sociis and ejusdem generis
will save it. See ante, at 13–16; see also ante, at 1–2 (opinion of ALITO, J.). The first of those related canons advises
that words grouped in a list be given similar meanings.
The second counsels that a general term following specific
words embraces only things of a similar kind. According
to the plurality, those Latin maxims change the English
meaning of “tangible object” to only things, like records
and documents, “used to record or preserve information.”
Ante, at 14.5 But understood as this Court always has, the
canons have no such transformative effect on the worka-
——————
5The plurality seeks support for this argument in the Sentencing
Commission’s construction of the phrase “records, documents, or
tangible objects,” ante, at 14, but to no avail. The plurality cites a note
in the Commission’s Manual clarifying that this phrase, as used in the
Sentencing Guidelines, “includes” various electronic information,
communications, and storage devices. United States Sentencing
Commission, Guidelines Manual §2J1.2, comment., n. 1 (Nov. 2014)
(USSG). But “includes” (following its ordinary definition) “is not
exhaustive,” as the Commission’s commentary makes explicit. USSG
§1B1.1, comment., n. 2. Otherwise, the Commission’s construction
wouldn’t encompass paper documents. All the note does is to make
plain that “records, documents, or tangible objects” embraces stuff
relating to the digital (as well as the material) world. 


day language Congress chose.
As an initial matter, this Court uses noscitur a sociis
and ejusdem generis to resolve ambiguity, not create it.
Those principles are “useful rule[s] of construction where
words are of obscure or doubtful meaning.” Russell Motor
Car Co. v. United States, 261 U. S. 514, 520 (1923). But
when words have a clear definition, and all other contextual clues support that meaning, the canons cannot
properly defeat Congress’s decision to draft broad legislation. See, e.g., Ali, 552 U. S., at 227 (rejecting the invocation of these canons as an “attempt to create ambiguity
where the statute’s text and structure suggest none”).
Anyway, assigning “tangible object” its ordinary meaning comports with noscitur a sociis and ejusdem generis
when applied, as they should be, with attention to §1519’s
subject and purpose. Those canons require identifying a
common trait that links all the words in a statutory
phrase. See, e.g., Graham County Soil and Water Conservation Dist. v. United States ex rel. Wilson, 559 U. S. 280,
289, n. 7 (2010); Ali, 552 U. S., at 224–226. In responding
to that demand, the plurality characterizes records and
documents as things that preserve information—and so
they are. But just as much, they are things that provide
information, and thus potentially serve as evidence relevant to matters under review. And in a statute pertaining
to obstruction of federal investigations, that evidentiary
function comes to the fore. The destruction of records and
documents prevents law enforcement agents from gathering facts relevant to official inquiries. And so too does the
destruction of tangible objects—of whatever kind. Whether
the item is a fisherman’s ledger or an undersized fish,
throwing it overboard has the identical effect on the administration of justice. See supra, at 7. For purposes of
§1519, records, documents, and (all) tangible objects are
therefore alike.
Indeed, even the plurality can’t fully credit its noscitur/ejusdem argument. The same reasoning would apply
to every law placing the word “object” (or “thing”) after
“record” and “document.” But as noted earlier, such statutes are common: The phrase appears (among other places)
in many state laws based on the Model Penal Code, as
well as in multiple provisions of §1512. See supra, at 4–5.
The plurality accepts that in those laws “object” means
object; its argument about superfluity positively depends
on giving §1512(c)(1) that broader reading. See ante, at
13, 16. What, then, is the difference here? The plurality
proposes that some of those statutes describe less serious
offenses than §1519. See ante, at 17. How and why that
distinction affects application of the noscitur a sociis and
ejusdem generis canons is left obscure: Count it as
one more of the plurality’s never-before-propounded,
not-readily-explained interpretive theories. See supra, at 7,
8–9, 11–12. But in any event, that rationale cannot support the plurality’s willingness to give “object” its natural
meaning in §1512, which (like §1519) sets out felonies
with penalties of up to 20 years. See §§1512(a)(3)(C), (b),
(c). The canons, in the plurality’s interpretive world,
apparently switch on and off whenever convenient.
And the plurality’s invocation of §1519’s verbs does
nothing to buttress its canon-based argument. See ante,
at 14–15; ante, at 2–3 (opinion of ALITO, J.). The plurality
observes that §1519 prohibits “falsif[ying]” or “mak[ing] a
false entry in” a tangible object, and no one can do those
things to, say, a murder weapon (or a fish). Ante, at 14.
But of course someone can alter, destroy, mutilate, conceal, or cover up such a tangible object, and §1519 prohibits
those actions too. The Court has never before suggested
that all the verbs in a statute need to match up with all
the nouns. See Robers v. United States, 572 U. S. ___, ___
(2014) (slip op., at 4) (“[T]he law does not require legislators to write extra language specifically exempting, phrase
by phrase, applications in respect to which a portion of a phrase is not needed”). And for good reason. It is exactly
when Congress sets out to draft a statute broadly—to
include every imaginable variation on a theme—that such
mismatches will arise. To respond by narrowing the law,
as the plurality does, is thus to flout both what Congress
wrote and what Congress wanted.
Finally, when all else fails, the plurality invokes the
rule of lenity. See ante, at 18. But even in its most robust
form, that rule only kicks in when, “after all legitimate
tools of interpretation have been exhausted, ‘a reasonable
doubt persists’ regarding whether Congress has made the
defendant’s conduct a federal crime.” Abramski v. United
States, 573 U. S. ___, ___ (2014) (SCALIA, J., dissenting)
(slip op., at 12) (quoting Moskal v. United States, 498 U. S.
103, 108 (1990)). No such doubt lingers here. The plurality points to the breadth of §1519, see ante, at 18, as
though breadth were equivalent to ambiguity. It is not.
Section 1519 is very broad. It is also very clear. Every
traditional tool of statutory interpretation points in the
same direction, toward “object” meaning object. Lenity
offers no proper refuge from that straightforward (even
though capacious) construction.6
——————
6As part of its lenity argument, the plurality asserts that Yates did
not have “fair warning” that his conduct amounted to a felony. Ante, at
18; see ante, at 17 (stating that “Yates would have had scant reason to
anticipate a felony prosecution” when throwing fish overboard). But
even under the plurality’s view, the dumping of fish is potentially a
federal felony—just under §1512(c)(1), rather than §1519. See ante, at
12–13. In any event, the plurality itself acknowledges that the ordinary meaning of §1519 covers Yates’s conduct, see ante, at 7: That
provision, no less than §1512(c)(1), announces its broad scope in the
clearest possible terms. And when an ordinary citizen seeks notice of a
statute’s scope, he is more likely to focus on the plain text than (as the
plurality would have it) on the section number, the superfluity principle, and the noscitur and ejusdem canons. 

B.


The concurring opinion is a shorter, vaguer version of
the plurality’s. It relies primarily on the noscitur a sociis
and ejusdem generis canons, tries to bolster them with
§1519’s “list of verbs,” and concludes with the section’s
title. See supra, at 7–8, 12–13, 14–15 (addressing each of
those arguments). (Notably, even the concurrence puts no
stock in the plurality’s section-number and superfluity
claims.) From those familiar materials, the concurrence
arrives at the following definition: “‘tangible object’ should
mean something similar to records or documents.” Ante,
at 4 (opinion of ALITO, J.). In amplifying that purported
guidance, the concurrence suggests applying the term
“tangible object” in keeping with what “a neighbor, when
asked to identify something similar to record or document,” might answer. Ante, at 1. “[W]ho wouldn’t raise an
eyebrow,” the concurrence wonders, if the neighbor said
“crocodile”? Ante, at 1–2. Courts sometimes say, when
explaining the Latin maxims, that the “words of a statute
should be interpreted consistent with their neighbors.”
See, e.g., United States v. Locke, 529 U. S. 89, 105 (2000).
The concurrence takes that expression literally.
But §1519’s meaning should not hinge on the odd game
of Mad Libs the concurrence proposes. No one reading
§1519 needs to fill in a blank after the words “records” and
“documents.” That is because Congress, quite helpfully,
already did so—adding the term “tangible object.” The
issue in this case is what that term means. So if the concurrence wishes to ask its neighbor a question, I’d recommend a more pertinent one: Do you think a fish (or, if the
concurrence prefers, a crocodile) is a “tangible object”? As
to that query, “who wouldn’t raise an eyebrow” if the
neighbor said “no”?
In insisting on its different question, the concurrence
neglects the proper function of catchall phrases like “or
tangible object.” The reason Congress uses such terms is precisely to reach things that, in the concurrence’s words,
“do[] not spring to mind”—to my mind, to my neighbor’s,
or (most important) to Congress’s. Ante, at 1 (opinion of
ALITO, J.). As this Court recently explained: “[T]he whole
value of a generally phrased residual [term] is that it
serves as a catchall for matters not specifically contemplated—known unknowns.” Beaty, 556 U. S., at 860.
Congress realizes that in a game of free association with
“record” and “document,” it will never think of all the
other things—including crocodiles and fish—whose destruction or alteration can (less frequently but just as
effectively) thwart law enforcement. Cf. United States v.
Stubbs, 11 F. 3d 632, 637–638 (CA6 1993) (dead crocodiles
used as evidence to support smuggling conviction). And so
Congress adds the general term “or tangible object”—
again, exactly because such things “do[] not spring to
mind.”7
The concurrence suggests that the term “tangible object”
serves not as a catchall for physical evidence but to “ensure beyond question” that e-mails and other electronic
files fall within §1519’s compass. Ante, at 2. But that
claim is eyebrow-raising in its own right. Would a Congress wishing to make certain that §1519 applies to
e-mails add the phrase “tangible object” (as opposed, say, to
“electronic communications”)? Would a judge or jury
member predictably find that “tangible object” encompasses something as virtual as e-mail (as compared, say,
——————
7The concurrence contends that when the noscitur and ejusdem canons are in play, “ ‘known unknowns’ should be similar to known
knowns, i.e., here, records and documents.” Ante, at 2. But as noted
above, records and documents are similar to crocodiles and fish as far
as §1519 is concerned: All are potentially useful as evidence in an
investigation. See supra, at 13. The concurrence never explains why
that similarity isn’t the relevant one in a statute aimed at evidencetampering. 


with something as real as a fish)? If not (and the answer
is not), then that term cannot function as a failsafe for
e-mails.
The concurrence acknowledges that no one of its arguments can carry the day; rather, it takes the Latin canons
plus §1519’s verbs plus §1519’s title to “tip the case” for
Yates. Ante, at 1. But the sum total of three mistaken
arguments is . . . three mistaken arguments. They do not
get better in the combining. And so the concurrence ends
up right where the plurality does, except that the concurrence, eschewing the rule of lenity, has nothing to fall back on.


III.


If none of the traditional tools of statutory interpretation can produce today’s result, then what accounts for it?
The plurality offers a clue when it emphasizes the disproportionate penalties §1519 imposes if the law is read
broadly. See ante, at 17–18. Section 1519, the plurality
objects, would then “expose[] individuals to 20-year prison
sentences for tampering with any physical object that
might have evidentiary value in any federal investigation
into any offense.” Ante, at 18. That brings to the surface
the real issue: overcriminalization and excessive punishment in the U. S. Code.
Now as to this statute, I think the plurality somewhat—
though only somewhat—exaggerates the matter. The
plurality omits from its description of §1519 the requirement that a person act “knowingly” and with “the intent to
impede, obstruct, or influence” federal law enforcement.
And in highlighting §1519’s maximum penalty, the plurality glosses over the absence of any prescribed minimum.
(Let’s not forget that Yates’s sentence was not 20 years,
but 30 days.) Congress presumably enacts laws with high
maximums and no minimums when it thinks the prohibited
conduct may run the gamut from major to minor. That 
is assuredly true of acts obstructing justice. Compare this
case with the following, all of which properly come within,
but now fall outside, §1519: McRae, 702 F. 3d, at 834–838
(burning human body to thwart murder investigation);
Maury, 695 F. 3d, at 243–244 (altering cement mixer to
impede inquiry into amputation of employee’s fingers);
United States v. Natal, 2014 U. S. Dist. LEXIS 108852,
*24–*26 (D Conn., Aug. 7, 2014) (repainting van to cover
up evidence of fatal arson). Most district judges, as Congress knows, will recognize differences between such cases
and prosecutions like this one, and will try to make the
punishment fit the crime. Still and all, I tend to think, for
the reasons the plurality gives, that §1519 is a bad law—
too broad and undifferentiated, with too-high maximum
penalties, which give prosecutors too much leverage and
sentencers too much discretion. And I’d go further: In
those ways, §1519 is unfortunately not an outlier, but an
emblem of a deeper pathology in the federal criminal code.
But whatever the wisdom or folly of §1519, this Court
does not get to rewrite the law. “Resolution of the pros
and cons of whether a statute should sweep broadly or
narrowly is for Congress.” Rodgers, 466 U. S., at 484. If
judges disagree with Congress’s choice, we are perfectly
entitled to say so—in lectures, in law review articles, and
even in dicta. But we are not entitled to replace the statute Congress enacted with an alternative of our own design.
I respectfully dissent. 

1.2.3 Required Readings 1.2.3 Required Readings

1.3 WEEK 3: Originalist Statutory Interpretation: Legislative Supremacy & Judicial Power 1.3 WEEK 3: Originalist Statutory Interpretation: Legislative Supremacy & Judicial Power

1.3.1 King v. Burwell 1.3.1 King v. Burwell

576 U.S. 473

Opinion [Link]

Argument [Link]

NOTE: Where it is feasible, a syllabus (headnote) will be released, as is being done in connection with this case, at the time the opinion is issued.The syllabus constitutes no part of the opinion of the Court but has been prepared by the Reporter of Decisions for the convenience of the reader.See United States v. Detroit Timber & Lumber Co., 200 U. S. 321 .

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES

Syllabus

KING et al. v. BURWELL, SECRETARY OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES, et al.

certiorari to the united states court of appeals for the fourth circuit

No. 14–114. Argued March 4, 2015—Decided June 25, 2015

The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act grew out of a long history of failed health insurance reform. In the 1990s, several States sought to expand access to coverage by imposing a pair of insurance market regulations—a “guaranteed issue” requirement, which bars insurers from denying coverage to any person because of his health, and a “community rating” requirement, which bars insurers from charging a person higher premiums for the same reason. The reforms achieved the goal of expanding access to coverage, but they also encouraged people to wait until they got sick to buy insurance. The result was an economic “death spiral”: premiums rose, the number of people buying insurance declined, and insurers left the market entirely. In 2006, however, Massachusetts discovered a way to make the guaranteed issue and community rating requirements work—by requiring individuals to buy insurance and by providing tax credits to certain individuals to make insurance more affordable. The combination of these three reforms—insurance market regulations, a coverage mandate, and tax credits—enabled Massachusetts to drastically reduce its uninsured rate.

The Affordable Care Act adopts a version of the three key reforms that made the Massachusetts system successful. First, the Act adopts the guaranteed issue and community rating requirements. 42 U. S. C. §§300gg, 300gg–1. Second, the Act generally requires individuals to maintain health insurance coverage or make a payment to the IRS, unless the cost of buying insurance would exceed eight percent of that individual’s income. 26 U. S. C. §5000A. And third, the Act seeks to make insurance more affordable by giving refundable tax credits to individuals with household incomes between 100 percent and 400 percent of the federal poverty line. §36B.

In addition to those three reforms, the Act requires the creation of an “Exchange” in each State—basically, a marketplace that allows people to compare and purchase insurance plans. The Act gives each State the opportunity to establish its own Exchange, but provides that the Federal Government will establish “such Exchange” if the State does not. 42 U. S. C. §§18031, 18041. Relatedly, the Act provides that tax credits “shall be allowed” for any “applicable taxpayer,” 26 U. S. C. §36B(a), but only if the taxpayer has enrolled in an insurance plan through “an Exchange established by the State under [ 42 U. S. C. §18031],” §§36B(b)–(c). An IRS regulation interprets that language as making tax credits available on “an Exchange,” 26 CFR §1.36B–2, “regardless of whether the Exchange is established and operated by a State . . . or by HHS,” 45 CFR §155.20.

Petitioners are four individuals who live in Virginia, which has a Federal Exchange. They do not wish to purchase health insurance. In their view, Virginia’s Exchange does not qualify as “an Exchange established by the State under [ 42 U. S. C. §18031],” so they should not receive any tax credits. That would make the cost of buying insurance more than eight percent of petitioners’ income, exempting them from the Act’s coverage requirement. As a result of the IRS Rule, however, petitioners would receive tax credits. That would make the cost of buying insurance less than eight percent of their income, which would subject them to the Act’s coverage requirement.

Petitioners challenged the IRS Rule in Federal District Court. The District Court dismissed the suit, holding that the Act unambiguously made tax credits available to individuals enrolled through a Federal Exchange. The Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit affirmed. The Fourth Circuit viewed the Act as ambiguous, and deferred to the IRS’s interpretation under Chevron U. S. A. Inc. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc., 467 U. S. 837 .

Held: Section 36B’s tax credits are available to individuals in States that have a Federal Exchange. Pp. 7–21.

(a) When analyzing an agency’s interpretation of a statute, this Court often applies the two-step framework announced in Chevron, 467 U. S. 837 . But Chevron does not provide the appropriate framework here. The tax credits are one of the Act’s key reforms and whether they are available on Federal Exchanges is a question of deep “economic and political significance”; had Congress wished to assign that question to an agency, it surely would have done so expressly. And it is especially unlikely that Congress would have delegated this decision to the IRS, which has no expertise in crafting health insurance policy of this sort.

It is instead the Court’s task to determine the correct reading of Section 36B. If the statutory language is plain, the Court must enforce it according to its terms. But oftentimes the meaning—or ambiguity—of certain words or phrases may only become evident when placed in context. So when deciding whether the language is plain, the Court must read the words “in their context and with a view to their place in the overall statutory scheme.” FDA v. Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corp., 529 U. S. 120 . Pp. 7–9.

(b) When read in context, the phrase “an Exchange established by the State under [ 42 U. S. C. §18031]” is properly viewed as ambiguous. The phrase may be limited in its reach to State Exchanges. But it could also refer to all Exchanges—both State and Federal—for purposes of the tax credits. If a State chooses not to follow the directive in Section 18031 to establish an Exchange, the Act tells the Secretary of Health and Human Services to establish “such Exchange.” §18041. And by using the words “such Exchange,” the Act indicates that State and Federal Exchanges should be the same. But State and Federal Exchanges would differ in a fundamental way if tax credits were available only on State Exchanges—one type of Exchange would help make insurance more affordable by providing billions of dollars to the States’ citizens; the other type of Exchange would not. Several other provisions in the Act—e.g., Section 18031(i)(3)(B)’s requirement that all Exchanges create outreach programs to “distribute fair and impartial information concerning . . . the availability of premium tax credits under section 36B”—would make little sense if tax credits were not available on Federal Exchanges.

The argument that the phrase “established by the State” would be superfluous if Congress meant to extend tax credits to both State and Federal Exchanges is unpersuasive. This Court’s “preference for avoiding surplusage constructions is not absolute.” Lamie v. United States Trustee, 540 U. S. 526 . And rigorous application of that canon does not seem a particularly useful guide to a fair construction of the Affordable Care Act, which contains more than a few examples of inartful drafting. The Court nevertheless must do its best, “bearing in mind the ‘fundamental canon of statutory construction that the words of a statute must be read in their context and with a view to their place in the overall statutory scheme.’ ” Utility Air Regulatory Group v. EPA, 573 U. S. ___, ___. Pp. 9–15.

(c) Given that the text is ambiguous, the Court must look to the broader structure of the Act to determine whether one of Section 36B’s “permissible meanings produces a substantive effect that is compatible with the rest of the law.” United Sav. Assn. of Tex. v. Timbers of Inwood Forest Associates, Ltd., 484 U. S. 365 .

Here, the statutory scheme compels the Court to reject petitioners’ interpretation because it would destabilize the individual insurance market in any State with a Federal Exchange, and likely create the very “death spirals” that Congress designed the Act to avoid. Under petitioners’ reading, the Act would not work in a State with a Federal Exchange. As they see it, one of the Act’s three major reforms—the tax credits—would not apply. And a second major reform—the coverage requirement—would not apply in a meaningful way, because so many individuals would be exempt from the requirement without the tax credits. If petitioners are right, therefore, only one of the Act’s three major reforms would apply in States with a Federal Exchange.The combination of no tax credits and an ineffective coverage requirement could well push a State’s individual insurance market into a death spiral. It is implausible that Congress meant the Act to operate in this manner. Congress made the guaranteed issue and community rating requirements applicable in every State in the Nation, but those requirements only work when combined with the coverage requirement and tax credits. It thus stands to reason that Congress meant for those provisions to apply in every State as well. Pp. 15–19.

(d) The structure of Section 36B itself also suggests that tax credits are not limited to State Exchanges. Together, Section 36B(a), which allows tax credits for any “applicable taxpayer,” and Section 36B(c)(1), which defines that term as someone with a household income between 100 percent and 400 percent of the federal poverty line, appear to make anyone in the specified income range eligible for a tax credit. According to petitioners, however, those provisions are an empty promise in States with a Federal Exchange. In their view, an applicable taxpayer in such a State would be eligible for a tax credit, but the amount of that tax credit would always be zero because of two provisions buried deep within the Tax Code. That argument fails because Congress “does not alter the fundamental details of a regulatory scheme in vague terms or ancillary provisions.” Whitman v. American Trucking Assns., Inc., 531 U. S. 457 . Pp. 19–20.

(e) Petitioners’ plain-meaning arguments are strong, but the Act’s context and structure compel the conclusion that Section 36B allows tax credits for insurance purchased on any Exchange created under the Act. Those credits are necessary for the Federal Exchanges to function like their State Exchange counterparts, and to avoid the type of calamitous result that Congress plainly meant to avoid. Pp. 20–21.

759 F. 3d 358, affirmed.

Roberts, C. J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which Kennedy, Ginsburg, Breyer, Sotomayor, and Kagan, JJ., joined. Scalia, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which Thomas and Alito, JJ., joined.

 

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES

_________________

No. 14–114

_________________

DAVID KING, et al., PETITIONERS v. SYLVIA BURWELL, SECRETARY OF HEALTHAND HUMAN SERVICES, et al.

on writ of certiorari to the united states court of appeals for the fourth circuit

[June 25, 2015]

Chief Justice Roberts delivered the opinion of the Court.

The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act adopts a series of interlocking reforms designed to expand coverage in the individual health insurance market. First, the Act bars insurers from taking a person’s health into account when deciding whether to sell health insurance or how much to charge. Second, the Act generally requires each person to maintain insurance coverage or make a payment to the Internal Revenue Service. And third, the Act gives tax credits to certain people to make insurance more affordable.

In addition to those reforms, the Act requires the creation of an “Exchange” in each State—basically, a marketplace that allows people to compare and purchase insurance plans. The Act gives each State the opportunity to establish its own Exchange, but provides that the Federal Government will establish the Exchange if the State does not.

This case is about whether the Act’s interlocking reforms apply equally in each State no matter who establishes the State’s Exchange. Specifically, the question pre-sented is whether the Act’s tax credits are available in States that have a Federal Exchange.

I

A

The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, 124Stat. 119, grew out of a long history of failed health insurance reform. In the 1990s, several States began experimenting with ways to expand people’s access to coverage. One common approach was to impose a pair of insurance market regulations—a “guaranteed issue” requirement, which barred insurers from denying coverage to any person because of his health, and a “community rating” requirement, which barred insurers from charging a person higher premiums for the same reason. Together, those requirements were designed to ensure that anyone who wanted to buy health insurance could do so.

The guaranteed issue and community rating requirements achieved that goal, but they had an unintended consequence: They encouraged people to wait until they got sick to buy insurance. Why buy insurance coverage when you are healthy, if you can buy the same coverage for the same price when you become ill? This consequence—known as “adverse selection”—led to a second: Insurers were forced to increase premiums to account for the fact that, more and more, it was the sick rather than the healthy who were buying insurance. And that consequence fed back into the first: As the cost of insurance rose, even more people waited until they became ill tobuy it.

This led to an economic “death spiral.” As premiums rose higher and higher, and the number of people buying insurance sank lower and lower, insurers began to leave the market entirely. As a result, the number of people without insurance increased dramatically.

This cycle happened repeatedly during the 1990s. For example, in 1993, the State of Washington reformed its individual insurance market by adopting the guaranteed issue and community rating requirements. Over the next three years, premiums rose by 78 percent and the number of people enrolled fell by 25 percent. By 1999, 17 of the State’s 19 private insurers had left the market, and the remaining two had announced their intention to do so. Brief for America’s Health Insurance Plans as Amicus Curiae 10–11.

For another example, also in 1993, New York adopted the guaranteed issue and community rating requirements. Over the next few years, some major insurers in the individual market raised premiums by roughly 40 percent. By 1996, these reforms had “effectively eliminated the commercial individual indemnity market in New York with the largest individual health insurer exiting the market.” L. Wachenheim & H. Leida, The Impact of Guaranteed Issue and Community Rating Reforms on States’ Individual Insurance Markets 38 (2012).

In 1996, Massachusetts adopted the guaranteed issue and community rating requirements and experienced similar results. But in 2006, Massachusetts added two more reforms: The Commonwealth required individuals to buy insurance or pay a penalty, and it gave tax credits to certain individuals to ensure that they could afford the insurance they were required to buy. Brief for Bipartisan Economic Scholars as Amici Curiae 24–25. The combination of these three reforms—insurance market regulations, a coverage mandate, and tax credits—reduced the uninsured rate in Massachusetts to 2.6 percent, by far the lowest in the Nation. Hearing on Examining Individual State Experiences with Health Care Reform Coverage Initiatives in the Context of National Reform before the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions, 111th Cong., 1st Sess., 9 (2009).

B

The Affordable Care Act adopts a version of the three key reforms that made the Massachusetts system successful. First, the Act adopts the guaranteed issue and community rating requirements. The Act provides that “each health insurance issuer that offers health insurance coverage in the individual . . . market in a State must accept every . . . individual in the State that applies for such coverage.” 42 U. S. C. §300gg–1(a). The Act also bars insurers from charging higher premiums on the basis of a person’s health. §300gg.

Second, the Act generally requires individuals to maintain health insurance coverage or make a payment to the IRS. 26 U. S. C. §5000A. Congress recognized that, without an incentive, “many individuals would wait to purchase health insurance until they needed care.” 42 U. S. C. §18091(2)(I). So Congress adopted a coverage requirement to “minimize this adverse selection and broaden the health insurance risk pool to include healthy individuals, which will lower health insurance premiums.” Ibid. In Congress’s view, that coverage requirement was “essential to creating effective health insurance markets.” Ibid. Congress also provided an exemption from the coverage requirement for anyone who has to spend more than eight percent of his income on health insurance. 26 U. S. C. §§5000A(e)(1)(A), (e)(1)(B)(ii).

Third, the Act seeks to make insurance more affordable by giving refundable tax credits to individuals with household incomes between 100 percent and 400 percent of the federal poverty line. §36B. Individuals who meet the Act’s requirements may purchase insurance with the tax credits, which are provided in advance directly to the individual’s insurer. 42 U. S. C. §§18081, 18082.

These three reforms are closely intertwined. As noted, Congress found that the guaranteed issue and community rating requirements would not work without the coverage requirement. §18091(2)(I). And the coverage requirement would not work without the tax credits. The reason is that, without the tax credits, the cost of buying insurance would exceed eight percent of income for a large number of individuals, which would exempt them from the coverage requirement. Given the relationship between these three reforms, the Act provided that they should take effect on the same day—January 1, 2014. See Affordable Care Act, §1253, redesignated §1255, 124Stat. 162, 895; §§1401(e), 1501(d), id., at 220, 249.

C

In addition to those three reforms, the Act requires the creation of an “Exchange” in each State where peoplecan shop for insurance, usually online. 42 U. S. C. §18031(b)(1). An Exchange may be created in one of two ways. First, the Act provides that “[e]ach State shall . . . establish an American Health Benefit Exchange . . . for the State.” Ibid. Second, if a State nonetheless chooses not to establish its own Exchange, the Act provides that the Secretary of Health and Human Services “shall . . . establish and operate such Exchange within the State.” §18041(c)(1).

The issue in this case is whether the Act’s tax credits are available in States that have a Federal Exchange rather than a State Exchange. The Act initially provides that tax credits “shall be allowed” for any “applicable taxpayer.” 26 U. S. C. §36B(a). The Act then provides that the amount of the tax credit depends in part on whether the taxpayer has enrolled in an insurance plan through “an Exchange established by the State under section 1311 of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act [hereinafter 42 U. S. C. §18031].” 26 U. S. C. §§36B(b)–(c) (emphasis added).

The IRS addressed the availability of tax credits by promulgating a rule that made them available on both State and Federal Exchanges. 77 Fed. Reg. 30378 (2012). As relevant here, the IRS Rule provides that a taxpayer is eligible for a tax credit if he enrolled in an insurance plan through “an Exchange,” 26 CFR §1.36B–2 (2013), which is defined as “an Exchange serving the individual market . . . regardless of whether the Exchange is established and operated by a State . . . or by HHS,” 45 CFR §155.20 (2014). At this point, 16 States and the District of Columbia have established their own Exchanges; the other 34 States have elected to have HHS do so.

D

Petitioners are four individuals who live in Virginia, which has a Federal Exchange. They do not wish to purchase health insurance. In their view, Virginia’s Exchange does not qualify as “an Exchange established by the State under [ 42 U. S. C. §18031],” so they should not receive any tax credits. That would make the cost of buying insurance more than eight percent of their income, which would exempt them from the Act’s coverage requirement. 26 U. S. C. §5000A(e)(1).

Under the IRS Rule, however, Virginia’s Exchange would qualify as “an Exchange established by the State under [ 42 U. S. C. §18031],” so petitioners would receive tax credits. That would make the cost of buying insurance less than eight percent of petitioners’ income, which would subject them to the Act’s coverage requirement. The IRS Rule therefore requires petitioners to either buy health insurance they do not want, or make a payment to the IRS.

Petitioners challenged the IRS Rule in Federal District Court. The District Court dismissed the suit, holding that the Act unambiguously made tax credits available to individuals enrolled through a Federal Exchange. King v. Sebelius, 997 F. Supp. 2d 415 (ED Va. 2014). The Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit affirmed. 759 F. 3d 358 (2014). The Fourth Circuit viewed the Act as “ambiguous and subject to at least two different interpretations.” Id., at 372. The court therefore deferred to the IRS’s interpretation under Chevron U. S. A. Inc. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc., 467 U. S. 837 (1984) . 759 F. 3d, at 376.

The same day that the Fourth Circuit issued its decision, the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit vacated the IRS Rule in a different case, holding that the Act “unambiguously restricts” the tax credits to State Exchanges. Halbig v. Burwell, 758 F. 3d 390, 394 (2014). We granted certiorari in the present case. 574 U. S. ___ (2014).

II

The Affordable Care Act addresses tax credits in what is now Section 36B of the Internal Revenue Code. That section provides: “In the case of an applicable taxpayer, there shall be allowed as a credit against the tax imposed by this subtitle . . . an amount equal to the premium assistance credit amount.” 26 U. S. C. §36B(a). Section 36B then defines the term “premium assistance credit amount” as “the sum of the premium assistance amounts determined under paragraph (2) with respect to all coverage months of the taxpayer occurring during the taxable year.” §36B(b)(1) (emphasis added). Section 36B goes on to define the two italicized terms—“premium assistance amount” and “coverage month”—in part by referring to an insurance plan that is enrolled in through “an Exchange established by the State under [ 42 U. S. C. §18031].” 26 U. S. C. §§36B(b)(2)(A), (c)(2)(A)(i).

The parties dispute whether Section 36B authorizes tax credits for individuals who enroll in an insurance plan through a Federal Exchange. Petitioners argue that a Federal Exchange is not “an Exchange established by the State under [ 42 U. S. C. §18031],” and that the IRS Rule therefore contradicts Section 36B. Brief for Petitioners 18–20. The Government responds that the IRS Rule is lawful because the phrase “an Exchange established by the State under [ 42 U. S. C. §18031]” should be read to include Federal Exchanges. Brief for Respondents 20–25.

When analyzing an agency’s interpretation of a statute, we often apply the two-step framework announced in Chevron, 467 U. S. 837 . Under that framework, we ask whether the statute is ambiguous and, if so, whether the agency’s interpretation is reasonable. Id., at 842–843. This approach “is premised on the theory that a statute’s ambiguity constitutes an implicit delegation from Congress to the agency to fill in the statutory gaps.” FDA v. Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corp., 529 U. S. 120, 159 (2000) . “In extraordinary cases, however, there may be reason to hesitate before concluding that Congress has intended such an implicit delegation.” Ibid.

This is one of those cases. The tax credits are among the Act’s key reforms, involving billions of dollars in spending each year and affecting the price of health insurance for millions of people. Whether those credits are available on Federal Exchanges is thus a question of deep “economic and political significance” that is central to this statutory scheme; had Congress wished to assign that question to an agency, it surely would have done so expressly. Utility Air Regulatory Group v. EPA, 573 U. S. ___, ___ (2014) (slip op., at 19) (quoting Brown & Williamson, 529 U. S., at 160). It is especially unlikely that Congress would have delegated this decision to the IRS, which has no expertise in crafting health insurance policy of this sort. See Gonzales v. Oregon, 546 U. S. 243 –267 (2006). This is not a case for the IRS.

It is instead our task to determine the correct reading of Section 36B. If the statutory language is plain, we must enforce it according to its terms. Hardt v. Reliance Standard Life Ins. Co., 560 U. S. 242, 251 (2010) . But oftentimes the “meaning—or ambiguity—of certain words or phrases may only become evident when placed in context.” Brown & Williamson, 529 U. S., at 132. So when deciding whether the language is plain, we must read the words “in their context and with a view to their place in the overall statutory scheme.” Id., at 133 (internal quotation marks omitted). Our duty, after all, is “to construe statutes, not isolated provisions.” Graham County Soil and Water Conservation Dist. v. United States ex rel. Wilson, 559 U. S. 280, 290 (2010) (internal quotation marks omitted).

A

We begin with the text of Section 36B. As relevant here, Section 36B allows an individual to receive tax credits only if the individual enrolls in an insurance plan through “an Exchange established by the State under [ 42 U. S. C. §18031].” In other words, three things must be true: First, the individual must enroll in an insurance plan through “an Exchange.” Second, that Exchange must be “established by the State.” And third, that Exchange must be established “under [ 42 U. S. C. §18031].” We address each requirement in turn.

First, all parties agree that a Federal Exchange qualifies as “an Exchange” for purposes of Section 36B. See Brief for Petitioners 22; Brief for Respondents 22. Section 18031 provides that “[e]ach State shall . . . establish an American Health Benefit Exchange . . . for the State.” §18031(b)(1). Although phrased as a requirement, the Act gives the States “flexibility” by allowing them to “elect” whether they want to establish an Exchange. §18041(b). If the State chooses not to do so, Section 18041 provides that the Secretary “shall . . . establish and operatesuch Exchange within the State.” §18041(c)(1) (emphasis added).

By using the phrase “such Exchange,” Section 18041 instructs the Secretary to establish and operate the same Exchange that the State was directed to establish under Section 18031. See Black’s Law Dictionary 1661 (10th ed. 2014) (defining “such” as “That or those; having just been mentioned”). In other words, State Exchanges and Fed-eral Exchanges are equivalent—they must meet the same requirements, perform the same functions, and serve the same purposes. Although State and Federal Exchanges are established by different sovereigns, Sections 18031 and 18041 do not suggest that they differ in any meaningful way. A Federal Exchange therefore counts as “an Exchange” under Section 36B.

Second, we must determine whether a Federal Exchange is “established by the State” for purposes of Section 36B. At the outset, it might seem that a Federal Exchange cannot fulfill this requirement. After all, the Act defines “State” to mean “each of the 50 States and the District of Columbia”—a definition that does not include the Federal Government. 42 U. S. C. §18024(d). But when read in context, “with a view to [its] place in the overall statutory scheme,” the meaning of the phrase “established by the State” is not so clear. Brown &Williamson, 529 U. S., at 133 (internal quotation marks omitted).

After telling each State to establish an Exchange, Section 18031 provides that all Exchanges “shall make available qualified health plans to qualified individuals.” 42 U. S. C. §18031(d)(2)(A). Section 18032 then defines the term “qualified individual” in part as an individual who “resides in the State that established the Exchange.” §18032(f)(1)(A). And that’s a problem: If we give the phrase “the State that established the Exchange” its most natural meaning, there would be no “qualified individuals” on Federal Exchanges. But the Act clearly contemplates that there will be qualified individuals on every Exchange. As we just mentioned, the Act requires all Exchanges to “make available qualified health plans to qualified individuals”—something an Exchange could not do if there were no such individuals. §18031(d)(2)(A). And the Act tells the Exchange, in deciding which health plans to offer, to consider “the interests of qualified individuals . . . in the State or States in which such Exchange operates”—again, something the Exchange could not do if qualified individ-uals did not exist. §18031(e)(1)(B). This problem arises repeatedly throughout the Act. See, e.g., §18031(b)(2) (allowing a State to create “one Exchange . . . for providing . . . services to both qualified individuals and qualified small employers,” rather than creating separate Exchanges for those two groups).[1]

These provisions suggest that the Act may not always use the phrase “established by the State” in its most natural sense. Thus, the meaning of that phrase may not be as clear as it appears when read out of context.

Third, we must determine whether a Federal Exchange is established “under [ 42 U. S. C. §18031].” This too might seem a requirement that a Federal Exchange cannot fulfill, because it is Section 18041 that tells the Secretary when to “establish and operate such Exchange.” But here again, the way different provisions in the statute interact suggests otherwise.

The Act defines the term “Exchange” to mean “an American Health Benefit Exchange established under section 18031.” §300gg–91(d)(21). If we import that definition into Section 18041, the Act tells the Secretary to “establish and operate such ‘American Health Benefit Exchange established under section 18031.’ ” That suggests that Section 18041 authorizes the Secretary to establish an Exchange under Section 18031, not (or not only) under Section 18041. Otherwise, the Federal Exchange, by definition, would not be an “Exchange” at all. See Halbig, 758 F. 3d, at 399–400 (acknowledging that the Secretary establishes Federal Exchanges under Section 18031).

This interpretation of “under [ 42 U. S. C. §18031]” fits best with the statutory context. All of the requirements that an Exchange must meet are in Section 18031, so it is sensible to regard all Exchanges as established under that provision. In addition, every time the Act uses the word “Exchange,” the definitional provision requires that we substitute the phrase “Exchange established under section 18031.” If Federal Exchanges were not established under Section 18031, therefore, literally none of the Act’s requirements would apply to them. Finally, the Act repeatedly uses the phrase “established under [ 42 U. S. C. §18031]” in situations where it would make no sense to distinguish between State and Federal Exchanges. See, e.g., 26 U. S. C. §125(f)(3)(A) (2012 ed., Supp. I) (“The term ‘qualified benefit’ shall not include any qualified health plan . . . offered through an Exchange established under [ 42 U. S. C. §18031]”); 26 U. S. C. §6055(b)(1)(B)(iii)(I) (2012 ed.) (requiring insurers to report whether each insurance plan they provided “is a qualified health plan offered through an Exchange established under [ 42 U. S. C. §18031]”). A Federal Exchange may therefore be considered one established “under [ 42 U. S. C. §18031].”

The upshot of all this is that the phrase “an Exchange established by the State under [ 42 U. S. C. §18031]” is properly viewed as ambiguous. The phrase may be limited in its reach to State Exchanges. But it is also possible that the phrase refers to all Exchanges—both State and Federal—at least for purposes of the tax credits. If a State chooses not to follow the directive in Section 18031 that it establish an Exchange, the Act tells the Secretary to establish “such Exchange.” §18041. And by using the words “such Exchange,” the Act indicates that State and Federal Exchanges should be the same. But State and Federal Exchanges would differ in a fundamental way if tax credits were available only on State Exchanges—one type of Exchange would help make insurance more affordable by providing billions of dollars to the States’ citizens; the other type of Exchange would not.[2]

The conclusion that Section 36B is ambiguous is further supported by several provisions that assume tax credits will be available on both State and Federal Exchanges. For example, the Act requires all Exchanges to create outreach programs that must “distribute fair and impartial information concerning . . . the availability of premium tax credits under section 36B.” §18031(i)(3)(B). The Act also requires all Exchanges to “establish and make avail-able by electronic means a calculator to determine the actual cost of coverage after the application of any pre-mium tax credit under section 36B.” §18031(d)(4)(G). And the Act requires all Exchanges to report to the Treasury Secretary information about each health plan they sell, including the “aggregate amount of any advance payment of such credit,” “[a]ny information . . . necessary to determine eligibility for, and the amount of, such credit,” and any “[i]nformation necessary to determine whether a taxpayer has received excess advance payments.” 26 U. S. C. §36B(f)(3). If tax credits were not available on Federal Exchanges, these provisions would make little sense.

Petitioners and the dissent respond that the words “established by the State” would be unnecessary if Congress meant to extend tax credits to both State and Fed-eral Exchanges. Brief for Petitioners 20; post, at 4–5. But “our preference for avoiding surplusage constructions is not absolute.” Lamie v. United States Trustee, 540 U. S. 526, 536 (2004) ; see also Marx v. General Revenue Corp., 568 U. S. ___, ___ (2013) (slip op., at 13) (“The canon against surplusage is not an absolute rule”). And specifically with respect to this Act, rigorous application of the canon does not seem a particularly useful guide to a fair construction of the statute.

The Affordable Care Act contains more than a few examples of inartful drafting. (To cite just one, the Act creates three separate Section 1563s. See 124Stat. 270, 911, 912.) Several features of the Act’s passage contributed to that unfortunate reality. Congress wrote key partsof the Act behind closed doors, rather than through “the traditional legislative process.” Cannan, A Legislative History of the Affordable Care Act: How Legislative Procedure Shapes Legislative History, 105 L. Lib. J. 131, 163 (2013). And Congress passed much of the Act using a complicated budgetary procedure known as “reconciliation,” which limited opportunities for debate and amendment, and bypassed the Senate’s normal 60-vote filibuster requirement. Id., at 159–167. As a result, the Act does not reflect the type of care and deliberation that one might expect of such significant legislation. Cf. Frankfurter, Some Reflections on the Reading of Statutes, 47 Colum. L. Rev. 527, 545 (1947) (describing a cartoon “in which a senator tells his colleagues ‘I admit this new bill is too complicated to understand. We’ll just have to pass it to find out what it means.’ ”).

Anyway, we “must do our best, bearing in mind the fundamental canon of statutory construction that the words of a statute must be read in their context and with a view to their place in the overall statutory scheme.” Util-ity Air Regulatory Group, 573 U. S., at ___ (slip op., at 15) (internal quotation marks omitted). After reading Section 36B along with other related provisions in the Act, we cannot conclude that the phrase “an Exchange established by the State under [Section 18031]” is unambiguous.

B

Given that the text is ambiguous, we must turn to the broader structure of the Act to determine the meaning of Section 36B. “A provision that may seem ambiguous in isolation is often clarified by the remainder of the statu-tory scheme . . . because only one of the permissible meanings produces a substantive effect that is compatible with the rest of the law.” United Sav. Assn. of Tex. v. Timbers of Inwood Forest Associates, Ltd., 484 U. S. 365, 371 (1988) . Here, the statutory scheme compels us to reject petitioners’ interpretation because it would destabilize the individual insurance market in any State with a Federal Exchange, and likely create the very “death spirals” that Congress designed the Act to avoid. See New York State Dept. of Social Servs. v. Dublino, 413 U. S. 405 –420 (1973) (“We cannot interpret federal statutes to negate their own stated purposes.”).[3]

As discussed above, Congress based the Affordable Care Act on three major reforms: first, the guaranteed issue and community rating requirements; second, a requirement that individuals maintain health insurance coverage or make a payment to the IRS; and third, the tax credits for individuals with household incomes between 100 percent and 400 percent of the federal poverty line. In a State that establishes its own Exchange, these three reforms work together to expand insurance coverage. The guaranteed issue and community rating requirements ensure that anyone can buy insurance; the coverage requirement creates an incentive for people to do so before they get sick; and the tax credits—it is hoped—make insurance more affordable. Together, those reforms “minimize . . . adverse selection and broaden the health in-surance risk pool to include healthy individuals, which will lower health insurance premiums.” 42 U. S. C. §18091(2)(I).

Under petitioners’ reading, however, the Act would operate quite differently in a State with a Federal Exchange. As they see it, one of the Act’s three major reforms—the tax credits—would not apply. And a second major reform—the coverage requirement—would not apply in a meaningful way. As explained earlier, the coverage requirement applies only when the cost of buying health insurance (minus the amount of the tax credits) is less than eight percent of an individual’s income. 26 U. S. C. §§5000A(e)(1)(A), (e)(1)(B)(ii). So without the tax credits, the coverage requirement would apply to fewer individuals. And it would be a lot fewer. In 2014, approximately 87 percent of people who bought insurance on a Federal Exchange did so with tax credits, and virtually all of those people would become exempt. HHS, A. Burke, A. Misra, & S. Sheingold, Premium Affordability, Competition, and Choice in the Health Insurance Marketplace 5 (2014); Brief for Bipartisan Economic Scholars as Amici Curiae 19–20. If petitioners are right, therefore, only one of the Act’s three major reforms would apply in States with a Federal Exchange.

The combination of no tax credits and an ineffective coverage requirement could well push a State’s individual insurance market into a death spiral. One study predicts that premiums would increase by 47 percent and enrollment would decrease by 70 percent. E. Saltzman & C. Eibner, The Effect of Eliminating the Affordable Care Act’s Tax Credits in Federally Facilitated Marketplaces (2015). Another study predicts that premiums would increase by 35 percent and enrollment would decrease by 69 percent. L. Blumberg, M. Buettgens, & J. Holahan, The Implications of a Supreme Court Finding for the Plaintiff in King vs. Burwell: 8.2 Million More Uninsured and 35% Higher Premiums (2015). And those effects would not be limited to individuals who purchase insurance on the Exchanges. Because the Act requires insurers to treat the entire individual market as a single risk pool, 42 U. S. C. §18032(c)(1), premiums outside the Exchange would rise along with those inside the Exchange. Brief for Bipartisan Economic Scholars as Amici Curiae 11–12.

It is implausible that Congress meant the Act to operate in this manner. See National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius, 567 U. S. ___, ___ (2012) (Scalia, Kennedy, Thomas, and Alito, JJ., dissenting) (slip op., at 60) (“Without the federal subsidies . . . the exchanges would not operate as Congress intended and may not operate at all.”). Congress made the guaranteed issue and community rating requirements applicable in every State in the Nation. But those requirements only work when combined with the coverage requirement and the tax credits. So it stands to reason that Congress meant for those provisions to apply in every State as well.[4]

Petitioners respond that Congress was not worried about the effects of withholding tax credits from States with Federal Exchanges because “Congress evidently believed it was offering states a deal they would not refuse.” Brief for Petitioners 36. Congress may have been wrong about the States’ willingness to establish their own Exchanges, petitioners continue, but that does not allow this Court to rewrite the Act to fix that problem. That is particularly true, petitioners conclude, because the States likely would have created their own Exchanges in the absence of the IRS Rule, which eliminated any incentive that the States had to do so. Id., at 36–38.

Section 18041 refutes the argument that Congress believed it was offering the States a deal they would not refuse. That section provides that, if a State elects not to establish an Exchange, the Secretary “shall . . . establish and operate such Exchange within the State.” 42 U. S. C. §18041(c)(1)(A). The whole point of that provision is to create a federal fallback in case a State chooses not to establish its own Exchange. Contrary to petitioners’ argument, Congress did not believe it was offering States a deal they would not refuse—it expressly addressed what would happen if a State did refuse the deal.

C

Finally, the structure of Section 36B itself suggests that tax credits are not limited to State Exchanges. Section 36B(a) initially provides that tax credits “shall be allowed” for any “applicable taxpayer.” Section 36B(c)(1) then defines an “applicable taxpayer” as someone who (among other things) has a household income between 100 percent and 400 percent of the federal poverty line. Together, these two provisions appear to make anyone in the specified income range eligible to receive a tax credit.

According to petitioners, however, those provisions are an empty promise in States with a Federal Exchange. In their view, an applicable taxpayer in such a State would be eligible for a tax credit—but the amount of that tax credit would always be zero. And that is because—diving several layers down into the Tax Code—Section 36B says that the amount of the tax credits shall be “an amount equal to the premium assistance credit amount,” §36B(a); and then says that the term “premium assistance credit amount” means “the sum of the premium assistance amounts determined under paragraph (2) with respect to all coverage months of the taxpayer occurring during the taxable year,” §36B(b)(1); and then says that the term “premium assistance amount” is tied to the amount of the monthly premium for insurance purchased on “an Exchange established by the State under [42 U. S. C. §18031],” §36B(b)(2); and then says that the term “coverage month” means any month in which the taxpayer has insurance through “an Exchange established by the State under [ 42 U. S. C. §18031],” §36B(c)(2)(A)(i).

We have held that Congress “does not alter the fundamental details of a regulatory scheme in vague terms or ancillary provisions.” Whitman v. American Trucking Assns., Inc., 531 U. S. 457, 468 (2001) . But in petitioners’ view, Congress made the viability of the entire Affordable Care Act turn on the ultimate ancillary provision: a sub-sub-sub section of the Tax Code. We doubt that is what Congress meant to do. Had Congress meant to limit tax credits to State Exchanges, it likely would have done so in the definition of “applicable taxpayer” or in some other prominent manner. It would not have used such a winding path of connect-the-dots provisions about the amount of the credit.[5]

D

Petitioners’ arguments about the plain meaning of Section 36B are strong. But while the meaning of the phrase “an Exchange established by the State under [ 42 U. S. C. §18031]” may seem plain “when viewed in isolation,” such a reading turns out to be “untenable in light of [the statute] as a whole.” Department of Revenue of Ore. v. ACF Industries, Inc., 510 U. S. 332, 343 (1994) . In this instance, the context and structure of the Act compel us to depart from what would otherwise be the most natural reading of the pertinent statutory phrase.

Reliance on context and structure in statutory interpretation is a “subtle business, calling for great wariness lest what professes to be mere rendering becomes creation and attempted interpretation of legislation becomes legislation itself.” Palmer v. Massachusetts, 308 U. S. 79, 83 (1939) . For the reasons we have given, however, such reliance is appropriate in this case, and leads us to conclude that Section 36B allows tax credits for insurance purchased on any Exchange created under the Act. Those credits are necessary for the Federal Exchanges to function like their State Exchange counterparts, and to avoid the type of calamitous result that Congress plainly meant to avoid.

*  *  *

In a democracy, the power to make the law rests with those chosen by the people. Our role is more confined—“to say what the law is.” Marbury v. Madison, 1 Cranch 137, 177 (1803). That is easier in some cases than in others. But in every case we must respect the role of the Legislature, and take care not to undo what it has done. A fair reading of legislation demands a fair understanding of the legislative plan.

Congress passed the Affordable Care Act to improve health insurance markets, not to destroy them. If at all possible, we must interpret the Act in a way that is consistent with the former, and avoids the latter. Section 36B can fairly be read consistent with what we see as Congress’s plan, and that is the reading we adopt.

The judgment of the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit is

Affirmed.

Notes
1  The dissent argues that one would “naturally read instructions about qualified individuals to be inapplicable to the extent a particular Exchange has no such individuals.” Post, at 10–11 (Scalia, J., dissenting). But the fact that the dissent’s interpretation would make so many parts of the Act “inapplicable” to Federal Exchanges is precisely what creates the problem. It would be odd indeed for Congress to write such detailed instructions about customers on a State Exchange, while having nothing to say about those on a Federal Exchange.
2  The dissent argues that the phrase “such Exchange” does not suggest that State and Federal Exchanges “are in all respects equivalent.” Post, at 8. In support, it quotes the Constitution’s Elections Clause, which makes the state legislature primarily responsible for prescribing election regulations, but allows Congress to “make or alter such Regulations.” Art. I, §4, cl. 1. No one would say that state and federal election regulations are in all respects equivalent, the dissent contends, so we should not say that State and Federal Exchanges are. But the Elections Clause does not precisely define what an election regulation must look like, so Congress can prescribe regulations that differ from what the State would prescribe. The Affordable Care Act does precisely define what an Exchange must look like, however, so a Federal Exchange cannot differ from a State Exchange.
3  The dissent notes that several other provisions in the Act use the phrase “established by the State,” and argues that our holding applies to each of those provisions. Post, at 5–6. But “the presumption of consistent usage readily yields to context,” and a statutory term may mean different things in different places. Utility Air Regulatory Group v. EPA, 573 U. S. ___, ___ (2014) (slip op., at 15) (internal quotation marks omitted). That is particularly true when, as here, “the Act is far from a chef d’oeuvre of legislative draftsmanship.” Ibid. Because the other provisions cited by the dissent are not at issue here, we do not address them.
4  The dissent argues that our analysis “show[s] only that the statu-tory scheme contains a flaw,” one “that appeared as well in other parts of the Act.” Post, at 14. For support, the dissent notes that the guaranteed issue and community rating requirements might apply in the federal territories, even though the coverage requirement does not. Id., at 14–15. The confusion arises from the fact that the guaranteed issue and community rating requirements were added as amendments to the Public Health Service Act, which contains a definition of the word “State” that includes the territories, 42 U. S. C. §201(f), while the later-enacted Affordable Care Act contains a definition of the word “State” that excludes the territories, §18024(d). The predicate for the dissent’s point is therefore uncertain at best.
5  The dissent cites several provisions that “make[ ] taxpayers of all States eligible for a credit, only to provide later that the amount of the credit may be zero.” Post, at 11 (citing 26 U. S. C. §§24, 32, 35, 36). None of those provisions, however, is crucial to the viability of a comprehensive program like the Affordable Care Act. No one suggests, for example, that the first-time-homebuyer tax credit, §36, is essential to the viability of federal housing regulation.

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES

_________________

No. 14–114

_________________

DAVID KING, et al., PETITIONERS v. SYLVIA BURWELL, SECRETARY OF HEALTHAND HUMAN SERVICES, et al.

on writ of certiorari to the united states court of appeals for the fourth circuit

[June 25, 2015]

 

Justice Scalia, with whom Justice Thomas and Justice Alito join, dissenting.

The Court holds that when the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act says “Exchange established by the State” it means “Exchange established by the State or the Federal Government.” That is of course quite absurd, and the Court’s 21 pages of explanation make it no less so.

I

The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act makes major reforms to the American health-insurance market. It provides, among other things, that every State “shall . . . establish an American Health Benefit Exchange”—a marketplace where people can shop for health-insurance plans. 42 U. S. C. §18031(b)(1). And it provides that if a State does not comply with this instruction, the Secretary of Health and Human Services must “establish and operate such Exchange within the State.” §18041(c)(1).

A separate part of the Act—housed in §36B of the Internal Revenue Code—grants “premium tax credits” to subsidize certain purchases of health insurance made on Exchanges. The tax credit consists of “premium assistance amounts” for “coverage months.” 26 U. S. C. §36B(b)(1). An individual has a coverage month only when he is covered by an insurance plan “that was enrolled in through an Exchange established by the State under [§18031].” §36B(c)(2)(A). And the law ties the size of the premium assistance amount to the premiums for health plans which cover the individual “and which were enrolled in through an Exchange established by the State under [§18031].” §36B(b)(2)(A). The premium assistance amount further depends on the cost of certain other insurance plans “offered through the same Exchange.” §36B(b)(3)(B)(i).

This case requires us to decide whether someone who buys insurance on an Exchange established by the Secretary gets tax credits. You would think the answer would be obvious—so obvious there would hardly be a need for the Supreme Court to hear a case about it. In order to receive any money under §36B, an individual must enroll in an insurance plan through an “Exchange established by the State.” The Secretary of Health and Human Services is not a State. So an Exchange established by the Secretary is not an Exchange established by the State—which means people who buy health insurance through such an Exchange get no money under §36B.

Words no longer have meaning if an Exchange that is not established by a State is “established by the State.” It is hard to come up with a clearer way to limit tax credits to state Exchanges than to use the words “established by the State.” And it is hard to come up with a reason to include the words “by the State” other than the purpose of limiting credits to state Exchanges. “[T]he plain, obvious, and rational meaning of a statute is always to be preferred to any curious, narrow, hidden sense that nothing but the exigency of a hard case and the ingenuity and study of an acute and powerful intellect would discover.” Lynch v. Alworth-Stephens Co., 267 U. S. 364, 370 (1925) (internal quotation marks omitted). Under all the usual rules of interpretation, in short, the Government should lose this case. But normal rules of interpretation seem always to yield to the overriding principle of the present Court: The Affordable Care Act must be saved.

II

The Court interprets §36B to award tax credits on both federal and state Exchanges. It accepts that the “most natural sense” of the phrase “Exchange established by the State” is an Exchange established by a State. Ante, at 11. (Understatement, thy name is an opinion on the Afford-able Care Act!) Yet the opinion continues, with no semblance of shame, that “it is also possible that the phrase refers to all Exchanges—both State and Federal.” Ante, at 13. (Impossible possibility, thy name is an opinion on the Affordable Care Act!) The Court claims that “the context and structure of the Act compel [it] to depart from what would otherwise be the most natural reading of the pertinent statutory phrase.” Ante, at 21.

I wholeheartedly agree with the Court that sound interpretation requires paying attention to the whole law, not homing in on isolated words or even isolated sections. Context always matters. Let us not forget, however, why context matters: It is a tool for understanding the terms of the law, not an excuse for rewriting them.

Any effort to understand rather than to rewrite a law must accept and apply the presumption that lawmakers use words in “their natural and ordinary signification.” Pensacola Telegraph Co. v. Western Union Telegraph Co., 96 U. S. 1, 12 (1878) . Ordinary connotation does not always prevail, but the more unnatural the proposed interpretation of a law, the more compelling the contex-tual evidence must be to show that it is correct. Today’s interpretation is not merely unnatural; it is unheard of. Who would ever have dreamt that “Exchange established by the State” means “Exchange established by the State or the Federal Government”? Little short of an express statutory definition could justify adopting this singular reading. Yet the only pertinent definition here provides that “State” means “each of the 50 States and the District of Columbia.” 42 U. S. C. §18024(d). Because the Secretary is neither one of the 50 States nor the District of Columbia, that definition positively contradicts the eccentric theory that an Exchange established by the Secretary has been established by the State.

Far from offering the overwhelming evidence of meaning needed to justify the Court’s interpretation, other contextual clues undermine it at every turn. To begin with, other parts of the Act sharply distinguish between the establishment of an Exchange by a State and the establishment of an Exchange by the Federal Government. The States’ authority to set up Exchanges comes from one provision, §18031(b); the Secretary’s authority comes from an entirely different provision, §18041(c). Funding for States to establish Exchanges comes from one part of the law, §18031(a); funding for the Secretary to establish Exchanges comes from an entirely different part of the law, §18121. States generally run state-created Ex-changes; the Secretary generally runs federally created Exchanges. §18041(b)–(c). And the Secretary’s authority to set up an Exchange in a State depends upon the State’s “[f]ailure to establish [an] Exchange.” §18041(c) (emphasis added). Provisions such as these destroy any pretense that a federal Exchange is in some sense also established by a State.

Reading the rest of the Act also confirms that, as relevant here, there are only two ways to set up an Exchange in a State: establishment by a State and establishment by the Secretary. §§18031(b), 18041(c). So saying that an Exchange established by the Federal Government is “established by the State” goes beyond giving words bizarre meanings; it leaves the limiting phrase “by the State” with no operative effect at all. That is a stark violation of the elementary principle that requires an interpreter “to give effect, if possible, to every clause and word of a statute.” Montclair v. Ramsdell, 107 U. S. 147, 152 (1883) . In weighing this argument, it is well to remember the difference between giving a term a meaning that duplicates another part of the law, and giving a term no meaning at all. Lawmakers sometimes repeat themselves—whether out of a desire to add emphasis, a sense of belt-and-suspenders caution, or a lawyerly penchant for doublets (aid and abet, cease and desist, null and void). Lawmakers do not, however, tend to use terms that “have no operation at all.” Marbury v. Madison, 1 Cranch 137, 174 (1803). So while the rule against treating a term as a redundancy is far from categorical, the rule against treating it as a nullity is as close to absolute as interpretive principles get. The Court’s reading does not merely give “by the State” a duplicative effect; it causes the phrase to have no effect whatever.

Making matters worse, the reader of the whole Act will come across a number of provisions beyond §36B that refer to the establishment of Exchanges by States. Adopting the Court’s interpretation means nullifying the term “by the State” not just once, but again and again throughout the Act. Consider for the moment only those parts of the Act that mention an “Exchange established by the State” in connection with tax credits:

The formula for calculating the amount of the tax credit, as already explained, twice mentions “an Exchange established by the State.” 26 U. S. C. §36B(b)(2)(A), (c)(2)(A)(i).

The Act directs States to screen children for eligibility for “[tax credits] under section 36B” and for “anyother assistance or subsidies available for coverage obtained through” an “Exchange established by the State.” 42 U. S. C. §1396w–3(b)(1)(B)–(C).

The Act requires “an Exchange established by the State” to use a “secure electronic interface” to determine eligibility for (among other things) tax credits. §1396w–3(b)(1)(D).

The Act authorizes “an Exchange established by the State” to make arrangements under which other state agencies “determine whether a State resident is eligible for [tax credits] under section 36B.” §1396w–3(b)(2).

The Act directs States to operate Web sites that allow anyone “who is eligible to receive [tax credits] under section 36B” to compare insurance plans offered through “an Exchange established by the State.” §1396w–3(b)(4).

One of the Act’s provisions addresses the enrollment of certain children in health plans “offered through an Exchange established by the State” and then dis-cusses the eligibility of these children for tax credits. §1397ee(d)(3)(B).

It is bad enough for a court to cross out “by the State” once. But seven times?

Congress did not, by the way, repeat “Exchange established by the State under [§18031]” by rote throughout the Act. Quite the contrary, clause after clause of the law uses a more general term such as “Exchange” or “Exchange established under [§18031].” See, e.g., 42 U. S. C. §§18031(k), 18033; 26 U. S. C. §6055. It is common sense that any speaker who says “Exchange” some of the time, but “Exchange established by the State” the rest of the time, probably means something by the contrast.

Equating establishment “by the State” with establishment by the Federal Government makes nonsense of other parts of the Act. The Act requires States to ensure (on pain of losing Medicaid funding) that any “Exchange established by the State” uses a “secure electronic interface” to determine an individual’s eligibility for various benefits (including tax credits). 42 U. S. C. §1396w–3(b)(1)(D). How could a State control the type of electronic interface used by a federal Exchange? The Act allows a State to control contracting decisions made by “an Exchange established by the State.” §18031(f )(3). Why would a State get to control the contracting decisions of a federal Exchange? The Act also provides “Assistance to States to establish American Health Benefit Exchanges” and directs the Secretary to renew this funding “if the State . . . is making progress . . . toward . . . establishing an Exchange.” §18031(a). Does a State that refuses to set up an Exchange still receive this funding, on the premise that Exchanges established by the Federal Government are really established by States? It is presumably in order to avoid these questions that the Court concludes that federal Exchanges count as state Exchanges only “for purposes of the tax credits.” Ante, at 13. (Contrivance, thy name is an opinion on the Affordable Care Act!)

It is probably piling on to add that the Congress that wrote the Affordable Care Act knew how to equate two different types of Exchanges when it wanted to do so. The Act includes a clause providing that “[a] territory that . . . establishes . . . an Exchange . . . shall be treated as a State” for certain purposes. §18043(a) (emphasis added). Tellingly, it does not include a comparable clause providing that the Secretary shall be treated as a State for purposes of §36B when she establishes an Exchange.

Faced with overwhelming confirmation that “Exchange established by the State” means what it looks like it means, the Court comes up with argument after feeble argument to support its contrary interpretation. None of its tries comes close to establishing the implausible conclusion that Congress used “by the State” to mean “by the State or not by the State.”

The Court emphasizes that if a State does not set up an Exchange, the Secretary must establish “such Exchange.” §18041(c). It claims that the word “such” implies that federal and state Exchanges are “the same.” Ante, at 13. To see the error in this reasoning, one need only consider a parallel provision from our Constitution: “The Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections for Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof; but the Congress may at any time by Law make or alter such Regulations.” Art. I, §4, cl. 1 (emphasis added). Just as the Affordable Care Act directs States to establish Exchanges while allowing the Secretary to establish “such Exchange” as a fallback, the Elections Clause directs state legislatures to prescribe election regulations while allowing Congress to make “such Regulations” as a fallback. Would anybody refer to an election regulation made by Congress as a “regulation prescribed by the state legislature”? Would anybody say that a federal election law and a state election law are in all respects equivalent? Of course not. The word “such” does not help the Court one whit. The Court’s argument also overlooks the rudimentary principle that a specific provision governs a general one. Even if it were true that the term “such Exchange” in §18041(c) implies that federal and state Exchanges are the same in general, the term “established by the State” in §36B makes plain that they differ when it comes to tax credits in particular.

The Court’s next bit of interpretive jiggery-pokery involves other parts of the Act that purportedly presuppose the availability of tax credits on both federal and state Exchanges. Ante, at 13–14. It is curious that the Court is willing to subordinate the express words of the section that grants tax credits to the mere implications of other provisions with only tangential connections to tax credits. One would think that interpretation would work the other way around. In any event, each of the provisions mentioned by the Court is perfectly consistent with limiting tax credits to state Exchanges. One of them says that the minimum functions of an Exchange include (alongside several tasks that have nothing to do with tax credits) setting up an electronic calculator that shows “the actual cost of coverage after the application of any premium tax credit.” 42 U. S. C. §18031(d)(4)(G). What stops a federal Exchange’s electronic calculator from telling a customer that his tax credit is zero? Another provision requires an Exchange’s outreach program to educate the public about health plans, to facilitate enrollment, and to “distribute fair and impartial information” about enrollment and “the availability of premium tax credits.” §18031(i)(3)(B). What stops a federal Exchange’s outreach program from fairly and impartially telling customers that no tax credits are available? A third provision requires an Exchange to report information about each insurance plan sold—including level of coverage, premium, name of the insured, and “amount of any advance payment” of the tax credit. 26 U. S. C. §36B(f)(3). What stops a federal Exchange’s report from confirming that no tax credits have been paid out?

The Court persists that these provisions “would make little sense” if no tax credits were available on federal Exchanges. Ante, at 14. Even if that observation were true, it would show only oddity, not ambiguity. Laws often include unusual or mismatched provisions. The Affordable Care Act spans 900 pages; it would be amazing if its provisions all lined up perfectly with each other. This Court “does not revise legislation . . . just because the text as written creates an apparent anomaly.” Michigan v. Bay Mills Indian Community, 572 U. S. ___, ___ (2014) (slip op., at 10). At any rate, the provisions cited by the Court are not particularly unusual. Each requires an Exchange to perform a standardized series of tasks, some aspects of which relate in some way to tax credits. It is entirely natural for slight mismatches to occur when, as here, lawmakers draft “a single statutory provision” to cover “different kinds” of situations. Robers v. United States, 572 U. S. ___, ___ (2014) (slip op., at 4). Lawmakers need not, and often do not, “write extra language specifically exempting, phrase by phrase, applications in respect to which a portion of a phrase is not needed.” Ibid.

Roaming even farther afield from §36B, the Court turns to the Act’s provisions about “qualified individuals.” Ante, at 10–11. Qualified individuals receive favored treatment on Exchanges, although customers who are not qualified individuals may also shop there. See Halbig v. Burwell, 758 F. 3d 390, 404–405 (CADC 2014). The Court claims that the Act must equate federal and state establishment of Exchanges when it defines a qualified individual as someone who (among other things) lives in the “State that established the Exchange,” 42 U. S. C. §18032(f )(1)(A). Otherwise, the Court says, there would be no qualified individuals on federal Exchanges, contradicting (for example) the provision requiring every Exchange to takethe “ ‘interests of qualified individuals’ ” into accountwhen selecting health plans. Ante, at 11 (quoting §18031(e)(1)(b)). Pure applesauce. Imagine that a university sends around a bulletin reminding every professor to take the “interests of graduate students” into account when setting office hours, but that some professors teach only undergraduates. Would anybody reason that the bulletin implicitly presupposes that every professor has “graduate students,” so that “graduate students” must really mean “graduate or undergraduate students”? Surely not. Just as one naturally reads instructions aboutgraduate students to be inapplicable to the extent a particular professor has no such students, so too would one naturally read instructions about qualified individuals to be inapplicable to the extent a particular Exchange has no such individuals. There is no need to rewrite the term “State that established the Exchange” in the definition of “qualified individual,” much less a need to rewrite the separate term “Exchange established by the State” in a separate part of the Act.

Least convincing of all, however, is the Court’s attempt to uncover support for its interpretation in “the structure of Section 36B itself.” Ante, at 19. The Court finds it strange that Congress limited the tax credit to state Exchanges in the formula for calculating the amount of the credit, rather than in the provision defining the range of taxpayers eligible for the credit. Had the Court bothered to look at the rest of the Tax Code, it would have seen that the structure it finds strange is in fact quite common. Consider, for example, the many provisions that initially make taxpayers of all incomes eligible for a tax credit, only to provide later that the amount of the credit is zero if the taxpayer’s income exceeds a specified threshold. See, e.g., 26 U. S. C. §24 (child tax credit); §32 (earned-income tax credit); §36 (first-time-homebuyer tax credit). Or consider, for an even closer parallel, a neighboring provision that initially makes taxpayers of all States eligible for a credit, only to provide later that the amount of the credit may be zero if the taxpayer’s State does not satisfy certain requirements. See §35 (health-insurance-costs tax credit). One begins to get the sense that the Court’s insistence on reading things in context applies to “established by the State,” but to nothing else.

For what it is worth, lawmakers usually draft tax-credit provisions the way they do—i.e., the way they drafted §36B—because the mechanics of the credit require it. Many Americans move to new States in the middle of the year. Mentioning state Exchanges in the definition of “coverage month”—rather than (as the Court proposes) in the provisions concerning taxpayers’ eligibility for the credit—accounts for taxpayers who live in a State with a state Exchange for a part of the year, but a State with a federal Exchange for the rest of the year. In addition, §36B awards a credit with respect to insurance plans “which cover the taxpayer, the taxpayer’s spouse, or any dependent . . . of the taxpayer and which were enrolled in through an Exchange established by the State.” §36B(b)(2)(A) (emphasis added). If Congress had mentioned state Exchanges in the provisions discussing taxpayers’ eligibility for the credit, a taxpayer who buys insurance from a federal Exchange would get no money, even if he has a spouse or dependent who buys insurance from a state Exchange—say a child attending college in a different State. It thus makes perfect sense for “Exchange established by the State” to appear where it does, rather than where the Court suggests. Even if that were not so, of course, its location would not make it any less clear.

The Court has not come close to presenting the compelling contextual case necessary to justify departing from the ordinary meaning of the terms of the law. Quite the contrary, context only underscores the outlandishness of the Court’s interpretation. Reading the Act as a whole leaves no doubt about the matter: “Exchange established by the State” means what it looks like it means.

III

For its next defense of the indefensible, the Court turns to the Affordable Care Act’s design and purposes. As relevant here, the Act makes three major reforms. The guaranteed-issue and community-rating requirements prohibit insurers from considering a customer’s health when deciding whether to sell insurance and how much to charge, 42 U. S. C. §§300gg, 300gg–1; its famous individ-ual mandate requires everyone to maintain insurance coverage or to pay what the Act calls a “penalty,” 26 U. S. C. §5000A(b)(1), and what we have nonetheless called a tax, see National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius, 567 U. S. ___, ___ (2012) (slip op., at 39); and its tax credits help make insurance more affordable. The Court reasons that Congress intended these three reforms to “work together to expand insurance coverage”; and because the first two apply in every State, so must the third. Ante, at 16.

This reasoning suffers from no shortage of flaws. To begin with, “even the most formidable argument concerning the statute’s purposes could not overcome the clarity [of ] the statute’s text.” Kloeckner v. Solis, 568 U. S. ___, ___, n. 4 (2012) (slip op., at 14, n. 4). Statutory design and purpose matter only to the extent they help clarify an otherwise ambiguous provision. Could anyone maintain with a straight face that §36B is unclear? To mention just the highlights, the Court’s interpretation clashes with a statutory definition, renders words inoperative in at least seven separate provisions of the Act, overlooks the contrast between provisions that say “Exchange” and those that say “Exchange established by the State,” gives the same phrase one meaning for purposes of tax credits but an entirely different meaning for other purposes, and (let us not forget) contradicts the ordinary meaning of the words Congress used. On the other side of the ledger, the Court has come up with nothing more than a general provision that turns out to be controlled by a specific one, a handful of clauses that are consistent with either understanding of establishment by the State, and a resemblance between the tax-credit provision and the rest of the Tax Code. If that is all it takes to make something ambiguous, everything is ambiguous.

Having gone wrong in consulting statutory purpose at all, the Court goes wrong again in analyzing it. The purposes of a law must be “collected chiefly from its words,” not “from extrinsic circumstances.” Sturges v. Crowninshield, 4 Wheat. 122, 202 (1819) (Marshall, C. J.). Only by concentrating on the law’s terms can a judge hope to uncover the scheme of the statute, rather than some other scheme that the judge thinks desirable. Like it or not, the express terms of the Affordable Care Act make only two of the three reforms mentioned by the Court applicable in States that do not establish Exchanges. It is perfectly possible for them to operate independently of tax credits. The guaranteed-issue and community-rating requirements continue to ensure that insurance companies treat all customers the same no matter their health, and the individual mandate continues to encourage people to maintain coverage, lest they be “taxed.”

The Court protests that without the tax credits, the number of people covered by the individual mandate shrinks, and without a broadly applicable individual mandate the guaranteed-issue and community-rating requirements “would destabilize the individual insurance market.” Ante, at 15. If true, these projections would show only that the statutory scheme contains a flaw; they would not show that the statute means the opposite of what it says. Moreover, it is a flaw that appeared as well in other parts of the Act. A different title established a long-term-care insurance program with guaranteed-issue and community-rating requirements, but without an individual mandate or subsidies. §§8001–8002, 124Stat. 828–847 (2010). This program never came into effect “only because Congress, in response to actuarial analyses predicting that the [program] would be fiscally unsustainable, repealed the provision in 2013.” Halbig, 758 F. 3d, at 410. How could the Court say that Congress would never dream of combining guaranteed-issue and community-rating requirements with a narrow individual mandate, when it combined those requirements with no individual mandate in the context of long-term-care insurance?

Similarly, the Department of Health and Human Services originally interpreted the Act to impose guaranteed-issue and community-rating requirements in the Federal Territories, even though the Act plainly does not make the individual mandate applicable there. Ibid.; see 26 U. S. C. §5000A(f)(4); 42 U. S. C. §201(f). “This combination, predictably, [threw] individual insurance markets in the territories into turmoil.” Halbig, supra, at 410. Responding to complaints from the Territories, the Department at first insisted that it had “no statutory authority” to address the problem and suggested that the Territories “seek legislative relief from Congress” instead. Letter from G. Cohen, Director of the Center for Consumer Information and Insurance Oversight, to S. Igisomar, Secretary of Commerce of the Commonwealth of Northern Mariana Islands (July 12, 2013). The Department changed its mind a year later, after what it described as “a careful review of [the] situation and the relevant statutory language.” Letter from M. Tavenner, Administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, to G. Francis, Insurance Commissioner of the Virgin Islands (July 16, 2014). How could the Court pronounce it “implausible” for Congress to have tolerated instability in insurance markets in States with federal Exchanges, ante, at 17, when even the Government maintained until recently that Congress did exactly that in American Samoa, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico, and the Virgin Islands?

Compounding its errors, the Court forgets that it is no more appropriate to consider one of a statute’s purposes in isolation than it is to consider one of its words that way. No law pursues just one purpose at all costs, and no statutory scheme encompasses just one element. Most relevant here, the Affordable Care Act displays a congressional preference for state participation in the establishment of Exchanges: Each State gets the first opportunity to set up its Exchange, 42 U. S. C. §18031(b); States that take up the opportunity receive federal funding for “activities . . . related to establishing” an Exchange, §18031(a)(3); and the Secretary may establish an Exchange in a State only as a fallback, §18041(c). But setting up and running an Exchange involve significant burdens—meeting strict deadlines, §18041(b), implementing requirements related to the offering of insurance plans, §18031(d)(4), setting up outreach programs, §18031(i), and ensuring that the Exchange is self-sustaining by 2015, §18031(d)(5)(A). A State would have much less reason to take on these burdens if its citizens could receive tax credits no matter who establishes its Exchange. (Now that the Internal Revenue Service has interpreted §36B to authorize tax credits everywhere, by the way, 34 States have failed to set up their own Exchanges. Ante, at 6.) So even if making credits available on all Exchanges advances the goal of improving healthcare markets, it frustrates the goal of encouraging state involvement in the implementation of the Act. This is what justifies going out of our way to read “established by the State” to mean “established by the State or not established by the State”?

Worst of all for the repute of today’s decision, the Court’s reasoning is largely self-defeating. The Court predicts that making tax credits unavailable in States that do not set up their own Exchanges would cause disastrous economic consequences there. If that is so, however, wouldn’t one expect States to react by setting up their own Exchanges? And wouldn’t that outcome satisfy two of the Act’s goals rather than just one: enabling the Act’s reforms to work and promoting state involvement in the Act’s implementation? The Court protests that the very existence of a federal fallback shows that Congress expected that some States might fail to set up their own Exchanges. Ante, at 19. So it does. It does not show, however, that Congress expected the number of recalcitrant States to be particularly large. The more accurate the Court’s dire economic predictions, the smaller that number is likely to be. That reality destroys the Court’s pretense that applying the law as written would imperil “the viability of the entire Affordable Care Act.” Ante, at 20. All in all, the Court’s arguments about the law’s purpose and design are no more convincing than its arguments about context.

IV

Perhaps sensing the dismal failure of its efforts to show that “established by the State” means “established by the State or the Federal Government,” the Court tries to palm off the pertinent statutory phrase as “inartful drafting.” Ante, at 14. This Court, however, has no free-floating power “to rescue Congress from its drafting errors.” Lamie v. United States Trustee, 540 U. S. 526, 542 (2004) (internal quotation marks omitted). Only when it is patently obvious to a reasonable reader that a drafting mistake has occurred may a court correct the mistake. The occurrence of a misprint may be apparent from the face of the law, as it is where the Affordable Care Act “creates three separate Section 1563s.” Ante, at 14. But the Court does not pretend that there is any such indication of a drafting error on the face of §36B. The occurrence of a misprint may also be apparent because a provision decrees an absurd result—a consequence “so monstrous, that all mankind would, without hesitation, unite in rejecting the application.” Sturges, 4 Wheat., at 203. But §36B does not come remotely close to satisfying that demanding standard. It is entirely plausible that tax credits were restricted to state Exchanges deliberately—for example,in order to encourage States to establish their own Exchanges. We therefore have no authority to dismiss the terms of the law as a drafting fumble.

Let us not forget that the term “Exchange established by the State” appears twice in §36B and five more times in other parts of the Act that mention tax credits. What are the odds, do you think, that the same slip of the pen occurred in seven separate places? No provision of the Act—none at all—contradicts the limitation of tax credits to state Exchanges. And as I have already explained, uses of the term “Exchange established by the State” beyond the context of tax credits look anything but accidental. Supra, at 6. If there was a mistake here, context suggests it was a substantive mistake in designing this part of the law, not a technical mistake in transcribing it.

V

The Court’s decision reflects the philosophy that judges should endure whatever interpretive distortions it takes in order to correct a supposed flaw in the statutory machinery. That philosophy ignores the American people’s decision to give Congress “[a]ll legislative Powers” enumerated in the Constitution. Art. I, §1. They made Congress, not this Court, responsible for both making laws and mending them. This Court holds only the judicial power—the power to pronounce the law as Congress has enacted it. We lack the prerogative to repair laws that do not work out in practice, just as the people lack the ability to throw us out of office if they dislike the solutions we concoct. We must always remember, therefore, that “[o]ur task is to apply the text, not to improve upon it.” Pavelic & LeFlore v. Marvel Entertainment Group, Div. of Cadence Industries Corp., 493 U. S. 120, 126 (1989) .

Trying to make its judge-empowering approach seem respectful of congressional authority, the Court asserts that its decision merely ensures that the Affordable Care Act operates the way Congress “meant [it] to operate.” Ante, at 17. First of all, what makes the Court so sure that Congress “meant” tax credits to be available everywhere? Our only evidence of what Congress meant comes from the terms of the law, and those terms show beyond all question that tax credits are available only on state Exchanges. More importantly, the Court forgets that ours is a government of laws and not of men. That means we are governed by the terms of our laws, not by the unen-acted will of our lawmakers. “If Congress enacted into law something different from what it intended, then it should amend the statute to conform to its intent.” Lamie, supra, at 542. In the meantime, this Court “has no roving license . . . to disregard clear language simply on the view that . . . Congress ‘must have intended’ something broader.” Bay Mills, 572 U. S., at ___ (slip op., at 11).

Even less defensible, if possible, is the Court’s claim that its interpretive approach is justified because this Act “does not reflect the type of care and deliberation that one might expect of such significant legislation.” Ante, at 14–15. It is not our place to judge the quality of the care and deliberation that went into this or any other law. A law enacted by voice vote with no deliberation whatever is fully as binding upon us as one enacted after years of study, months of committee hearings, and weeks of debate. Much less is it our place to make everything come out right when Congress does not do its job properly. It is up to Congress to design its laws with care, and it is up to the people to hold them to account if they fail to carry out that responsibility.

Rather than rewriting the law under the pretense of interpreting it, the Court should have left it to Congress to decide what to do about the Act’s limitation of tax credits to state Exchanges. If Congress values above everything else the Act’s applicability across the country, it could make tax credits available in every Exchange. If it prizes state involvement in the Act’s implementation, it could continue to limit tax credits to state Exchanges while taking other steps to mitigate the economic consequences predicted by the Court. If Congress wants to accommodate both goals, it could make tax credits available everywhere while offering new incentives for States to set up their own Exchanges. And if Congress thinks that the present design of the Act works well enough, it could do nothing. Congress could also do something else alto-gether, entirely abandoning the structure of the Affordable Care Act. The Court’s insistence on making a choice that should be made by Congress both aggrandizes judicial power and encourages congressional lassitude.

Just ponder the significance of the Court’s decision to take matters into its own hands. The Court’s revision of the law authorizes the Internal Revenue Service to spend tens of billions of dollars every year in tax credits on federal Exchanges. It affects the price of insurance for millions of Americans. It diminishes the participation of the States in the implementation of the Act. It vastly expands the reach of the Act’s individual mandate, whose scope depends in part on the availability of credits. What a parody today’s decision makes of Hamilton’s assurances to the people of New York: “The legislature not only commands the purse but prescribes the rules by which the duties and rights of every citizen are to be regulated. The judiciary, on the contrary, has no influence over . . . the purse; no direction . . . of the wealth of society, and can take no active resolution whatever. It may truly be said to have neither force nor will but merely judgment.” The Federalist No. 78, p. 465 (C. Rossiter ed. 1961).

*  *  *

Today’s opinion changes the usual rules of statutory interpretation for the sake of the Affordable Care Act. That, alas, is not a novelty. In National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius, 567 U. S. ___, this Court revised major components of the statute in order to save them from unconstitutionality. The Act that Congress passed provides that every individual “shall” maintain insurance or else pay a “penalty.” 26 U. S. C. §5000A. This Court, however, saw that the Commerce Clause does not authorize a federal mandate to buy health insurance. So it rewrote the mandate-cum-penalty as a tax. 567 U. S., at ___–___ (principal opinion) (slip op., at 15–45). The Act that Congress passed also requires every State to accept an expansion of its Medicaid program, or else risk losing all Medicaid funding. 42 U. S. C. §1396c. This Court, however, saw that the Spending Clause does not authorize this coercive condition. So it rewrote the law to withhold only the incremental funds associated with the Medicaid expansion. 567 U. S., at ___–___ (principal opinion) (slip op., at 45–58). Having transformed two major parts of the law, the Court today has turned its attention to a third. The Act that Congress passed makes tax credits available only on an “Exchange established by the State.” This Court, however, concludes that this limitation would prevent the rest of the Act from working as well as hoped. So it rewrites the law to make tax credits available everywhere. We should start calling this law SCOTUScare.

Perhaps the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act will attain the enduring status of the Social Security Act or the Taft-Hartley Act; perhaps not. But this Court’s two decisions on the Act will surely be remembered through the years. The somersaults of statutory interpretation they have performed (“penalty” means tax, “further [Medicaid] payments to the State” means only incremental Medicaid payments to the State, “established by the State” means not established by the State) will be cited by litigants endlessly, to the confusion of honest jurisprudence. And the cases will publish forever the discouraging truth that the Supreme Court of the United States favors some laws over others, and is prepared to do whatever it takes to uphold and assist its favorites.

I dissent.

1.3.2 ACA Statutes 1.3.2 ACA Statutes

1.3.3 Required Readings 1.3.3 Required Readings