 |
 |
to fill out a simple form to connect to Personal Injury Lawyers in your area.
|
|
|
|
|
Monarch v. Southern Pacific Transportation Co.3/25/1999
ht by the real parties in interest, employees and relatives of employees of the Santa Fe and Southern Pacific railroads, against the petitioner for damages resulting from exposure to asbestos insulation contained on locomotives manufactured by the defendant's predecessor in interest. The petitioner in Viad claimed preemption of the state law tort causes of action by the BIA.
The court in Viad acknowledged the venerable decision in Napier, but was influenced by "a number of other factors" and "two recent Supreme Court cases," Medtronic, Inc. v. Lohr (1996) 518 U.S. 470 (hereafter Medtronic) and Silkwood v. Kerr-McGee Corp. (1984) 464 U.S. 238 (hereafter Silkwood) and concluded "that, notwithstanding Napier, the tort damages sought by real parties against petitioner are not preempted by the BIA." (Viad Corp. v. Superior Court, supra, 55 Cal.App.4th at pp. 336-337.) The court in Viad departed from the holding in Napier under an altered preemption analysis derived from Medtronic and Silkwood that focused on "a precise identification of what field is preempted by the federal legislation at issue." (Viad Corp. v. Superior Court, supra, 55 Cal.App.4th at p. 339.) The court concluded "that although Napier expressly involves the BIA and contains language that could be construed to support petitioner's position, we must nevertheless be guided by the analysis employed more recently in Medtronic and Silkwood. Although those cases involve different statutes, they are more directly applicable because they involve state law tort damages. The language in Napier that Congress intended to occupy `the field of regulating locomotive equipment' must be read narrowly in light of the circumstances in existence at the time of its writing and in light of the statutory framework as a whole." (Viad Corp. v. Superior Court, supra, 55 Cal.App.4th at pp. 340-341, fn. omitted.) "Because . . . no intent to expressly preclude tort remedies against a manufacturer" was found in the BIA, the court declined to "say the field, which Napier found to be completely occupied, includes tort liabilities not contemplated at the time Napier was written." (Viad Corp. v. Superior Court, supra, 55 Cal.App.4th at p. 339.)
We do not agree with Viad that the Napier analysis of the broad preemptive reach of the BIA and the FELA has been undermined by the decisions in Medtronic and Silkwood. First, Medtronic was not a field preemption case, but rather focused upon an express preemption provision in the MDA and accompanying regulations, which, in contrast to the BIA, the court found did not evince a legislative intent to foreclose established state tort remedies absent a direct threat of interference with a specific, articulated federal interest. (Medtronic, supra, 518 U.S. at p. 500.) Further, nothing in the BIA is comparable to the Atomic Energy Act examined in Silkwood, which in companion legislation demonstrated congressional intent to leave existing state tort remedies intact. (Silkwood, supra, 464 U.S. at pp. 251-252.) To promote the primary objective of safety, the FELA provided a federal remedy for injured employees where none existed before, leading to the inference that Congress intended to supplant other future remedies furnished by state law. Finally, given the interstate nature of railroads and the need for national uniformity of regulations, the impact of state tort actions and attendant conflicting liability determinations upon locomotive design, manufacture, materials and operation, militates in favor of preemption to avoid the unintended result of forced conformance with diverse state standards.
The Ninth Circuit reached the opposite Conclusion of Viad in Law v. General Motors Corp. (9th Cir. 1997) 114 F.3d 908, 911-912, a
Page 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 California Personal Injury Attorneys
Personal Injury Lawyers
|
| |
to fill out a simple form to connect to Personal Injury Lawyers in your area.
|
|