August 03, 2003

Supremes: Calif's Holocaust Victim Insurance Relief Act Struck Down

California's HVIRA, aggressively pressed by Insurance Commissioner Garamendi, interferes with POTUS' conduct of foreign policy and the McCarran-Ferguson Act does not save it from preemption. Reversing the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. AMERICAN INS. ASSN. V. GARAMENDI.
4 dissents, for whom J. Ginsburg wrote an opinion.

From the syllabus of the June 23, 2003 decision:

    "[T]he consistent Presidential foreign policy has been to encourage European governments and companies to volunteer settlement funds and disclosure of policy information, in preference to litigation or coercive sanctions. California has taken a different tack: HVIRA’s economic compulsion to make public disclosure, of far more information about far more policies than ICHEIC rules require, employs “a different, state system of economic pressure,” and in doing so undercuts the President’s diplomatic discretion and the choice he has made exercising it. Crosby v. National Foreign Trade Council, 530 U.S. 363, 376. * * * Pp. 21—26."

    "The Court rejects the State’s submission that even if HVIRA does interfere with Executive Branch foreign policy, Congress authorized state law of this sort in the McCarran-Ferguson Act and the U.S. Holocaust Assets Commission Act of 1998." * * * Pp. 29—31."

    Posted by dougsimpson at August 3, 2003 08:09 PM | TrackBack
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