Title IV of the Federal Coal Mine Health and Safety Act of 1969,
as amended by the Black Lung Benefits Act of 1972, provides
benefits to coal miners suffering from "black lung disease"
(pneumoconiosis), and to survivors of miners who have died from, or
while totally disabled by, the disease. Financial responsibility
for payment of the benefits is divided into three parts: (1) Under
Part B of Title IV, claims filed between December 30, 1969
(enactment date), and June 30, 1973, are adjudicated by the
Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare (HEW), and paid by the
United States; (2) under § 415 of Part B claims filed during the
transition period between the Federal Government benefit provision
under Part B,
supra, and the state plan or operator
benefit provision under Part C,
infra (July 1 to December
31, 1973), are adjudicated by the Secretary of Labor and paid by
the United States. Federal payments to these claimants terminate on
December 31, 1973, and the claimant's coal mine employer assumes
responsibility to make continuing payments as if Part C and
Page 428 U. S. 2
§ 422 had applied (
see (3),
infra); and (3)
under Part C, claims filed after December 31, 1973, are to be
processed under an approved state workmen's compensation law and,
absent such an approved plan, claims are to be filed with and
adjudicated by the Secretary of Labor, and paid by the mine
operators, § 422. Under that provision, an operator, who is
entitled to a hearing in connection with these claims, is liable
for benefits with respect to death or total disability due to
pneumoconiosis arising out of employment in a mine for which the
operator is responsible, the operator's liability covering the
period from January 1, 1974, to December 30, 1981. Payments for
benefits under Part C are to the same category of persons (a miner
or certain survivors) and in the same amounts as under Part B. A
miner is "totally disabled," and thus entitled to compensation
"when pneumoconiosis prevents him from engaging in gainful
employment requiring the skills and abilities comparable to those
of any employment in a mine or mines in which he previously engaged
with some regularity and over a substantial period of time,"
§ 402(f). The Act prescribes several "presumptions" for use in
determining compensable disability: under § 411(c)(3), a miner
shown by X-ray or other clinical evidence to be afflicted with
complicated pneumoconiosis (the disease's incurable and final
stage) is "irrebuttably presumed" to be totally disabled due to the
disease; if such a miner has died, it is irrebuttably presumed that
he was totally disabled by the disease at the time of death, and
that his death was due thereto. There are three rebuttable
presumptions (none of which may, under § 413(b), be defeated solely
by a chest X-ray): (1) if a miner with 10 or more years' mine
employment contracts pneumoconiosis, it is presumed that the
disease arose out of such employment, § 411(c)(1); (2) if he died
from a respiratory disease, it is presumed that death was due to
pneumoconiosis, § 411(c)(2); (3) if a miner, or the survivor of a
miner, with 15 or more years' underground coal mine employment is
able, despite the absence of clinical evidence of complicated
pneumoconiosis, to demonstrate a totally disabling respiratory or
pulmonary impairment, it is presumed that the total disability is
attributable to the disease, that the miner was totally disabled
thereby when he died, and that death was due to the disease, §
411(c)(4), and the final sentence of that provision specifics
that
"[t]he Secretary may rebut [this latter] presumption only by
establishing that (A) such miner does not, or did not, have
pneumoconiosis, or that (b) his respiratory or pulmonary
impairment
Page 428 U. S. 3
did not arise out of, or in connection with, employment in a
coal mine."
A number of operators brought this suit claiming that the Act is
unconstitutional under the Due Process Clause of the Fifth
Amendment insofar as it requires benefit payments with respect to
miners who left mine employment before the Act's effective date;
that the statutory definitions, presumptions, and limitations on
rebuttal evidence unconstitutionally impair the operator's ability
to defend against benefit claims; and that certain regulations
promulgated by the Secretary of Labor regarding the apportionment
of liability for benefits among operators are inconsistent with the
Act, and unconstitutional. The District Court upheld each
challenged provision as constitutional, with two exceptions: (1) It
held § 411(c)(3) unconstitutional as an unreasonable and arbitrary
legislative finding of total disability "in terms other than those
provided by the Act as standards for total disability." (2) Reading
the evidence limitation on rebuttal in § 411(c)(4) to apply to an
operator's defense in a § 415 transition period case, the court
held the limitation arbitrary and unreasonable in not permitting a
rebuttal showing that the case of pneumoconiosis afflicting the
miner was not disabling. And, taking the provision to mean that an
operator may defend against liability only on the ground that
pneumoconiosis did not arise out of employment in any coal mine
(rather than in a coal mine for which the operator was
responsible), the District Court found the provision an arbitrary
and unreasonable limitation on rebuttal evidence relevant and
proper under § 422(c). The court enjoined the Secretary of Labor
from seeking to apply the two provisions thus found
unconstitutional.
Held:
1. This Court's summary affirmance in
National Independent
Coal Operators Assn. v. Brennan, 419 U.S. 955, did not
foreclose the District Court's rulings regarding §§ 411(c)(3) and
(4), which were not before the Court on that appeal. P.
428 U. S. 14.
2. The challenged provisions do not violate the Due Process
Clause of the Fifth Amendment. Pp.
428 U. S.
14-38.
(a) The Clause does not bar requiring an operator to provide
compensation for a former employee's death or disability due to
pneumoconiosis arising out of employment in its mines, even if the
former employee terminated his employment in its mines before the
Act was passed. Retrospective application of the Act in this manner
can be justified as serving to spread costs in a rational manner --
by allocating to the operator an actual cost of its business, whose
avoidance might be thought to have enlarged
Page 428 U. S. 4
the operator's profits.
Railroad Retirement Board v. Alton
R. Co., 295 U. S. 330,
distinguished. Pp.
428 U. S. 14-20,
428 U. S.
24-27.
(b) Though the operators contend that the § 402(f) definition of
total disability is arbitrary because former miners who might be
employable in other lines of work are compensated, a miner disabled
under § 402(f)'s standards has suffered health impairment, and has
been rendered unable to perform the work to which he has adapted
himself, factors which afford a rational basis for compensation. P.
428 U. S. 21.
(c) The effect of § 411(c)(3)'s "irrebuttable presumption" of
total disability -- to establish entitlement where a miner is
clinically diagnosable as extremely ill with pneumoconiosis arising
out of coal mine employment -- is clearly permissible, and the
provision, being part of a statute regulating purely economic
matters, is not rendered invalid by Congress' choice of statutory
language. Pp.
428 U. S.
22-24.
(d) The presumptions in §§ 411(c)(1) and (2) are valid because
there is a "rational connection between the fact proved and the
ultimate fact presumed,"
Mobile, J. & K. C. R. Co. v.
Turnipseed, 219 U. S. 35,
219 U. S. 43. In
view of the medical evidence before Congress indicating the
noticeable incidence of pneumoconiosis in cases of miners with 10
years' mine employment, it was not "purely arbitrary" for Congress
to select the 10-year figure as a reference point for the
presumptions; nor are the 10-year presumptions arbitrary because
they fail to account for varying degrees of exposure. Pp.
428 U. S.
27-30.
(e) The 15-year durational basis of the presumption in §
411(c)(4) is likewise unassailable, particularly in light of
medical testimony in the Senate Hearings on the 1969 Act. Pp.
428 U. S.
30-31.
(f) Congress had evidence showing doubts about the reliability
of negative X-ray evidence as indicating the absence of the
disease. That, through its adoption of § 413(b), Congress
ultimately resolved those doubts in the disabled miner's favor does
not render that provision arbitrary. Pp.
428 U. S.
31-34.
(g) The District Court improperly invalidated the limitation on
evidence contained in § 411(c)(4) because the limitation is
inapplicable to operators, and applies only to the Secretary of
HEW. Thus the Act does not restrict the evidence with which an
operator may rebut the § 411(c)(4) presumption. Pp.
428 U. S.
34-37.
385 F.
Supp. 424, affirmed in part; reversed in part; vacated and
remanded in part.
Page 428 U. S. 5
MARSHALL, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which
BRENNAN, WHITE, and BLACKMUN, JJ., joined; in all but Part IV of
which POWELL, J., joined; and in all but Part V-D of which STEWART
and REHNQUIST, JJ., joined. POWELL, J., filed an opinion concurring
in part and concurring in the judgment in part,
post, p.
428 U. S. 3.
STEWART, J., filed an opinion concurring in part and dissenting in
part, in which REHNQUIST, J., joined,
post, p.
428 U. S. 45.
BURGER, C.J., concurred in the judgment. STEVENS, J., took no part
in the consideration or decision of the cases.
MR. JUSTICE MARSHALL delivered the opinion of the Court.
Twenty-two coal mine operators (Operators) brought this suit to
test the constitutionality of certain aspects of Title IV of the
Federal Coal Mine Health and Safety Act of 1969, 83 Stat. 792, as
amended by the Black Lung Benefits Act of 1972, 86 Stat. 150, 30
U.S.C. § 901
et seq. (1970 ed. and Supp. IV). The
Operators, potentially liable under the amended Act to compensate
certain miners, former miners, and their survivors for death or
total disability due to pneumoconiosis arising out of employment in
coal mines, sought declaratory and injunctive relief against the
Secretary of Labor and the
Page 428 U. S. 6
Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare, who are responsible
for the administration of the Act and the promulgation of
regulations under the Act.
On cross-motions for summary judgment, a three-judge District
Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky, convened pursuant to 28
U.S.C. §§ 2282 and 2284, found the amended Act constitutional on
its face, except in regard to two provisions concerning the
determination of a miner's total disability due to pneumoconiosis.
The court enjoined the Secretary of Labor from further application
of those two provisions.
385 F.
Supp. 424 (1974). After granting a stay of the three-judge
court's order, 421 U.S. 944 (1975), we noted probable jurisdiction
of the cross-appeals. 421 U.S. 1010 (1975). We conclude that the
amended Act, as interpreted, is constitutionally sound against the
Operators' challenges.
I
Coal workers' pneumoconiosis -- black lung disease -- affects a
high percentage of American coal miners with severe, and frequently
crippling, chronic respiratory impairment. [
Footnote 1] The disease is caused by long-term
inhalation of coal dust. [
Footnote
2] Coal workers' pneumoconiosis (hereafter
Page 428 U. S. 7
pneumoconiosis) is generally diagnosed on the basis of X-ray
opacities indicating nodular lesions on the lungs of a patient with
a long history of coal dust exposure. As the Surgeon General has
stated, however,
post mortem examination data have
indicated a greater prevalence of the disease than X-ray diagnosis
reveals.
According to the Surgeon General, pneumoconiosis is customarily
classified as "simple" or "complicated." [
Footnote 3] Simple pneumoconiosis, ordinarily
identified by X-ray opacities of a limited extent, is generally
regarded by physicians as seldom productive of significant
respiratory impairment. Complicated pneumoconiosis, generally far
more serious, involves progressive massive fibrosis as a complex
reaction to dust and other factors (which may include tuberculosis
or other infection), and usually [
Footnote 4] produces significant pulmonary impairment and
marked respiratory disability. This disability limits the victim's
physical capabilities, may induce death by cardiac failure, and may
contribute to other causes of death. [
Footnote 5]
Removing the miner from the source of coal dust has so far
proved the only effective means of preventing the contraction of
pneumoconiosis, and once contracted, the disease is irreversible in
both its simple and complicated stages. No therapy has been
developed. Finally, because the disease is progressive, [
Footnote 6] at least in its
complicated
Page 428 U. S. 8
stage, its symptoms may become apparent only after a miner has
left the coal mines.
In order to curb the incidence of pneumoconiosis, Congress
provided in Title II of the Federal Coal Mine Health and Safety Act
of 1969, § 201
et seq., 30 U.S.C. § 841
et seq.,
for limits on the amount of dust to be permitted in the ambient air
of coal mines. Additionally, in view of the then-established
prevalence of irreversible pneumoconiosis among miners, and the
insufficiency of state compensation programs, Congress passed Title
IV of the 1969 Act, § 401
et seq., 30 U.S.C. § 901
et
seq., to provide benefits to afflicted miners and their
survivors. These benefit provisions were subsequently broadened by
the Black Lung Benefits Act of 1972. 30 U.S.C. § 901
et
seq. (1970 ed., Supp. IV).
As amended, the Act divides the financial responsibility for
payment of benefits into three parts. Under Part B of Title IV, §§
411-414, 30 U.S.C. §§ 921-924 (1970 ed. and Supp. IV), claims filed
between December 30, 1969, the date of enactment, and June 30,
1973, are adjudicated by the Secretary of Health, Education, and
Welfare and paid by the United States. [
Footnote 7]
Under Part C of Title IV, §§ 421-431, 30 U.S.C. §§ 931-941 (1970
ed. and Supp. IV), claims filed after December 31, 1973, are to be
processed under an applicable state workmen's compensation law
approved by the Secretary of Labor under the standards set forth in
§ 421, 30 U.S.C. § 931 (1970 ed. and Supp. IV). In
Page 428 U. S. 9
the absence of such an approved state program, and to date no
state program has been approved, claims are to be filed with and
adjudicated by the Secretary of Labor, and paid by the mine
operators. § 422, 30 U.S.C. § 932 (1970 ed. and Supp. IV). Under §
422, an operator who is entitled to a hearing in connection with
these claims is liable for Part C benefits with respect to death or
total disability due to pneumoconiosis arising out of employment in
a mine for which the operator is responsible. The operator's
liability for Part C benefits covers the period from January 1,
1974, to December 30, 1981. Payments of benefits under Part C are
to the same categories of persons -- a miner or certain survivors
-- and in the same amounts, as under Part B. §§ 422(c), (d);
see § 412(a), 30 U.S.C. § 922(a) (1970 ed. and Supp. IV).
[
Footnote 8]
Claims filed during the transition period between the Federal
Government benefit provision under Part B, and state plan or
operator benefit provision under Part C -- that is, July 1 to
December 31, 1973 -- are adjudicated
Page 428 U. S. 10
under. § 415 of Part B, 30 U.S.C. § 925 (1970 ed., Supp. IV), by
the Secretary of Labor. The United States is responsible for
payment of these claims until December 31, 1973. Responsible
operators, having been notified of a claim and entitled to
participate in a hearing thereon, are thereafter liable for
benefits as if the claim had been filed pursuant to Part C and §
422 had been applicable to the operator.
The Act provides that a miner shall be considered "totally
disabled," and consequently entitled to compensation,
"when pneumoconiosis prevents him from engaging in gainful
employment requiring the skills and abilities comparable to those
of any employment in a mine or mines in which he previously engaged
with some regularity and over a substantial period of time."
§ 402(f), 30 U.S.C. § 902(f) (1970 ed., Supp. IV). [
Footnote 9] The Act also prescribes
several "presumptions" for use in determining compensable
disability. [
Footnote 10]
Under § 411(c)(3), a miner
Page 428 U. S. 11
shown by X-ray or other clinical evidence to be afflicted with
complicated pneumoconiosis is "irrebuttably presumed" to be totally
disabled due to pneumoconiosis; if he has died, it is irrebuttably
presumed that he was totally disabled by pneumoconiosis at the time
of his death, and that his death was due to pneumoconiosis. 30
U.S.C. § 921(c)(3) (1970 ed., Supp. IV). In any event, the
presumption operates conclusively to establish entitlement to
benefits.
The other presumptions are each explicitly rebuttable by an
operator seeking to avoid liability. There are three such
presumptions. First, if a miner with 10 or more years' employment
in the mines contracts pneumoconiosis, it is rebuttably presumed
that the disease arose out of such employment. § 411(c)(1), 30
U.S.C. § 921(c)(1) (1970 ed., Supp. IV). Second, if a miner with 10
or more years' employment in the mines died from a "respirable
disease," it is rebuttably presumed that his death was due to
pneumoconiosis. § 411(C)(2), 30 U.S.C. § 921(C)(2) (1970 ed., Supp.
IV). Finally, if a miner, or the survivor of a miner, with 15 or
more years' employment in underground coal mines is able, despite
the absence of clinical evidence of complicated pneumoconiosis, to
demonstrate a totally disabling respiratory or pulmonary
impairment, the Act rebuttably presumes that the total disability
is due to pneumoconiosis, that the miner was totally disabled by
pneumoconiosis when he died, and that the miner's death was due to
pneumoconiosis. § 411(c)(4), 30 U.S.C. § 921(G)(4) (1970 ed., Supp.
IV). [
Footnote 11] Section
411(c)(4) specifically provides:
"The Secretary
Page 428 U. S. 12
may rebut [this latter] presumption only by establishing that
(A) such miner does not, or did not, have pneumoconiosis, or that
(b) his respiratory or pulmonary impairment did not arise out of,
or in connection with, employment in a coal mine."
Moreover, under § 413(b), 30 U.S.C. § 923(b) (1970 ed., Supp.
IV), none of these three rebuttable presumptions may be defeated
solely on the basis of a chest X-ray. [
Footnote 12]
II
In initiating this suit against the defendant Secretaries
(hereafter Federal Parties), the Operators contended that the
amended Act is unconstitutional insofar as it requires the payment
of benefits with respect to miners who left employment in the
industry before the effective date of the Act; that the Act's
definitions, presumptions, and limitations on rebuttal evidence
unconstitutionally impair the operators' ability to defend against
benefit claims; and that certain regulations promulgated by the
Secretary of Labor regarding the apportionment of liability for
benefits among operators, and the provision of medical benefits,
are inconsistent with the Act, and constitutionally defective.
Page 428 U. S. 13
The three-judge District Court held that all issues as to the
validity of the challenged regulations were within the jurisdiction
of a single district judge, and the court entered an order so
remanding them. 385 F. Supp. at 426. The District Court upheld each
challenged statutory provision as constitutional, with two
exceptions. First, the District Court held that § 411(c)(3)'s
irrebuttable presumption is unconstitutional as an unreasonable and
arbitrary legislative finding of total disability "in terms other
than those provided by the Act as standards for total disability."
385 F. Supp. at 430. Second, reading the limitation on evidence in
rebuttal to § 411(c)(4)'s presumption of total disability due to
pneumoconiosis to apply to an operator's defense in a § 415
transition period case, the District Court found that limitation
unconstitutional in two respects. It held the limitation arbitrary
and unreasonable in not permitting a rebuttal showing that the case
of pneumoconiosis afflicting the miner was not disabling. 385 F.
Supp. at 430. And taking the provision to mean that an operator may
defend against liability only on the ground that the pneumoconiosis
did not arise out of employment in
any coal mine, rather
than on the ground that it did not arise out of employment in a
coal mine for which the operator was responsible, the District
Court found the provision an unreasonable and arbitrary limitation
on rebuttal evidence relevant and proper under § 422(c), 30 U.S.C.
§ 932(c). 385 F. Supp. at 430-431. The District Court accordingly
entered an order declaring unconstitutional, and enjoining the
Secretary of Labor from seeking to apply, § 411(c)(3)'s
irrebuttable presumption and § 411(c)(4)'s limitation on rebuttable
evidence.
The Operators' appeal, No. 74-1316, reasserts the constitutional
challenges rejected by the District Court.
Page 428 U. S. 14
The appeal of the Federal Parties, No. 74-1302, seeks reversal
of the declaration and injunction respecting the constitutionality
of § § 411(c)(3) and (4). Neither side here questions the District
Court's decision not to address the issues raised with respect to
the Secretary of Labor's regulations. As we have already noted, we
uphold the statute against all the constitutional contentions
properly presented here. Because we read the limitation on rebuttal
evidence in § 411(c)(4) as inapplicable to the Operators, however,
we vacate that portion of the District Court's order which
invalidates that limitation.
III
The Federal Parties direct our attention initially to
National Independent Coal Operators Assn. v.
Brennan, 372 F. Supp.
16 (DC),
summarily aff'd, 419 U.S. 955 (1974), which
raised a number of issues identical to those presented here. Our
summary affirmance in that case did not foreclose the District
Court's determination of unconstitutionality regarding §§ 411(c)(3)
and (4), those issues not having been before us on the appeal.
Several questions presented here -- most notably those of
retroactivity and preclusion of sole reliance on X-ray testimony
evidence -- were raised and decided in
National Independent
Coal Operators Assn. v. Brennan, but, having heard oral
argument and entertained full briefing on these issues together
with the other questions raised in the case, we proceed to treat
them here more fully.
Cf. Edelman v. Jordan, 415 U.
S. 651,
415 U. S.
670-671 (1974).
IV
The Operators contend that the amended Act violates the Fifth
Amendment Due Process Clause by requiring them to compensate former
employees who terminated their work in the industry before the Act
was passed,
Page 428 U. S. 15
and the survivors of such employees. [
Footnote 13] The Operators accept the liability
imposed upon them to compensate employees working in coal mines now
and in the future who are disabled by pneumoconiosis; and they
recognize Congress' power to create a program for compensation of
disabled inactive coal miners. But the Operators complain that to
impose liability upon them for former employees' disabilities is
impermissibly to charge them with an unexpected liability for past,
completed acts that were legally proper and, at least in part,
unknown to be dangerous at the time.
It is by now well established that legislative Acts adjusting
the burdens and benefits of economic life come to the Court with a
presumption of constitutionality, and that the burden is on one
complaining of a due process violation to establish that the
legislature has acted in an arbitrary and irrational way.
See,
e.g., Ferguson v. Skrupa, 372 U. S. 726
(1963);
Williamson v. Lee Optical Co., 348 U.
S. 483,
348 U. S.
487-488 (1955). And this Court long ago upheld against
due process attack the competence of Congress to allocate the
interlocking economic rights and duties of employers and employees
upon workmen's compensation principles analogous to those enacted
here, regardless of contravening arrangements between employer and
employee.
New York Central R. Co. v. White, 243 U.
S. 188 (1917);
see also Philadelphia, B. & W. R.
Co. v. Schubert, 224 U. S. 603
(1912).
To be sure, insofar as the Act requires compensation for
disabilities bred during employment terminated
Page 428 U. S. 16
before the date of enactment, the Act has some retrospective
effect -- although, as we have noted, the Act imposed no liability
on operators until 1974. [
Footnote 14] And it may be that the liability imposed by
the Act for disabilities suffered by former employees was not
anticipated at the time of actual employment. [
Footnote 15] But our cases are clear that
legislation readjusting rights and burdens is not unlawful solely
because it upsets otherwise settled expectations.
See Fleming
v. Rhodes, 331 U. S. 100
(1947);
Carpenter v. Wabash R. Co., 309 U. S.
23 (1940);
Norman v. Baltimore & Ohio R.
Co., 294 U. S. 240
(1935);
Home Bldg. & Loan Assn. v. Blaisdell,
290 U. S. 398
(1934);
Louisville & Nashville R. Co. v. Mottley,
219 U. S. 467
(1911). This is true even though the effect of the legislation is
to impose a new duty or liability based on past acts.
See
Lichter v. United States, 334 U. S. 742
(1948);
Welch v. Henry, 305 U. S. 134
(1938);
Funkhouser v. Preston Co., 290 U.
S. 163 (1933).
It does not follow, however, that what Congress can legislate
prospectively it can legislate retrospectively.
Page 428 U. S. 17
The retrospective aspects of legislation, as well as the
prospective aspects, must meet the test of due process, and the
justifications for the latter may not suffice for the former. Thus,
in this case, the justification for the retrospective imposition of
liability must take into account the possibilities that the
Operators may not have known of the danger of their employees'
contracting pneumoconiosis, and that, even if they did know of the
danger, their conduct may have been taken in reliance upon the
current state of the law, which imposed no liability on them for
disabling pneumoconiosis. [
Footnote 16] While the Operators have clearly been aware
of the danger of pneumoconiosis for at least 20 years, [
Footnote 17] and while they have not
specifically pressed the contention that they would have taken
steps to reduce or eliminate the incidence of pneumoconiosis had
the law imposed liability upon them, we would nevertheless hesitate
to approve the retrospective imposition of liability on any theory
of deterrence,
cf. United States v. Peltier, 422 U.
S. 531,
422 U. S.
542
Page 428 U. S. 18
(1975), or blameworthiness,
cf. ibid.; De Veau v.
Braisted, 363 U. S. 144,
363 U. S. 160
(1960).
We find, however, that the imposition of liability for the
effects of disabilities bred in the past is justified as a rational
measure to spread the costs of the employees' disabilities to those
who have profited from the fruits of their labor -- the operators
and the coal consumers. The Operators do not challenge Congress'
power to impose the burden of past mine working conditions on the
industry. They do claim, however, that the Act spreads costs in an
arbitrary and irrational manner by basing liability upon past
employment relationships, rather than taxing all coal mine
operators presently in business. The Operators note that a coal
mine operator whose workforce has declined may be faced with a
total liability that is disproportionate to the number of miners
currently employed. And they argue that the liability scheme gives
an unfair competitive advantage to new entrants into the industry,
who are not saddled with the burden of compensation for inactive
miners' disabilities. In essence, the Operators contend that
competitive forces will prevent them from effectively passing on to
the consumer the costs of compensation for inactive miners'
disabilities, and will unfairly leave the burden on the early
operators alone.
Of course, as we have already indicated, a substantial portion
of the burden for disabilities stemming from the period prior to
enactment is borne by the Federal Government. But even taking the
Operators' argument at face value, it is for Congress to choose
between imposing the burden of inactive miners' disabilities on all
operators, including new entrants and farsighted early operators
who might have taken steps to minimize black lung dangers, or to
impose that liability solely on those early operators whose profits
may have been increased at the expense of their employees' health.
We are unwilling to assess the
Page 428 U. S. 19
wisdom of Congress' chosen scheme by examining the degree to
which the "cost savings" enjoyed by operators in the preenactment
period produced "excess" profits, or the degree to which the
retrospective liability imposed on the early operators can now be
passed on to the consumer. It is enough to say that the Act
approaches the problem of cost spreading rationally; whether a
broader cost-spreading scheme would have been wiser or more
practical under the circumstances is not a question of
constitutional dimension.
See, e.g., Ferguson v. Skrupa,
372 U.S. at
372 U. S.
730-732;
Williamson v. Lee Optical Co., 348
U.S. at
348 U. S.
488.
The Operators ultimately rest their due process argument on
Railroad Retirement Board v. Alton R. Co., 295 U.
S. 330 (1935), in which the Court found the Railroad
Retirement Act of 1934 to be unconstitutional. Among the provisions
specifically invalidated as arbitrary was a provision for
employer-financed pensions for former employees who, though not in
the employ of the railroads at the time of enactment, had been so
employed within the year. Assuming that the portion of
Alton invalidating this provision retains vitality,
[
Footnote 18] we find it
distinguishable from this case. The point of the black lung benefit
provisions is not simply to increase or supplement a former
employee's salary to meet his generalized need for funds. Rather,
the purpose of the Act is to satisfy a specific need created by the
dangerous conditions under which the former employee labored -- to
allocate to the mine operator an actual, measurable cost of his
business.
In sum, the Due Process Clause poses no bar to requiring an
operator to provide compensation for a
Page 428 U. S. 20
former employees death or disability due to pneumoconiosis
arising out of employment in its mines, even if the former employee
terminated his employment in the industry before the Act was
passed.
V
We turn next to a consideration of the Operators' challenge to
the "presumptions" and evidentiary rules governing adjudications of
compensable disability under the Act.
A
The Act prescribes two alternative methods for showing "total
disability," which is a prerequisite to compensation. First, a
miner is "totally disabled" under the definition contained in §
402(f) if pneumoconiosis, simple or complicated,
"prevents him from engaging in gainful employment requiring the
skills and abilities comparable to those of any employment in a
mine or mines in which he previously engaged with some regularity
and over a substantial period of time. [
Footnote 19]"
Second, if a miner can show by clinical evidence (ordinarily
X-ray evidence) that he is afflicted with complicated
pneumoconiosis, the incurable and final stage of the disease, then
the miner is deemed to be totally disabled under § 411(c)(3).
[
Footnote 20] Thus, Congress
has mandated that
Page 428 U. S. 21
the final stage of the disease is always compensable if its
existence can be shown by positive clinical evidence, and that any
stage of the disease is compensable when physically disabling under
the terms of § 402(f). The Operators maintain that both of these
standards are constitutionally untenable.
(1)
The Operators contend that the definition of "total disability"
set up in § 402(f) is unconstitutionally arbitrary and irrational,
because it provides for the compensation of former miners who might
well be employable in other lines of work, and who therefore are
not truly disabled by their mining-generated afflictions. We think
it patent that this attack on § 402(f) must fail. A miner disabled
under § 402(f) standards has suffered in at least two ways: his
health is impaired and he has been rendered unable to perform the
kind of work to which he has adapted himself. Whether these
interferences merit compensation is a public policy matter left
primarily to the determination of the legislature.
Cf. Geduldig
v. Aiello, 417 U. S. 484
(1974). We cannot say that they are so insignificant as not to be a
rational basis for compensation. Indeed, we long ago upheld against
similar attack a workmen's compensation scheme providing benefits
for injuries not depriving the employee of his ability to work.
See New York Central R. Co. v. Bianc, 250 U.
S. 596 (1919);
cf. Urie v. Thompson,
337 U. S. 163,
337 U. S.
181-187 (1949).
Page 428 U. S. 22
(2)
The District Court, relying on such cases as
Stanley v.
Illinois, 405 U. S. 645
(1972), and
Vlandis v. Kline, 412 U.
S. 441 (1973), invalidated § 411(c)(3)'s "irrebuttable
presumption" of total disability due to pneumoconiosis based on
clinical evidence of complicated pneumoconiosis. The presumption,
the court explained,
"forecloses all fact finding as to the effect of that disease
upon a particular coal miner. . . . To the extent that such
presumption purports to making a finding of total disability in
terms other than those provided by [§ 402(f)] as standards for
total disability, it is unreasonable and arbitrary. As written,
section [411(c)(3)] is violative of due process in precluding the
opportunity to present evidence as to the effect of a chronic dust
disease upon an individual in determining whether or not he is
disabled."
385 F. Supp. at 429-430. We think the District Court erred in
equating this case with those in the mold of
Stanley and
Vlandis.
As an operational matter, the effect of § 411(c)(3)'s
"irrebuttable presumption" of total disability is simply to
establish entitlement in the case of a miner who is clinically
diagnosable as extremely ill with pneumoconiosis arising out of
coal mine employment. [
Footnote
21] Indeed, the
Page 428 U. S. 23
legislative history discloses that it was precisely this
advanced and progressive stage of the disease that Congress sought
most certainly to compensate. [
Footnote 22] Were the Act phrased simply and directly to
provide that operators were bound to provide benefits for all
miners clinically demonstrating their affliction with complicated
pneumoconiosis arising out of employment in the mines, we think it
clear that there could be no due process objection to it. For, as
we have already observed, destruction of earning capacity is not
the sole legitimate basis for compulsory compensation of employees
by their employers.
New York Central R. Co. v. Bianc,
supra. We cannot say that it would be irrational for Congress
to conclude that impairment of health alone warrants compensation.
Since Congress can clearly draft a statute to accomplish precisely
what it has accomplished through § 411(c)(3)'s presumption of
disability, the argument is essentially that Congress has
accomplished its result in an impermissible manner -- by defining
eligibility in terms of "total disability" and erecting an
"irrebuttable presumption" of total disability upon a factual
showing that does not necessarily satisfy the statutory definition
of total disability. But in a statute such as this, regulating
Page 428 U. S. 24
purely economic matters, we do not think that Congress' choice
of statutory language can invalidate the enactment when its
operation and effect are clearly permissible.
Cf. Weinberger v.
Salfi, 422 U. S. 749,
422 U. S.
767-785 (1975);
McDonald v. Board of Election,
394 U. S. 802,
394 U. S. 809
(1969);
United States v. Carolene Products Co.,
304 U. S. 144,
304 U. S. 154
(1938).
(3)
In addition to creating an irrebuttable presumption of total
disability, § 411(c)(3) provides that clinical evidence of a
miner's complicated pneumoconiosis gives rise to an irrebuttable
presumption that he was totally disabled by pneumoconiosis at the
time of his death, and that his death was due to pneumoconiosis.
The effect of these presumptions, in particular, the presumption of
death due to pneumoconiosis, is to grant benefits to the survivors
of any miner who, during his lifetime, had complicated
pneumoconiosis arising out of employment in the mines, regardless
of whether the miner's death was caused by pneumoconiosis. The
Operators raise no separate challenge to these presumptions, and we
would have no occasion to comment separately on them were it not
for the Operators' general complaint against the application of the
Act to employees who terminated their employment before the Act was
passed. To the extent that the presumption of death due to
pneumoconiosis is viewed as requiring compensation for damages
resulting from death unrelated to the operator's conduct, its
application to employees who terminated their employment before the
Act was passed would present difficulties not encountered in our
prior discussion of retroactivity. The justification we found for
the retrospective application of the Act is that it serves to
spread costs in a rational manner -- by allocating to the operator
an actual cost of his
Page 428 U. S. 25
business, the avoidance of which might be thought to have
enlarged the operator's profits. The damage resulting from a
miner's death that is due to causes other than the operator's
conduct can hardly be termed a "cost" of the operator's
business.
We think it clear, however, that the benefits authorized by §
411(c)(3)'s presumption of death due to pneumoconiosis were
intended not simply as compensation for damages due to the miner's
death, but as deferred compensation for injury suffered during the
miner's lifetime as a result of his illness itself. Thus, the
Senate Report accompanying the 1972 amendments makes clear
Congress' purpose to award benefits not only to widows whose
husbands "[gave] their lives," but also to widows whose husbands
"gave their health . . . in the service of the nation's critical
coal needs." [
Footnote
23]
In the case of a miner who died with, but not from,
pneumoconiosis before the Act was passed, the benefits serve as
deferred compensation for the suffering endured by his dependents
by virtue of his illness. And in the case of a miner who died with,
but not from, pneumoconiosis after the Act was passed, the benefits
serve an additional purpose: the miner's knowledge that his
dependent survivors would receive benefits serves to compensate him
for the suffering he endures. In short, § 411(c)(3)'s presumption
of death due to pneumoconiosis authorizes compensation for injury
attributable to the operator's business, and, viewed as such, it
poses no retroactivity problems distinct from those considered in
our prior discussion.
It might be suggested that the payment of benefits to dependent
survivors is irrational as a scheme of compensation for injury
suffered as a result of a miner's disability. But we cannot say
that the scheme is wholly
Page 428 U. S. 26
unreasonable in providing benefits for those who were most
likely to have shared the miner's suffering. Nor can we say that
the scheme is arbitrary simply because it spreads the payment of
benefits over a period of time. [
Footnote 24]
We might face a more difficult problem in applying § 411(c)(3)'s
presumption of death due to pneumoconiosis on a retrospective basis
if the presumption authorized benefits to the survivors of a miner
who did not die from pneumoconiosis, and who, during his life, was
completely unaware of and unaffected by his illness; or, in the
case of a miner who died before the Act was passed, if the
presumption authorized benefits to the survivors of a miner who did
not die from pneumoconiosis, who nevertheless was aware of and
affected by his illness, but whose dependents were completely
unaware of and unaffected by his illness. But the Operators, in
their facial attack on the Act, have not suggested that a miner
whose condition was serious enough to activate the § 411(c)(3)
presumptions might not have been affected in any way by his
condition, or that the family of such a miner might not have
noticed it. Under the
Page 428 U. S. 27
circumstances, we decline to engage in speculation as to whether
such cases may arise. [
Footnote
25]
B
Turning our attention to the statutory regulations of proof of §
402(f) disability, we focus initially on the Operators' challenge
to the presumptions contained in §§ 411(c)(1) and (2). Section
411(c)(1) provides that a coal miner with 10 years' employment in
the mines who suffers from pneumoconiosis will be presumed to have
contracted the disease from his employment. [
Footnote 26] Section 411(c)(2) provides that, if
a coal miner with 10 years' employment in the mines dies from a
respiratory disease, his death will be presumed to have been due to
pneumoconiosis. [
Footnote
27] Each presumption is explicitly rebuttable, and the effect
of each is simply to shift the burden of going forward with
evidence from the claimant to the operator.
See Fed.Rule
Evid. 301.
Page 428 U. S. 28
We have consistently tested presumptions arising in civil
statutes such as this, involving matters of economic regulation,
against the standard articulated in
Mobile, J. & K. C. R.
Co. v. Turnipseed, 219 U. S. 35,
219 U. S. 43
(1910):
"That a legislative presumption of one fact from evidence of
another may not constitute a denial of due process of law or a
denial of the equal protection of the law, it is only essential
that there shall be some rational connection between the fact
proved and the ultimate fact presumed and that the inference of one
fact from proof of another shall not be so unreasonable as to be a
purely arbitrary mandate."
See Atlantic Coast Line R. Co. v. Ford, 287 U.
S. 502 (1933);
Bandini Petroleum Co. v. Superior
Court, 284 U. S. 8,
284 U. S. 19
(1931).
See also Leary v. United States, 395 U. S.
6,
395 U. S. 29-53
(1969);
Tot v. United States, 319 U.
S. 463,
319 U. S.
467-468 (1943). Moreover, as we have recognized:
"The process of making the determination of rationality is, by
its nature, highly empirical, and in matters not within specialized
judicial competence or completely commonplace, significant weight
should be accorded the capacity of Congress to amass the stuff of
actual experience and cull conclusions from it."
United States v. Gainey, 380 U. S.
63,
380 U. S. 67
(1965).
Judged by these standards, the presumptions contained in §
411(c)(1) and (2) are constitutionally valid. The Operators focus
their attack on the rationality of the presumptions' bases in
duration of employment. But it is agreed here that pneumoconiosis
is caused by breathing coal dust, and that the likelihood of a
miner's developing the disease rests upon both the concentration of
dust to which he was exposed and the duration of his exposure.
Against this scientific background, it was not
Page 428 U. S. 29
beyond Congress' authority to refer to exposure factors in
establishing a presumption that throws the burden of going forward
on the operators. And in view of the medical evidence before
Congress indicating the noticeable incidence of pneumoconiosis in
cases of miners with 10 years' employment in the mines, [
Footnote 28] we cannot say that it
was "purely arbitrary" for Congress to select the 10-year figure as
a point of reference for these presumptions. No greater
mathematical precision is required.
Cf. Lindsley v. Natural
Carbonic Gas Co., 220 U. S. 61,
220 U. S. 78
(1911).
The Operators insist, however, that the 10-year presumptions are
arbitrary, because they fail to account for varying degrees of
exposure, some of which would pose lesser dangers than others. We
reject this contention. In providing for a shifting of the burden
of going forward to the operators, Congress was no more constrained
to require a preliminary showing of the degree of dust
concentration to which a miner was exposed, a historical fact
difficult for the miner to prove, than it was to require a
preliminary showing with respect to all other factors that might
bear on the danger of infection. It is worth repeating that mine
employment for 10 years does not serve, by itself, to activate any
presumption of pneumoconiosis; it simply serves, along with proof
of pneumoconiosis under § 411(c)(1), to presumptively establish the
cause of pneumoconiosis, and, along with proof of death from a
respiratory disease under § 411(c)(2), to presumptively establish
that death was due to pneumoconiosis. In its "rough
accommodations,"
Metropolis Theatre Co. v. Chicago,
228 U. S. 61,
228 U. S. 69
(1913), Congress was surely entitled to select duration of
employment,
Page 428 U. S. 30
to the exclusion of the degree of dust exposure and other
relevant factors, as signaling the point at which the operator must
come forward with evidence of the cause of pneumoconiosis or death,
as the case may be. We certainly cannot say that the presumptions,
by excluding other relevant factors, operate in a "purely
arbitrary" manner.
Mobile, J. & K. C. R. Co. v. Turnipseed,
supra at
219 U. S.
43.
The Operators press the same due process attack upon the
durational basis of the rebuttable presumption in § 411(c)(4),
which provides,
inter alia, that a miner employed for 15
years in underground mines, who is able to marshal evidence
demonstrating a totally disabling respiratory or pulmonary
impairment, shall be rebuttably presumed to be totally disabled by
pneumoconiosis. [
Footnote
29] Particularly
Page 428 U. S. 31
in light of the Surgeon General's testimony at the Senate
hearings on the 1969 Act to the effect that the 15-year point marks
the beginning of linear increase in the prevalence of the disease
with years spent underground, [
Footnote 30] we think it clear that the durational basis
of this presumption is equally unassailable.
C
The Operators also challenge § 413(b) of the Act, which provides
that "no claim for benefits . . . shall be denied solely on the
basis of the results of a chest roentgenogram [X-ray]." [
Footnote 31] Congress, of course,
has plenary authority over the promulgation of evidentiary rules
for the federal courts.
See, e.g., Hawkins v. United
States, 358 U. S. 74,
358 U. S. 78
(1958);
Tot v. United States, 319 U.S. at
319 U. S. 467;
cf. Lindsley v. Natural Carbonic Gas Co., supra at
220 U. S. 81.
The Operators contend, however, that § 413(b) denies them due
process because X-ray evidence is frequently the sole evidence they
can marshal to rebut a claim of pneumoconiosis. [
Footnote 32] We conclude that, given
Congress' reasoned reservations regarding the reliability of
negative X-ray evidence, it was entitled to preclude exclusive
reliance on such evidence.
Congress was presented with significant evidence demonstrating
that X-ray testing that fails to disclose pneumoconiosis cannot be
depended upon as a trustworthy
Page 428 U. S. 32
indicator of the absence of the disease. [
Footnote 33] In particular, the findings of the
Surgeon General and others indicated that, although X-ray evidence
was generally the most important diagnostic tool in identifying the
presence or absence of pneumoconiosis, when considered alone, it
was not a wholly reliable indicator of the absence of the disease;
that autopsy frequently disclosed pneumoconiosis where X-ray
evidence had disclosed none; [
Footnote 34] and that pneumoconiosis may be masked from
X-ray detection by other disease. [
Footnote 35]
Taking these indications of the unreliability of negative X-ray
diagnosis at face value, Congress was faced with the problem of
determining which side should bear the burden of the unreliability.
On the one hand, preclusion of any reliance on negative X-ray
evidence would risk the success of some nonmeritorious claims; on
the other hand, reliance on uncorroborated negative X-ray evidence
would risk the denial of benefits in a significant number of
meritorious cases. Congress addressed the problem by adopting a
rule which, while preserving some of the utility, avoided the worst
dangers of X-ray evidence. Section 413(b) does not make negative
X-ray evidence inadmissible, or ineligible to be considered as
ultimately persuasive evidence when taken together with other
factors -- for example, a low level of coal dust concentration in
the operator's mine, a relatively short duration
Page 428 U. S. 33
of exposure to coal dust, or the likelihood that the miner is
disabled by some other cause. [
Footnote 36] The prohibition is only against sole
reliance upon negative X-ray evidence in rejecting a claim.
The Operators attack the limitation on the use of negative X-ray
evidence by suggesting that Congress' conclusion as to the
unreliability of negative X-ray evidence is constitutionally
unsupportable. Relying on other evidence submitted to Congress in
1972, [
Footnote 37] the
Operators contend that the consensus of medical judgment on the
question is that good quality X-ray evidence does reliably indicate
the presence or absence of pneumoconiosis. In essence, the
Operators seek a judicial reconsideration of the judgment of
Congress on this issue. But the reliability of negative X-ray
evidence was debated forcefully on both sides before the Congress,
and the Operators here suggest nothing new to add to the debate;
they are simply dissatisfied with Congress' conclusion. As we have
recognized in the past, however, when it comes to evidentiary rules
in matters "not within specialized judicial competence or
completely commonplace," it is primarily for Congress "to amass the
stuff of actual experience
Page 428 U. S. 34
an cull conclusions from it."
United States v. Gainey,
380 U.S. at
380 U. S. 67. It
is sufficient that the evidence before Congress showed doubts about
the reliability of negative X-ray evidence. That Congress
ultimately determined "to resolve doubts in favor of the disabled
miner" [
Footnote 38] does
not render the enactment arbitrary under the standard of
rationality appropriate to this legislation.
D
Finally, the Operators challenge the limitation on rebuttal
evidence contained in § 411(c)(4). That section, as we have
indicated, provides that a miner employed for 15 years in
underground mines who is able to demonstrate a totally disabling
respiratory or pulmonary impairment shall be rebuttably presumed to
be totally disabled by pneumoconiosis, and his death shall be
rebuttably presumed to be due to pneumoconiosis. The final sentence
of § 411(c)(4) provides that
"[t]he Secretary may rebut [the presumption provided herein]
only by establishing that (A) such miner does not, or did not, have
pneumoconiosis, or that (b) his respiratory or pulmonary impairment
did not arise out of, or in connection with, employment in a coal
mine."
The effect of this limitation on rebuttal evidence is,
inter
alia, to grant benefits to any miner with 15 years' employment
in the mines, if he is totally disabled by some respiratory or
pulmonary impairment arising in connection with his employment, and
has a case of pneumoconiosis. The Operators contend that this
limitation erects an impermissible irrebuttable presumption,
because it establishes liability even though it might be medically
demonstrable in an individual case that the miner's
Page 428 U. S. 35
pneumoconiosis was mild, and did not cause the disability --
that the disability was wholly a product of other disease, such as
tuberculosis or emphysema. Disability due to these diseases, as the
Operators note, is not otherwise compensable under the Act.
The District Court, concluding that the quoted limitation on
rebuttal evidence applied against an operator in a § 415 transition
period case, and recognizing that pneumoconiosis is not inherently
disabling in the § 402(f) sense, judged this limitation
unconstitutional on the ground that it deprived an operator of a
factual defense that the miner is not "totally disabled" due to
pneumoconiosis under § 402(f). Additionally, reading the second
part of the § 411(c)(4) limitation on rebuttal to preclude an
operator's defense that the disease did not arise out of employment
in the particular mines for which it was responsible, the District
Court found this aspect of § 411(c)(4) unconstitutional as
well.
The Federal Parties urge on their cross-appeal that these
constitutional judgments are erroneous. We need not inquire into
the constitutional questions raised by the District Court, however,
because we think it clear as a matter of statutory construction
that the § 411(c)(4) limitation on rebuttal evidence is
inapplicable to operators. By the language of § 411(c)(4), the
limitation applies only to "the Secretary," and not to an operator
seeking to avoid liability under § 415 or § 422. And this plain
language is fortified by the legislative history. The Senate Report
on § 411(c)(4) specifically states that the limitation on rebuttal
applies to the Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare, but
nowhere suggests that it binds an operator. [
Footnote 39]
Page 428 U. S. 36
While apparently recognizing that the § 411(c)(4) limitation on
rebuttal evidence could not apply against an operator in a Part C
determination, the District Court believed that the limitation
bound an operator in the determination of a claim filed during the
§ 415 transition period, "[s]ince, under section [415], the
operator is bound by the Secretary's finding of liability under
Part B." 385 F. Supp. at 430. In so concluding, the District Court
was in error. First, it would appear, again from the plain language
of the statute, that the reference to "the Secretary" in §
411(c)(4) does not refer to the Secretary of Labor. On the
contrary, § 402(c), 30 U.S.C. § 902(c), quite plainly defines
"Secretary" when used in Part B, including § 411, as meaning the
Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare, not the Secretary of
Labor. The Senate Report referred to above confirms this
conclusion. Even assuming, however, that the § 411(c)(4) limitation
on rebuttal by "the Secretary" may be taken to bind the Secretary
of Labor insofar as he was required to
pay benefits for
which the United States was liable during the transition period, §
415(a)(1), we have found nothing in the statute or in its
legislative history to suggest that an operator is similarly bound
because the Secretary of Labor is also to
adjudicate the
operator's liability. § 415(a)(5). Indeed, such a reading would
render a mine operator bound by the rebuttal limitation in § 415
transition period cases, although not so bound in cases filed
thereafter under Part C. And that result would be contrary to the
language of § 415(a)(5), which prescribes that an operator
"shall be bound by the determination of the Secretary of Labor
[on a § 415 transition period claim] as if the claim had been filed
pursuant to part C."
In short, we conclude that the Act does not itself limit the
evidence with which an operator may rebut the
Page 428 U. S. 37
§ 411(c)(4) presumption. Accordingly, we vacate the order of the
District Court declaring the § 411(c)(4) limitation on rebuttal
evidence unconstitutional and enjoining the Secretary of Labor from
limiting evidence in rebuttal to the § 411(c)(4) presumption.
Cf. Van Lare v. Hurley, 421 U. S. 338,
421 U. S. 344
(1975);
United States v. Munsingwear, Inc., 340 U. S.
36 (1950).
We are aware that regulations promulgated in 1972 by the
Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare under his § 411(b)
authorization, 20 CFR § § 410.414, 410.454 (1975), applicable to
Part C determinations under § 422(h), and expressly adopted in 1973
by the Secretary of Labor, 20 CFR pt. 718 (1975), authorize
limitations on rebuttal evidence similar to those contained in §
411(c)(4), and appear to apply in determinations of an operator's
liability. But the Operators' amended complaint never challenged
the statutory or constitutional validity of these regulations.
[
Footnote 40] Particularly
in the absence of any mention of the regulations in the opinion and
judgment of the District Court, or in the briefs and oral arguments
of the parties, we find it inappropriate to consider their
statutory or constitutional validity at this stage. [
Footnote 41]
Page 428 U. S. 38
VI
In sum, the challenged provisions, as construed, are
constitutionally sound against the Operators' facial attack. The
judgment of the District Court as appealed from in No. 74-1316 is
affirmed. The judgment of the District Court as appealed from in
No. 74-1302 is reversed, except insofar as it declares
unconstitutional, and enjoins the operation of, the limitation on
rebuttal evidence contained in § 411(c)(4) of the Act. In this
latter respect, the judgment in No. 74-1302 is vacated, and the
case remanded with directions to dismiss.
It is so ordered.
THE CHIEF JUSTICE concurs in the judgment.
MR. JUSTICE STEVENS took no part in the consideration or
decision of these cases.
* Together with No. 74-1316,
Turner Elkhorn Mining Co. et
al. v. Usery, Secretary of Labor,
et al., also on
appeal from the same court.
[
Footnote 1]
The House and Senate Reports on the 1969 Act placed the number
of afflicted active and retired miners at 100,000. S.Rep. No.
91-411, p. 6 (1969), and H.R.Rep. No. 91-563, p. 17 (1969). The
Senate Report,
supra at 7, specified that, on the basis of
X-ray examination, the disease rat was 10% for then-active coal
miners, and 20% for inactive coal miners. Other estimates have run
significantly higher.
See, e.g., Hearings on S. 355 before
the Subcommittee on Labor of the Senate Committee on Labor and
Public Welfare, 91st Cong., 1st Sess., pt. 2, p. 641 (1969).
[
Footnote 2]
Coal workers' pneumoconiosis is a distinct clinical entity, and
is not the only type of pneumoconiosis. The remarks of the Surgeon
General, reproduced in H.R.Rep. No. 91-563,
supra at 15,
indicate that the pathological condition of pneumoconiosis may also
be caused by inhalation of other dusty materials, such as cotton
fibers or silica.
[
Footnote 3]
S.Rep. No. 91-411,
supra at 7-8; H.R.Rep. No. 91-563,
supra at 15-16.
[
Footnote 4]
There was evidence before Congress that the complicated stage of
the disease is sometimes exhibited with "mild pulmonary function
changes and little or no disability." Hearings on S. 355,
supra, n. 1, at 858.
[
Footnote 5]
Ibid.
[
Footnote 6]
Ibid.
[
Footnote 7]
As of December 31, 1974, 556,200 claims had been filed under
Part B of the law. As of that date, with all but 400 cases decided,
509,900 individuals had established eligibility as black lung
beneficiaries under the Act. Department of Health, Education, and
Welfare, Fifth Annual Report to Congress on the Administration of
Part B of Title IV of the Federal Coal Mine Health and Safety Act
of 1969, p. 3 (1975).
[
Footnote 8]
The individual claimant is entitled to benefits at a rate equal
to 50% of the minimum monthly payment to which a totally disabled
federal employee in Grade GS-2 is entitled. § 412(a)(1), 30 U.S.C.
§ 922(a)(1). At current rates, the individual claimant's
entitlement is $196.80 per month, or $2,361.60 per year. 40
Fed.Reg. 56886-56887 (1975);
see 20 CFR § 410.510 (1975).
These basic benefits are increased if the claimant has dependents;
the maximum increase of 100% is available if the claimant has three
or more dependents. § 412(a)(4), 30 U.S.C. § 922(a)(4) (1970 ed.,
Supp. IV).
See also 30 U.S.C. §§ 922(a)(3), (5) (1970 ed.,
Supp. IV). Thus, the maximum in benefits to which a claimant could
be entitled is $393.60 per month, or $4,723.20 per year. Benefits
under Part C are reduced to account for certain alternative income.
§ 422(g), 30 U.S.C. § 932(g). In addition to these monthly
benefits, the operators are responsible for claimants' medical
expenses.
See § 422(a), 30 U.S.C. § 932(a) (1970 ed.,
Supp. IV), incorporating 33 U.S.C. § 907 (1970 ed., Supp. IV).
[
Footnote 9]
Section 402(f), as set forth in 30 U.S.C. § 902(f) (1970 ed.,
Supp. IV), provides in full:
"The term 'total disability' has the meaning given it by
regulations of the Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare,
except that such regulations shall provide that a miner shall be
considered totally disabled when pneumoconiosis prevents him from
engaging in gainful employment requiring the skills and abilities
comparable to those of any employment in a mine or mines in which
he previously engaged with some regularity and over a substantial
period of time. Such regulations shall not provide more restrictive
criteria than those applicable under section 423(d) of Title
42."
The Act defines "pneumoconiosis" as "a chronic dust disease of
the lung arising out of employment in a coal mine." § 402(b), 30
U.S.C. § 902(b) (1970 ed., Supp. IV).
[
Footnote 10]
These presumptions are applicable directly to Part B
adjudications by the Secretary of HEW, and indirectly to transition
period and Part C adjudications by the Secretary of Labor by
operation of §§ 422(h) and 411(b), 30 U.S.C. §§ 932(h) and 921(b)
(1970 ed. and Supp. IV).
See S.Rep. No. 92-743, p. 21
(1972).
See also §§ 422(f)(2), 430, 30 U.S.C. §§
932(f)(2), 940 (1970 ed., Supp. IV).
[
Footnote 11]
The use of this presumption in Part C adjudications is limited
in some regards not significant in this case.
See §§
422(f)(2), 430, 30 U.S.C. §§ 932(f)(2), 940 (1970 ed., Supp.
IV).
[
Footnote 12]
Section 413(b), as set forth in 30 U.S.C. § 923(b) (1970 ed.,
Supp. IV), provides in pertinent part: "[N]o claim for benefits
under this part shall be denied solely on the basis of the
results of a chest roentgenogram." (Emphasis added.) Section 413(b)
is found in Part B of Title IV. Section 430, as set forth in 30
U.S.C. § 940 (1970 ed., Supp. IV), provides, however, that
"[t]he amendments made by the Black Lung Benefits Act of 1972 to
part B . . . shall, to the extent appropriate, also apply [with
limitations not relevant here] to . . . part [C]."
The legislative history, moreover, makes clear that the § 413(b)
limitation on use of X-ray evidence, enacted as § 4(f) of the 1972
Act, was intended to apply to Part C claims as well as Part B
claims,
see H.R.Conf.Rep. No. 92-1048, p. 9 (1972), and
the Operators so concede. Brief for Operators 21.
[
Footnote 13]
For simplicity of discussion, we will generally refer to claims
as though presented by the miner himself, although they may, in
fact, be maintained upon death by a survivor. Neither the District
Court nor the parties have distinguished miners' claims from
survivors' claims under the constitutional attacks raised in this
case.
[
Footnote 14]
The Federal Parties suggest that, since a claim for benefits
under Part C must be filed within three years of the discovery of
total disability due to pneumoconiosis (or the date of death), §
422(f)(1), 30 U.S.C. § 932(f)(1) (1970 ed., Supp. IV), the
operators will not ordinarily be liable for any disabilities
maturing before enactment of their responsibility.
See
also § 422(f)(2), 30 U.S.C. § 932(f)(2) (1970 ed., Supp. IV).
This does not hold true, however, for non-underground operators,
since Part C liability did not apply to them until 1972.
See Black Lung Benefits Act of 1972, § 3, 86 Stat. 153,
amending §§ 401, 402(b), (d), 411(c)(1), (2), 422(a), (h), 423(a),
30 U.S.C. §§ 901, 902(b), (d), 921(c)(1), (2), 932(a), (h), 933(a)
(1970 ed., Supp. IV). In any event, we think the point unnecessary
to our conclusion.
[
Footnote 15]
The Operators have not contended, however, that the Act is
constitutionally defective insofar as it requires them to provide
compensation for present employees whose disabilities may stem from
exposure that was terminated before enactment of the Act.
[
Footnote 16]
Whether or not a person who could have anticipated the potential
liability attaching to his chosen course of conduct would have
avoided the liability by altering his conduct has been significant
in at least one line of cases in this Court. In
Welch v.
Henry, 305 U. S. 134
(1938), the Court upheld against a due process attack a state
statute enacted in 1935 taxing 1933 dividend income that the 1933
taxing statute had explicitly exempted. Adopting the view that a
stockholder would have continued to receive corporate dividends
even if he knew that the dividends would subsequently be taxed, the
Court distinguished prior cases invalidating the retroactive
taxation of gifts on the ground that the donor might have refrained
from making the gift had he anticipated the tax.
Id. at
305 U. S.
147-148.
But see Carpenter v. Wabash R. Co.,
309 U. S. 23
(1940);
Louisville & Nashville R. Co. v. Mottley,
219 U. S. 467
(1911).
[
Footnote 17]
Coal miner's pneumoconiosis was recognized in Great Britain as
early as 1943. It was not generally recognized in the United States
as an entity distinct from silicosis until the 1950's. S.Rep. No.
91-411, p.8 (1969).
[
Footnote 18]
Mr. Chief Justice Hughes, joined by Justices Brandeis, Stone,
and Cardozo, dissented from the Court's invalidating the Railroad
Retirement Act altogether, but agreed with the Court that the
provision for allowances to former employees was arbitrary. 295
U.S. at
295 U. S. 374,
295 U. S.
389.
[
Footnote 19]
For the full text of § 402(f),
see n 9,
supra.
[
Footnote 20]
Section 411(c)(3), as set forth in 30 U.S.C. § 921(c)(3) (1970
ed., Supp. IV), provides:
"[I]f a miner is suffering or suffered from a chronic dust
disease of the lung which (A) when diagnosed by chest
roentgenogram, yields one or more large opacities (greater than one
centimeter in diameter) and would be classified in category A, B,
or C in the International Classification of Radiographs of the
Pneumoconioses by the International Labor Organization, (b) when
diagnosed by biopsy or autopsy, yields massive lesions in the lung,
or (C) when diagnosis is made by other means, would be a condition
which could reasonably be expected to yield results described in
clause (A) or (B) if diagnosis had been made in the manner
prescribed in clause (A) or (B), then there shall be an
irrebuttable presumption that he is totally disabled due to
pneumoconiosis or that his death was due to pneumoconiosis or that
at the time of his death he was totally disabled by pneumoconiosis,
as the case may be."
[
Footnote 21]
Although the premise of § 411(c)(3), that the miner have a
"chronic dust disease of the lung," does not explicitly provide
that the disease must be one arising out of employment in a coal
mine, it is clear under § 422(a), and hence under § 415(a)(5) as
well, that an operator can be liable only for pneumoconiosis
arising out of employment in a coal mine. Section 422(a), as set
forth in 30 U.S.C. § 932(a) (1970 ed., Supp. IV), provides that
Part C liability
"[shall] be applicable to each operator of a coal mine . . .
with respect to death or total disability due to pneumoconiosis
arising out of employment in such mine."
[
Footnote 22]
The original House and Senate bills that gave rise to the
Conference bill enacted as Title IV of the Federal Coal Mine Health
and Safety Act of 1969 each provided for compensation only for
complicated pneumoconiosis. H.R. 13950, 91st Cong., 1st Sess., §§
112(b)(1), (7)(B), as it passed the House, 115 Cong.Rec. 32061
(1969), continued the diagnostic criteria presently embodied in §
411(c)(3), and deemed complicated pneumoconiosis to be "totally
disabling" and compensable. S. 2917, 91st Cong., 1st Sess., §§
501-504, as amended on the floor, 115 Cong.Rec. 27632 (1969), and
passed,
id. at 28243, established a program of interim
benefits for total disability due to complicated pneumoconiosis,
and directed the Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare to
develop standards for determining total disability due to
complicated pneumoconiosis.
[
Footnote 23]
S.Rep. No. 92-743, p. 8 (1972)
[
Footnote 24]
Under the present scheme, the payment of monthly benefits is not
without limit. Section 422(e), as set forth in 30 U.S.C. § 932(e)
(1970 ed., Supp. IV), quite clearly provides that
"[n]o payment of benefits shall be required under this section .
. . (2) for any period prior to January 1, 1974; or (3) for any
period after twelve years after December 30, 1969."
This time limitation, applicable in Part C cases by its terms,
is also applicable to transition period cases by virtue of §
415(a)(5), 30 U.S.C. § 925(a)(5) (1970 ed., Supp. IV). Thus, the
operator is liable for monthly payments only for a period of eight
years. The total amount payable to a single dependent survivor
during this period, under current rates, is approximately $18,900.
The maximum amount for which the operator would be liable, if the
miner had four or more dependent survivors, is approximately
$37,800.
See n 8,
supra.
[
Footnote 25]
Our analysis of the retrospective application of the § 411(c)(3)
presumption of death due to pneumoconiosis is, of course, fully
applicable to the retrospective application of any other provisions
that might be construed to authorize benefits in the case of miners
who die with, but not from, totally disabling pneumoconiosis.
See §§ 422(a), (c), 412(a)(2), (3), (5), 411(a), 30 U.S.C.
§§ 932(a), (c), 922(a)(2), (3), (5), 921(a) (1970 ed. and Supp.
IV).
[
Footnote 26]
Section 411(c)(1), as set forth in 30 U.S.C. § 921(c)(1) (1970
ed., Supp. IV), provides in full:
"[I]f a miner who is suffering or suffered from pneumoconiosis
was employed for ten years or more in one or more coal mines there
shall be a rebuttable presumption that his pneumoconiosis arose out
of such employment."
[
Footnote 27]
Section 411(c)(2), as set forth in 30 U.S.C. § 921(c)(2) (1970
ed., Supp. IV), provides in full:
"[I]f a deceased miner was employed for ten years or more in one
or more coal mines and died from a respirable disease there shall
be a rebuttable presumption that his death was due to
pneumoconiosis."
[
Footnote 28]
See, e.g., Hearings on S. 355,
supra, n 1, at 699 (testimony of Dr. Werner A.
Laqueur).
[
Footnote 29]
Section 411(c)(4), as set forth in 30 U.S.C. § 921(c)(4) (1970
ed., Supp. IV), provides in full:
"[I]f a miner was employed for fifteen years or more in one or
more underground coal mines, and if there is a chest roentgenogram
submitted in connection with such miner's, his widow's, his
child's, his parent's, his brother's, his sister's, or his
dependent's claim under this subchapter and it is interpreted as
negative with respect to the requirements of paragraph (3) of this
subsection, and if other evidence demonstrates the existence of a
totally disabling respiratory or pulmonary impairment, then there
shall be a rebuttable presumption that such miner is totally
disabled due to pneumoconiosis, that his death was due to
pneumoconiosis, or that at the time of his death he was totally
disabled by pneumoconiosis. In the case of a living miner, a wife's
affidavit may not be used by itself to establish the presumption.
The Secretary shall not apply all or a portion of the requirement
of this paragraph that the miner work in an underground mine where
he determines that conditions of a miner's employment in a coal
mine other than an underground mine were substantially similar to
conditions in an underground mine. The Secretary may rebut such
presumption only by establishing that (A) such miner does not, or
did not, have pneumoconiosis, or that (b) his respiratory or
pulmonary impairment did not arise out of, or in connection with,
employment in a coal mine."
[
Footnote 30]
See S.Rep. No. 92-743, p. 13 (1972).
[
Footnote 31]
See n 12,
supra.
[
Footnote 32]
The Operators frame their argument by saying that the effect of
§ 413(b) is to render the rebuttable presumptions of § 411(c)
effectively irrebuttable. But this dressing adds nothing. Once it
is determined that the limitation on X-ray evidence is permissible
generally, it is irrelevant that the burden of going forward with
some rebuttal evidence is thrown upon the operator by a permissible
presumption, rather than by the claimant's affirmative factual
showing.
[
Footnote 33]
Our attention has not been directed to any authoritative
indications that X-ray evidence of the presence of pneumoconiosis
is untrustworthy.
[
Footnote 34]
Evidence was produced at the Senate hearings showing that, in
one study,
"approximately 25 percent of a random sample of some 200 coal
miners whose medical records based upon X-ray findings showed no
coal worker's pneumoconiosis were found on
post mortem
examination to have the disease."
S.Rep. No. 92-743,
supra at 12.
[
Footnote 35]
Id. at 9-16; H.R.Rep. No. 92-460, pp. 10 (1971).
[
Footnote 36]
Section 413(b) directs additionally that,
"[i]n determining the validity of claims under this part, all
relevant evidence shall be considered, including, where relevant,
medical tests such as blood gas studies, X-ray examination,
electrocardiogram, pulmonary function studies, or physical
performance tests, and any medical history, evidence submitted by
the claimant's physician, or his wife's affidavits, and in the case
of a deceased miner, other appropriate affidavits of persons with
knowledge of the miner's physical condition, and other supportive
materials."
30 U.S.C. § 923(b) (1970 ed., Supp. IV).
[
Footnote 37]
This evidence was brought. to the hearings by the Social
Security Administration, whose rules the § 413(b) limitation was
designed to overrule, and was credited by the minority of the House
Committee on Education and Labor. H.R.Rep. No. 92-460,
supra, at 22, 29-30.
[
Footnote 38]
S.Rep. No. 92-743,
supra, at 11.
[
Footnote 39]
Id. at 12. Similarly, the Conference Report refers to
the limitation only as running against "the Secretary." S.Conf.Rep.
No. 92-780, p. 8 (1972); H.R.Conf.Rep. No. 92-1048, p. 8
(1972).
[
Footnote 40]
It follows from our discussion of the § 411(c)(4) limitation on
rebuttal that these regulations cannot stand as authoritative
administrative interpretations of the statute itself. But the role
of regulations is not merely interpretative; they may instead be
designedly creative in a substantive sense, if so authorized.
See, e.g., Mourning v. Family Publications Service, Inc.,
411 U. S. 356
(1973). If the regulations promulgated here are to be upheld, it
must be in this latter sense.
[
Footnote 41]
We see no reason to remand the case to the three-judge District
Court for the purpose of determining whether the Operators should
be granted leave to amend their complaint to include a statutory
and constitutional challenge to the regulations. The three-judge
court remanded to a single judge all questions regarding the
validity of regulations challenged in the Operators' complaint, and
that portion of the case is pending before a single judge. Any
motion for leave to amend the complaint to include a challenge to
any additional regulations can be addressed to that single
judge.
MR. JUSTICE POWELL, concurring in part and concurring in the
judgment in part.
Appellants in No. 74-1316, the Operators, challenge as
unconstitutional the retroactive obligations imposed on them by the
Federal Coal Mine Health and Safety Act of 1969 (Act), 83 Stat.
792, as amended by the Black Lung Benefits Act of 1972, 86 Stat.
150, 30 U.S.C. § 901
et seq. (1970 ed. and Supp. IV). The
Court rejects their contention in Part IV of its opinion. I concur
in the judgment as to Part IV, and concur in other portions of the
opinion not inconsistent with the views herein expressed.
I
Coal miner's pneumoconiosis was not recognized in the United
States until the 1950's, and there was no federal
Page 428 U. S. 39
legislation providing' benefits to its victims until the
enactment of this statute in 1969. In Title IV of the Act, Congress
significantly redefined the respective rights and obligations of
miners and their employers in regard to this disease by
establishing a benefits scheme to compensate victims of
pneumoconiosis. [
Footnote 2/1]
Under Title IV, miners who filed claims before July 1, 1973, are to
collect benefits from the Federal Government, §§ 411-414, 30 U.S.C.
§§ 921-924 (1970 ed. and Supp. IV). [
Footnote 2/2] Miners filing claims after June 30, 1973,
are to collect benefits until 1981,
see ante at
428 U. S. 26 n.
24, from their individual employers. §§ 415, 421-431, 30 U.S.C. §§
925, 931-941 (1970 ed. and Supp. IV). [
Footnote 2/3] Under the statute, the class of claimants
to which individual employers are liable includes both (i) miners
employed at the time of or after enactment and (ii) miners no
longer employed in the industry at the time of enactment (former
miners).
The unprecedented feature of the Act is that miners may be
eligible to receive benefits from a particular coal mining concern
even if the miner was no longer employed in the industry at the
time of enactment. The
Page 428 U. S. 40
Department of Labor already has made initial determinations of
liability against one of the Operators and in favor of claimants
whose employment terminated decades ago. [
Footnote 2/4]
II
The Operators do not challenge their liability to miners
employed at the time of or after enactment, a liability which
accords with familiar principles of workmen's compensation.
[
Footnote 2/5] They contend,
however, that a statutory liability to former miners has been
imposed in violation of the Fifth Amendment guarantee against
arbitrary, irrational, or discriminatory legislation,
see,
e.g., Richardson v. Belcher, 404 U. S. 78,
404 U. S. 81
(1971), as there
Page 428 U. S. 41
is no rational justification for imposing liability to former
miners upon individual mine owners.
The Court recognizes that its evaluation of he rationality of
the employers' challenged liability must take into account the
retroactive nature of the liability:
"The retrospective aspects of legislation, as well as the
prospective aspects, must meet the test of due process, and the
justifications for the latter may not suffice for the former. Thus,
in this case, the justification for the retrospective imposition of
liability must take into account the possibilities that the
Operators may not have known of the danger of their employees'
contracting pneumoconiosis, and that, even if they did know of the
danger, their conduct may have been taken in reliance upon the
current state of the law. . . ."
Ante at
428 U. S. 17. The
Court then acknowledges that the Act would not be justified "on any
theory of deterrence . . . or blameworthiness."
Ante at
428 U. S. 17-18.
It nonetheless sustains the provision for retroactive liability,
reasoning as follows:
"We find . . . that the imposition of liability for the effects
of disabilities bred in the past is justified as a rational measure
to spread the costs of the employees' disabilities to those who
have profited from the fruits of their labor -- the operators and
the coal consumers."
Ante at
428 U. S. 18.
"We are unwilling to assess the wisdom of Congress' chosen
scheme by examining the degree to which the 'cost savings' enjoyed
by operators in the preenactment period produced 'excess' profits,
or the degree to which the retrospective liability imposed on the
early operators can now be passed on to the consumer. It is enough
to say that the Act approaches the problem of cost-spreading
rationally. . . ."
Ante at
428 U. S.
18-19.
Page 428 U. S. 42
In my view, whether the retroactive liability is constitutional
is a considerably closer question than the Court's treatment
suggests. The rationality of retrospective liability as a
cost-spreading device is highly questionable.
If coal mining concerns actually enjoyed "excess" profits in the
preenactment period by virtue of their nonliability for
pneumoconiosis, and if such profits could be quantified in some
discernible way, Congress rationally could impose retrospective
liability for the benefit of the miners concerned. But, in this
context, the term "excess profits" must mean profits over and above
those that operators would have made in years and decades past if
they had set aside from current operations funds sufficient to
provide compensation, although under no obligation to do so. It is
unlikely that such profits existed. The coal industry is highly
competitive, and prices normally are determined by market forces.
One therefore would expect that, had a compensation increment been
added to operating costs, the operators, over the long-term, simply
would have passed most of it on to consumers, thereby leaving their
profitability relatively unaffected. In short, the talk of "excess
profits" in any realistic sense is wholly speculative.
Nor can I accept without serious question the Court's view that
the costs now imposed by the Act may be passed on to consumers.
Firms burdened with retroactive payments must meet that expense
from current production and current sales in a market where prices
must be competitive with the prices of firms not so burdened. One
ordinarily would expect that, if burdened firms are to meet both
competitive prices and their retroactive obligations, their profits
necessarily will be less than those of their competitors. Thus, the
burdened firms, in all likelihood, will have to bear the costs of
the
Page 428 U. S. 43
retroactive liability, rather than pass those costs on to
consumers. And they must bear such costs quite without regard to
whether "excess profits" may have been made in some earlier years.
[
Footnote 2/6]
In some industries, conditions might be such that the cost of
retroactively imposed benefits could be spread to consumers. It
seems most unlikely, however, that the coal industry is such an
industry. A notable fact about coal mining is that the industry
currently employs only about 150,000 persons, whereas, in 1939, it
employed nearly 450,000. Brief for Operators 24. The reduced scale
of employment in the coal industry, combined with the liability to
former miners and their survivors, means that retroactive
obligations almost certainly will be disproportionate to the scale
of current operations. [
Footnote
2/7] Moreover, it is unlikely that liability to former miners
will be distributed randomly across the industry, as it is dictated
by historical patterns that may be wholly unrelated to the present
contours of the industry. Two examples are illustrative: (i) some
coal mining concerns have been in the mining business for decades,
while some competitors have commenced operation more recently. The
exposure of the former group to claims of employees long separated
from active employment is likely to be significantly
Page 428 U. S. 44
greater than that of their competitors. (ii) Some companies
engaged in coal mining in years past on a much larger scale and
with many more employees than currently. This is not an unusual
situation in a "depleting asset" industry, where smaller companies
often lack the resources with which to continue the acquisition and
development of new properties. Stronger competitors, on the other
hand, may have operated on a constant or an increasingly large
scale. [
Footnote 2/8] In each case,
the competitively disadvantaged companies may be unable to spread a
substantial portion of their costs to consumers. In view of these
considerations, it is unrealistic to think that the Act will spread
costs to "the operators and the coal consumers,"
ante at
428 U. S. 18, and
thus I question the Court's conclusion that the Act is rational in
imposing retroactive liability.
III
Despite the foregoing, I must concur in the judgment on the
record before us. Congress had broad discretion in formulating a
statute to deal with the serious problem of pneumoconiosis
affecting former miners.
E.g., Richardson v. Belcher,
404 U. S. 78
(1971);
cf. Williamson v. Lee Optical Co., 348 U.
S. 483 (1955). Nor does the Constitution require that
legislation on economic matters be compatible with sound economics,
or even with normal fairness. As a result, economic and remedial
social enactments carry a strong presumption of constitutionality,
e.g., United States v. Carolene Products Co., 304 U.
S. 144,
304 U. S. 148
(1938), and the Operators had the heavy burden of showing the Act
to be unconstitutional.
Page 428 U. S. 45
The constitutionality of the retrospective liability in question
here ultimately turns on the sophisticated questions of economic
fact suggested above, and these facts are likely to vary widely
among the Operators. [
Footnote 2/9]
In this case, however, decided on the cross-motions for summary
judgment, the Operators have failed to make any factual showings
that support their sweeping assertions of irrationality. Although I
find these assertions strongly suggestive that Congress has acted
irrationally in pursuing a legitimate end, I am not satisfied that
they are sufficient -- in the absence of appropriate factual
support -- to override the presumption of constitutionality.
Accordingly, I agree that the federal parties were entitled to
summary judgment on this record.
[
Footnote 2/1]
Title II of the Act prescribes the maintenance of less hazardous
mine conditions in the future. § 201
et seq., 30 U.S.C. §
841
et seq.
[
Footnote 2/2]
As does the Court, I simplify by not distinguishing between
claims by employees and claims by their survivors.
See
ante at
428 U. S. 15 n.
13.
[
Footnote 2/3]
Claims filed between July 1, 1973, and December 31, 1973, were
to be paid by the Federal Government until December 31, 1973, after
which they became the responsibility of individual mining concerns.
§ 415, 30 U.S.C. § 925 (1970 ed., Supp. IV). Liability on the part
of individual mining concerns arises only if the claimant does not
have recourse to an applicable state workmen's compensation program
approved by the Secretary of Labor, §§ 421-422, 30 U.S.C. §§
931-932 (1970 ed. and Supp. IV), but no such state programs have
been approved.
See ante at
428 U. S. 8-9.
[
Footnote 2/4]
Favorable initial determinations have been made for claimants
who left mine work in 1923, 1927, 1931, 1932, 1937, 1943, 1946, and
1948. Brief for Operators 30 n. 1. These determinations rebut the
federal parties' suggestion that, in combination, the initial
period of federal liability and the statute of limitations
specified in § 422(f)(1), 30 U.S.C. § 932(f)(1) (1970 ed., Supp.
IV), will prevent employer liability to miners who left the
industry before passage of the Act.
See ante at
428 U. S. 16 n.
14.
[
Footnote 2/5]
Congress apparently recognized that the employers burdened by
retroactive liability were not blameworthy. Senator Javits, who
played a significant role in the development of individual employer
liability,
see Brief for Operators 34, thought that the
"blame" for past neglect must be shared by "all of us," including
"the industry, the medical profession, and the Government --
particularly the Public Health Service." House Committee on
Education and Labor, 91st Cong., 2d Sess., Legislative History --
Federal Coal Mine Health and Safety Act 338 (Committee Print 1970),
115 Cong. Rec . 27627 (1969) (floor remarks).
The retroactive nature of the liability makes deterrence an
insufficient justification. In their prospective application, it is
rational for Title IV and other workmen's compensation schemes to
disadvantage competitively employers who take less effective
precautions to protect their employees. But only prospective
liability creates an incentive for occupational safety
measures.
[
Footnote 2/6]
It is, of course, impossible to spread the cost to "coal
consumers" who "profited from the fruits of [former employees']
labor."
Ante at
428 U. S. 18. A
coal mining concern cannot retroactively increase its prices to the
former customers who benefited from the pre-1969 labors of former
miners. The only consumers, therefore, who could bear these burdens
are those who purchase coal currently. But, in a free market, such
customers cannot be expected to pay a reparation add-on for coal
produced by disadvantaged coal companies when the same product is
readily obtainable from others at a lower price.
[
Footnote 2/7]
Indeed, the number of former miners and survivors whom an
individual employer is obliged to compensate could be larger than
the employer's present workforce.
[
Footnote 2/8]
In addition, the incidence of liability to former miners may be
skewed artificially by the regulation imposing liability upon the
company which last employed the claimant, without regard to
previous employment with other companies. 20 CFR § 725.311 (1975).
The validity of this regulation remains to be considered.
See
ante at
428 U. S. 14.
[
Footnote 2/9]
I would not foreclose the possibility that a particular coal
mining concern, in a proper case, may be able to show that the
impact of the Act on its operations is irrational.
Cf.
ante at
428 U. S.
26-27.
MR. JUSTICE STEWART, with whom MR. JUSTICE REHNQUIST joins,
concurring in part and dissenting in part.
While in all other respects joining the opinion and judgment of
the Court, I cannot accept the Court's conclusion,
ante at
428 U. S. 36-37,
that the limitation on rebuttal evidence in § 411(c)(4), 30 U.S.C.
§ 921(c)(4) (1970 ed., Supp. IV), is inapplicable to "transition"
determinations under § 415 insofar as those determinations bind
operators. Section 415(a)(5), as set forth in 30 U.S.C. § 925(a)(5)
(1970 ed., Supp. IV), provides that an
"operator . . . shall be bound by the determination of the
Secretary of Labor [on a transition] claim as if the claim had been
filed pursuant to part C of this subchapter and section 932 of this
title had been applicable to such operator."
As the Court correctly observes, the critical question is thus
whether the § 411(c)(4) limitation
Page 428 U. S. 46
would apply "if the claim had been filed pursuant to part C . .
. and section 932. . . ."
The Court reads the "plain language" of § 411(c)(4), and in
particular the reference to "the Secretary [of Health, Education,
and Welfare]," to mean that
"the limitation applies only to 'the Secretary,' and not to an
operator seeking to avoid liability under § 415 [30 U.S.C. § 925]
or § 422 [30 U.S.C. § 932]."
Ante at
428 U. S. 35.
This reading, the Court concludes, is "fortified by the legislative
history," and, in particular, by the
"Senate Report on § 411(c)(4) [which] specifically states that
the limitation on rebuttal applies to the Secretary of Health,
Education, and Welfare, but nowhere suggests that it binds an
operator."
Ibid.
The Court's analysis omits any consideration of the effect of §
430, as set forth in 30 U.S.C. § 940 (1970 ed., Supp. IV), which
provides as follows:
"The amendments made by the Black Lung Benefits Act of 1972 to
part B of this subchapter shall, to the extent appropriate, also
apply to [Part C]:
Provided, That for the purpose of
determining the applicability of the presumption established by
section 921(c)(4) of this title to claims filed under this part, no
period of employment after June 30, 1971, shall be considered in
determining whether a miner was employed at least fifteen years in
one or more underground mines."
Since the limitation on rebuttal evidence in § 411(c)(4) was
created by the "amendments made by the Black Lung Benefits Act of
1972," it would seem to follow that the limitation applies to Part
C determinations. This inference is reinforced by the Senate
Report, which stated:
"New section 430 requires that amendments to
Page 428 U. S. 47
part B be applied, wherever appropriate, to part C. . . ."
"Questions were raised during the Committee deliberations over
whether the amendments to part B would automatically be applicable,
where appropriate, to part C."
"
* * * *"
"Although it would appear clear that the same standards are to
govern, the Committee concluded that it would be best to so
specify."
"It is contemplated by the Committee that the applicable
portions of following sections of part B, as amended, would apply
to part C: section 411, section 412 (except the last sentence of
subsection (b) thereof), section 413, and section 414."
S.Rep. No. 92-743, p. 21 (1972).
See also id. at
33.
The only play in the tight linkage of Part C to the amendments
to Part B is that afforded by the proviso in § 430 and by the
phrase "to the extent appropriate" which appears in that section.
The proviso does not remove the rebuttal limitation, but it does
alter § 411(c)(4)'s allocation of the burden of proof in another
crucial respect: it limits the period of employment which may be
considered for purposes of determining the applicability of the
presumption. The presence of the proviso is relevant in two
respects. First, it underscores the basic applicability to Part C
determinations of the § 411(c)(4) rebuttal presumption. Second, it
demonstrates that Congress knew how to place a significant
limitation on the applicability of that presumption when it chose
to do so.
The care and precision which Congress used in drafting this
qualifying language bears on the propriety of reading the phrase
"to the extent appropriate" as obliquely qualifying the
applicability of the rebuttal limitation to
Page 428 U. S. 48
Part C determinations. That limitation is part and parcel of an
elaborate reallocation of the burden of proving disability
resulting from pneumoconiosis. Under prior Social Security
procedure,
"if an X-ray [did] not show totally disabling pneumoconiosis, no
further processing of a claim [was] allowed. Thus, any further
evidence of disability [was] not allowed if the X-ray show[ed]
negative."
S.Rep. No. 92-743,
supra, at 11. This heavy reliance on
X-ray evidence had unfortunate consequences for coal miners because
of the inability of X-ray examinations to detect pneumoconiosis in
some instances. Congress responded to this particular problem
by
"prohibiting denial of a claim solely on the basis of an X-ray,
by providing a presumption of pneumoconiosis for miners with
respiratory or pulmonary disability where they have worked 15 years
or more in a coal mine, and by requiring the Social Security
Administration to use tests other than the X-ray to establish the
basis for a judgment that a miner is or is not totally disabled due
to pneumoconiosis."
Ibid.
The 15-year rebuttable presumption embodied in § 411(c)(4) was
perhaps the most significant feature of Congress' response. Based
in part on testimony of the Surgeon General that,
"[f]or work periods greater than 15 years underground, there was
a linear increase in the prevalence of the disease with years spent
underground,"
S.Rep. No. 92-743,
supra at 13, the presumption
embodied a congressional decision to "giv[e] the benefit of the
doubt,"
id. at 11, to a specific class of claimants
totally disabled by respiratory or pulmonary impairments who could
not prove by X-ray evidence that the impairment resulted from
pneumoconiosis. The presumption was rebuttable only if the
respondent could show either that
"(A) such miner does not, or did not, have pneumoconiosis, or
that (B) his respiratory or pulmonary impairment did not arise out
of,
Page 428 U. S. 49
or in connection with, employment in a coal mine."
§ 411(c)(4), 30 U.S.C. § 921(c)(4) (1970 ed., Supp. IV).
It is difficult to believe that Congress would have used the
phrase "to the extent appropriate" in § 430 to withdraw the
protection of the rebuttal limitation under Part C while retaining
the rebuttable presumption of which it is an integral part. Such an
interpretation is inconsistent with the care Congress displayed in
drafting the § 430 proviso. Moreover, it leads necessarily to other
improbable results. The Court's approach, for instance, necessarily
implies that Congress extended the benefit of the § 411(c)(4)
presumption to "surface, as well as underground, miners [in
specified circumstances]," S.Rep. No. 92-743,
supra at 2,
with the intention that the protection would lapse as soon as Part
C came into play. The relevant sentence in § 411(c)(4) states
that
"[t]he
Secretary [of Health, Education, and Welfare]
shall not apply all or a portion of the requirement of this
paragraph that the miner work in an underground mine where he
determines that conditions of a miner's employment in a coal mine
other than an underground mine were substantially similar to
conditions in an underground mine."
(Emphasis added.) If the operative principle is that provisions
in § 411(c)(4) which bind "the Secretary [of Health, Education, and
Welfare]" are automatically "inappropriate" for Part C proceedings,
then surface miners would be stripped of the benefits of §
411(c)(4) as soon as the legislative scheme enters its transitional
stage.
Moreover, the Court's reading of the statute is anomalous in
terms of the overall structure of Part C. The primary goal of
Congress in framing Part C was to transfer adjudicatory
responsibilities over coal miners' pneumoconiosis claims to state
workmen's compensation tribunals, but only if the state
compensation law was
Page 428 U. S. 50
found by the Secretary of Labor to provide
"standards for determining death or total disability due to
pneumoconiosis . . . substantially equivalent to . . . those
standards established under part B of this subchapter. . . ."
421(b)(2)(C), as set forth in 30 U.S.C. 931(b)(2)(C) (1970 ed.,
Supp. IV). One of the Part B standards is the rebuttal limitation
in § 411(c)(4). Thus, the Secretary of Labor would not be empowered
to approve a state law which did not contain a "substantially
equivalent" evidentiary limitation.
The delegation of adjudicatory responsibility to the Secretary
of Labor under Part C was a backstop measure, intended to provide a
forum for presentation of claims during any period after January 1,
1974, when a state workmen's compensation law was not included on
the Secretary of Labor's list of state laws with provisions
"substantially equivalent" to those in Part B. § 421(a), 30 U.S.C.
§ 931(a) (1970 ed., Supp. IV).
See S.Rep. No. 92-743,
supra at 19-21. Since the very reason for withholding
approval of a state law and providing an alternative federal forum
is lack of "substantial equivalence" between the state law
provisions and the "standards established under part B," including
the rebuttal limitation in § 411(c)(4), it would be anomalous if
the substitute federal forum could employ evidentiary rules which
deviate substantially from those in Part B.
The statutory language and legislative history simply will not
yield such an unlikely result. The phrase "to the extent
appropriate" in § 430, 30 U.S.C. § 940 (1970 ed., Supp. IV),
plainly refers to language in Part B which has no relevance to Part
C, notably the language that specifics that "the Secretary [of
Health, Education, and Welfare]" is to have certain adjudicative
responsibilities. These are the references that are not
"appropriate" under Part C, because Part C transfers adjudicative
responsibilities to the States or, in the alternative,
Page 428 U. S. 51
to the Secretary of Labor. The obvious purpose of the phrase "to
the extent appropriate" is to accommodate minor linguistic
variations resulting from this transfer of responsibility. Thus,
the interaction of the phrase "to the extent appropriate" and the
reference to "the Secretary" in the rebuttal limitation of §
411(c)(4) does not render the entire limitation "inappropriate" to
Part C proceedings; it merely renders the reference to "the
Secretary" inappropriate under Part C.
It is significant that the Court's interpretation of §
411(c)(4)'s rebuttal limitation is not urged or even suggested by
any party to this suit. The Federal Parties' position is that the
District Court erred by reading § 411(c)(4) to foreclose a showing
that would refute total disability. That position is clearly
correct. The § 411(c)(4) presumption comes into play only after the
claimant establishes total disability.
See § 411(c)(4), 30
U.S.C. § 921(c)(4) (1970 ed., Supp. IV) ("and if other evidence
demonstrates the existence of a totally disabling respiratory or
pulmonary impairment, then there shall be a rebuttable presumption
. . ."). In addition, the District Court ruled that § 411(c)(4)
places upon a specific coal mine owner the burden of proving that
the respiratory or pulmonary disease did not arise out of coal mine
employment. The Federal Parties urge that this construction is
erroneous, because it overlooks the fact that, under § 422(c), 30
U.S.C. § 932(c), a specific operator can also defeat liability by
showing that the disability did not arise, even in part, out of
employment in his mine during the period when he operated it.
Again, the Federal Parties are clearly correct. If the operator
makes the § 422(c) showing, then the § 411(c)(4) presumption -- and
the rebuttal limitation -- is irrelevant. Accordingly, I would
reverse the District Court's ruling that the § 411(c)(4) rebuttal
limitation violates the Constitution.