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NOTICE: This opinion is subject to formal revision before publication in the
preliminary print of the United States Reports.  Readers are requested to
notify the Reporter of Decisions, Supreme Court of the United States, Wash-
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SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES
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No. 94-286
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FREIGHTLINER CORPORATION, et al., PETI-
TIONERS v. BEN MYRICK, et ux., et al.
on writ of certiorari to the united states court
of appeals for the eleventh circuit
[April 18, 1995]

  Justice Thomas delivered the opinion of the Court.
  By statute, the Secretary of Transportation has the
authority to issue appropriate safety standards for motor
vehicles and their equipment.  Respondents filed law-
suits under state common law alleging negligent design
defects in equipment manufactured by petitioners.
Petitioners claim that these actions are pre-empted by
a federal safety standard, even though the standard was
suspended by a federal court.  We hold that the absence
of a federal standard cannot implicitly extinguish state
common law.

                            I
  This case arises from two separate but essentially
identical accidents in Georgia involving tractor-trailers.
In both cases, 18-wheel tractor-trailers attempted to
brake suddenly and ended up jackknifing into oncoming
traffic.  Neither vehicle was equipped with an antilock
braking system (ABS).  In the first case, respondent
Ben Myrick was the driver of an oncoming vehicle that
was hit by a tractor-trailer manufactured by petitioner
Freightliner.  The accident left him permanently para-
plegic and brain damaged.  In the second case, the
driver of an oncoming car, Grace Lindsey, was killed
when her vehicle collided with a tractor-trailer manufac-
tured by petitioner Navistar.
  Respondents independently sued the manufacturers of
the tractor-trailers under state tort law.  They alleged
that the absence of ABS was a negligent design that
rendered the vehicles defective.  Petitioners removed the
actions to the District Court for the Northern District of
Georgia on the basis of diversity of citizenship.  They
then sought summary judgment on the ground that
respondents' claims were pre-empted by the National
Traffic and Motor Vehicle Safety Act of 1966 (Safety Act
or Act), Pub. L. 89-563, 80 Stat. 718, as amended, 15
U. S. C. 1381 et seq., and its implementing regulations.
In respondent Myrick's case, the District Court held that
the claims were pre-empted by federal law and granted
summary judgment for petitioner Freightliner.  Myrick
v. Fruehauf Corp., 795 F. Supp. 1139 (ND Ga. 1992).
Following the opinion in the Myrick case, the District
Court granted summary judgment in the Lindsey action
in favor of petitioner Navistar.
  The Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit consoli-
dated the cases and reversed.  Myrick v. Freuhauf Corp.,
13 F. 3d 1516 (1994).  It held that under its previous
decision in Taylor v. General Motors Corp., 875 F. 2d
816 (CA11 1989), cert. denied, 494 U. S. 1065 (1990),
the state-law tort claims were not expressly pre-empted.
The Court of Appeals rejected petitioners' alternative
argument that the claims were pre-empted due to a
conflict between state law and the federal regulatory
scheme.  We granted certiorari, 513 U. S. ___ (1994).
We now affirm.

                           II
  In 1966, Congress enacted the Safety Act -to reduce
traffic accidents and deaths and injuries to persons
resulting from traffic accidents.-  15 U. S. C. 1381.
The Act requires the Secretary of Transportation to
establish -appropriate Federal motor vehicle safety
standards.-  1392(a).  The Act defines a safety standard
as -a minimum standard for motor vehicle performance,
or motor vehicle equipment performance, which is
practicable, which meets the need for motor vehicle
safety and which provides objective criteria.-  1391(2).
  The Safety Act's express pre-emption clause provides:
      -Whenever a Federal motor vehicle safety standard
established under this subchapter is in effect, no
State or political subdivision of a State shall have
any authority either to establish, or to continue in
effect, with respect to any motor vehicle or item of
motor vehicle equipment any safety standard appli-
cable to the same aspect of performance of such
vehicle or item of equipment which is not identical
to the Federal standard.  Nothing in this section
shall be construed as preventing any State from
enforcing any safety standard which is identical to
a Federal safety standard.-  1392(d).
The Act also contains a savings clause, which states:
-Compliance with any Federal motor vehicle safety
standard issued under this subchapter does not exempt
any person from any liability under common law.-
1397(k).
  The Secretary has delegated the authority to promul-
gate safety standards to the Administrator of the
National Highway Traffic Safety Administration
(NHTSA).  49 CFR 1.50(a) (1994).  In 1970, the pre-
decessor to NHTSA issued regulations concerning
vehicles equipped with air brakes, which are used in
trucks and tractor-trailers.  Known as Standard 121,
this regulation imposed stopping distances and vehicle
stability requirements for trucks.  See 36 Fed. Reg. 3817
(1971).  Because these stopping distances were shorter
than those that could be achieved with brakes without
ABS, several manufacturers notified NHTSA that ABS
devices would be required.  Some manufacturers asked
NHTSA to alter the standard itself because they be-
lieved that ABS devices were unreliable and rendered
vehicles dangerously unsafe when combined with new,
more effective brakes.  In 1974, NHTSA responded that
Standard 121 was practical and that ABS devices did
not cause accidents.  See generally Paccar, Inc. v.
NHTSA, 573 F. 2d 632, 637-638 (CA9), cert. denied, 439
U. S. 862 (1978).
  Several manufacturers and trade associations then
sought review of Standard 121 in the Court of Appeals
for the Ninth Circuit.  That court remanded the case to
NHTSA because -a careful review of the extensive
record- indicated that -the Standard was neither
reasonable nor practicable at the time it was put into
effect.-  573 F. 2d, at 640.  The court found that
NHTSA had failed to consider the high failure rate of
ABS devices placed in actual use, id., at 642, and that
-there [was] a strong probability that [ABS] has created
a potentially more hazardous highway situation than
existed before the Standard became operative,- id., at
643.  Until NHTSA compiled sufficient evidence to show
that ABS would not create the possibility of greater
danger, the court concluded, the Standard would remain
suspended.  Ibid.
  After the Ninth Circuit's decision in Paccar, the
agency amended Standard 121 so that the stopping
distance and lock-up requirements no longer applied to
trucks and trailers.  NHTSA nevertheless left the
unamended Standard 121 in the Code of Federal Regula-
tions so that -the affected sections [could] most easily be
reinstated- when the agency met Paccar's requirements.
44 Fed. Reg. 46849 (1979).  NHTSA also stated that the
provisions would remain in place so that manufacturers
would know -what the agency still considers to be
reasonable standards for minimum acceptable perfor-
mance.-  Ibid.  Although NHTSA has developed new
stopping distance standards, to this day it still has not
taken final action to reinstate a safety standard govern-
ing the stopping distance of trucks and trailers.

                           III
  Despite the fact that Standard 121 remains suspended,
petitioners maintain that respondents' lawsuits are
expressly pre-empted.  We disagree.  The Act's pre-
emption clause applies only -[w]henever a Federal motor
vehicle safety standard . . . is in effect- with respect to
-the same aspect of performance- regulated by a state
standard.  15 U. S. C. 1392(d).  There is no express
federal standard addressing stopping distances or vehicle
stability for trucks or trailers.  No NHTSA regulation
currently establishes a -minimum standard for . . .
motor vehicle equipment performance,- 1391(2), nor is
any standard -stated in objective terms,- 1392(a).
There is simply no minimum, objective standard stated
at all.  Therefore, States remain free to -establish, or to
continue in effect,- their own safety standards concern-
ing those -aspect[s] of performance.-  1392(d).
  Petitioners insist, however, that the absence of
regulation itself constitutes regulation.  Relying upon
our opinion in Ray v. Atlantic Richfield Co., 435 U. S.
151 (1978), petitioners assert that the failure of federal
officials -`affirmatively to exercise their full authority
takes on the character of a ruling that no such regula-
tion is appropriate or approved pursuant to the policy of
the statute.'-  Id., at 178 (quoting Bethlehem Steel Co.
v. New York State Labor Relations Bd., 330 U. S. 767,
774 (1947).  Unlike this case, however, we found in Ray
that Congress intended to centralize all authority over
the regulated area in one decision-maker: the Federal
Government.  435 U. S., at 177.  Here, there is no
evidence that NHTSA decided that trucks and trailers
should be free from all state regulation of stopping
distances and vehicle stability.  Indeed, the lack of
federal regulation did not result from an affirmative
decision of agency officials to refrain from regulating air
brakes.  NHTSA did not decide that the minimum,
objective safety standard required by 15 U. S. C.
1392(a) should be the absence of all standards, both
federal and state.  Rather, the lack of a federal stand-
ard stemmed from the decision of a federal court that
the agency had not compiled sufficient evidence to justify
its regulations.

                           IV
  Even if 1392(d) does not expressly extinguish state
tort law, petitioners argue that respondents' lawsuits are
pre-empted by implication because the state-law princi-
ple they seek to vindicate would conflict with federal
law.  We have recognized that a federal statute implic-
itly overrides state law either when the scope of a
statute indicates that Congress intended federal law to
occupy a field exclusively, English v. General Electric
Co., 496 U. S. 72, 78-79 (1990), or when state law is in
actual conflict with federal law.  We have found implied
conflict pre-emption where it is -impossible for a private
party to comply with both state and federal require-
ments,- id., at 79, or where state law -stands as an
obstacle to the accomplishment and execution of the full
purposes and objectives of Congress.-  Hines v.
Davidowitz, 312 U. S. 52, 67 (1941).

                            A
  As an initial matter, we must address the argument
that we need not reach the conflict pre-emption issue at
all.  According to respondents and the Court of Appeals,
Cipollone v. Liggett Group Inc., 505 U. S. ___ (1992),
held that implied pre-emption cannot exist when Con-
gress has chosen to include an express pre-emption
clause in a statute.  This argument is without merit.  In
Cipollone we did hold that the pre-emptive scope of the
two statutes at issue was governed by the language in
each act.  That conclusion rested on a familiar canon of
statutory construction and on the absence of any reason
to infer any broader pre-emption.  Instead of announcing
a categorical rule precluding the coexistence of express
and implied pre-emption, however, the relevant passage
in the opinion stated:
      -In our opinion, the pre-emptive scope of the 1965
Act and the 1969 Act is governed entirely by the
express language in 5 of each Act.  When Congress
has considered the issue of pre-emption and has
included in the enacted legislation a provision
explicitly addressing that issue, and when that
provision provides a `reliable indicium of congres-
sional intent with respect to state authority,' Malone
v. White Motor Corp., 435 U. S., at 505, `there is no
need to infer congressional intent to pre-empt state
laws from the substantive provisions' of the legisla-
tion.  California Federal Savings & Loan Assn. v.
Guerra, 479 U. S. 272, 282 (1987) (opinion of
Marshall, J.).  Such reasoning is a variant of the
familiar principle of expressio unius est exclusio
alterius: Congress' enactment of a provision defining
the pre-emptive reach of a statute implies that
matters beyond that reach are not pre-empted.  In
this case, the other provisions of the 1965 and 1969
Acts offer no cause to look beyond 5 of each Act.
Therefore, we need only identify the domain ex-
pressly pre-empted by each of those sections.  As the
1965 and 1969 provisions differ substantially, we
consider each in turn.-  Cipollone, supra, at ___ (slip
op., at 11).
  The fact that an express definition of the pre-emptive
reach of a statute -implies--i.e. supports a reasonable
inference-that Congress did not intend to pre-empt
other matters does not mean that the express clause
entirely forecloses any possibility of implied pre-emption.
Indeed, just two paragraphs after the quoted passage in
Cipollone, we engaged in a conflict pre-emption analysis
of the Federal Cigarette Labeling and Advertising Act,
79 Stat. 282, as amended, 15 U. S. C. 1331 et seq., and
found -no general, inherent conflict between federal pre-
emption of state warning requirements and the contin-
ued vitality of state common law damages actions.- 505
U. S., at ___ (slip op., at 12).  Our subsequent decisions
have not read Cipollone to obviate the need for analysis
of an individual statute's pre-emptive effects.  See, e.g.,
CSX Transportation, Inc. v. Easterwood, 507 U. S. ___,
___, n. 12 (1993) (slip op., at 14, n. 12).  (-We reject
petitioner's claim of implied `conflict' pre-emption . . . on
the basis of the preceding analysis.-).  At best, Cipollone
supports an inference that an express pre-emption clause
forecloses implied pre-emption; it does not establish a
rule.

                            B
  Petitioners' pre-emption argument is ultimately futile,
however, because respondents' common-law actions do
not conflict with federal law.  First, it is not impossible
for petitioners to comply with both federal and state law
because there is simply no federal standard for a private
party to comply with.  Nothing in the Safety Act or its
regulations currently regulates the use of ABS devices.
As Standard 121 imposes no requirements either
requiring or prohibiting ABS systems, tractor-trailer
manufacturers are free to obey state standards concern-
ing stopping distances and vehicle stability.
  Second, we cannot say that the respondents' lawsuits
frustrate -the accomplishment and execution of the full
purposes and objectives of Congress.-  Hines, supra, at
67.  In the absence of a promulgated safety standard,
the Act simply fails to address the need for ABS devices
at all.  Further, Standard 121 currently has nothing to
say concerning ABS devices one way or the other, and
NHTSA has not ordered truck manufacturers to refrain
from using ABS devices.  A finding of liability against
petitioners would undermine no federal objectives or
purposes with respect to ABS devices, since none exist.
  For the foregoing reasons, the judgment of the Court
of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit is affirmed.

                                      It is so ordered.

  Justice Scalia concurs in the judgment.