High Court Justices Doubt Broad CERCLA Preemption Of State Tort Limits

摘要

Supreme Court justices appeared skeptical that Congress intended to broadly preempt state limits on tort claims filed by plaintiffs who have been exposed to chemicals at waste sites when it enacted the Superfund law. "I find it hard to read [the law] that way," Justice Antonin Scalia told the attorney for a group of North Carolina plaintiffs during oral arguments April 23. At issue in CTS Corporation v. Waldburger is whether the federal "discovery rule" in the Superfund law that prevents state statutes of limitations on tort suits from beginning until a victim has discovered his or her injury also applies to so-called statutes of repose, which set an end date on liability, regardless of whether an injury is known.