rejecting the argument that a general state policy of promoting harmonious labor relations permitted a state university to consider the communications of a union attempting to organize its workers as university business
How later courts described this case
- rejecting the argument that a general state policy of promoting harmonious labor relations permitted a state university to consider the communications of a union attempting to organize its workers as university business
- examining statute’s legislative history in determining how broadly to construe exception provided by statute
- "Because Congress desires 'prompt, reliable, and efficient services to [postal] patrons in all areas,' it has enacted the Private Express Statutes and has provided for nationwide delivery of mail at uniform rates."
Written by the judges who cited it.
Later courts went against this
Questioned by Fort Wayne Community Schools v. Fort Wayne Education Ass'n, 735 F. Supp. 907 (1990)
485 U.S. 589, 108 S.Ct. 1404, 99 L.Ed.2d 664 (1988), calls into question the legality of the Schools’ carriage of Union correspondence without the payment of postage.
The opinion
Justice White,
concurring in the judgment.
The issue here is the proper interpretation of the letters-of-the-carrier and the private mail exceptions to the Private Express Statutes. In reaching a decision we must deal with the Postal Service regulations construing these exceptions; for those regulations, which the majority sets out in its Part II-C, must be respected unless they are inconsistent with the statute — unless either or both are clearly foreclosed by the language or legislative history of the governing statute. If Congress has expressly spoken on the precise issue at hand, the agency must of course not stray from that legislative intent in enforcing the statute. Chevron U. S. A. Inc. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc., 467 U. S. 837, 842-843 (1984). But if there is more than one rational construction of the statute, the agency’s view should normally be respected.
Here, as I see it, the language of neither exception settles the matter. That should end the inquiry unless the legislative history clearly negates the agency’s view expressed in the regulations. Where the statute itself is not determinative and is open to more than one construction, the legislative history must be quite clear if it is to foreclose the agency’s construction as expressed in its regulations, which is surely not the case here.
Inquiry into that history may lead a court to conclude that the agency’s interpretation is not only permissible but is also the only acceptable construction of the law. But even on the majority’s own description of the statutory background, I am unable to conclude that the agency could not have adopted, and could not now adopt, a view of the exceptions that would, *604 on the facts of this case, have reflected the views urged by appellees, particularly with respect to the private mail exception.
Accordingly, I concur in 'the judgment.