United States Court of Appeals
For the First Circuit
No. 99-1786
CARPENTERS LOCAL UNION NO. 26,
UNITED BROTHERHOOD OF CARPENTERS & JOINERS OF AMERICA, ET AL.,
Plaintiffs, Appellants,
v.
UNITED STATES FIDELITY & GUARANTY COMPANY,
Defendant, Appellee.
APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT
FOR THE DISTRICT OF MASSACHUSETTS
[Hon. Reginald C. Lindsay, U.S. District Judge]
Before
Selya, Boudin and Lynch,
Circuit Judges.
Christopher N. Souris, with whom Krakow & Souris, LLC was
on brief, for appellants.
Richard D. Wayne, with whom Charles E. Schaub, Jr., Willard
Krasnow, and Hinckley, Allen & Snyder LLP were on brief, for
appellee.
June 16, 2000
SELYA, Circuit Judge. In this matter, the district
court, understandably deeming itself bound by our holding in
Williams v. Ashland Eng'g Co., 45 F.3d 588 (1st Cir. 1995),
ruled that the plaintiffs' action — brought to enforce claims
under a labor and materials bond for wages and fringe benefit
contributions allegedly due in respect to construction of a
public works project in Peabody, Massachusetts — was preempted
by the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA),
29 U.S.C. §§ 1001-1461, and in particular, 29 U.S.C. § 1144(a).
Accordingly, the court terminated the action by entering
judgment on the pleadings.
We have considerably greater freedom than the district
courts to evaluate the impact of recent Supreme Court precedent
on our previous decisions. Having reexamined Williams against
the changed legal landscape that now confronts us, we are
persuaded that subsequent developments have overtaken our
decision. Consequently, we abrogate the central holding of
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Williams,1 reverse the judgment below, and remand for further
proceedings consistent with this opinion.
I. BACKGROUND
The individual plaintiffs performed carpentry work on
a public works project in Peabody, Massachusetts. All of them
belonged to Carpenters Local No. 26 (the union). At the times
relevant hereto, their employer, Henry Construction, Inc.
(Henry), was a party to a collective bargaining agreement with
the union that required contributions to various fringe benefit
funds on the individual plaintiffs' behalf. Henry defaulted on
this obligation before completing the Peabody job.
In Massachusetts, a so-called bond statute, Mass. Gen.
Laws ch. 149, § 29, the pertinent text of which is set forth in
the margin,2 requires the general contractor on a public works
1Following the procedure described in cases such as Trailer
Marine Transport Corp. v. Rivera Vazquez, 977 F.2d 1, 9 n.5 (1st
Cir. 1992), and Gallagher v. Wilton Enterprises, Inc., 962 F.2d
120, 124 n.4 (1st Cir. 1992), the panel opinion in this case was
circulated to all active judges of the court prior to
publication. None interposed an objection to our proposed
course of action. We caution, however, that the use of this
informal procedure does not convert this opinion into an opinion
en banc, nor does it preclude a suggestion of rehearing en banc
on any issue in the case.
2The statute provides:
Officers or agents contracting in behalf of the
commonwealth or in behalf of any county, city, town,
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project to post a bond covering labor and materials (including
indebtedness incurred by subcontractors and suppliers for wages
and fringe benefits). The general contractor on the Peabody
project obtained such a bond from defendant-appellee United
States Fidelity & Guaranty Company (USF&G). When Henry, a
subcontractor, failed to make contributions in respect to fringe
benefits, the union's collection agent, Massachusetts Carpenters
Central Collection Agency (MCCCA), acting for the aggrieved
employees, staked a claim on the bond.
district or other political subdivision of the
commonwealth . . . for the construction,
reconstruction, alteration, remodeling, repair or
demolition of public buildings or other public works
. . . shall obtain security by bond in an amount not
less than one half of the total contract price, for
payment by the contractor and subcontractors for labor
performed or furnished and materials used or employed
therein [subject to certain restrictions]; for payment
of transportation charges for materials used or
employed therein . . . ; for payment by such
contractor and subcontractors of any sums due for the
rental or hire of vehicles . . . and other appliances
and equipment . . . ; for payment of transportation
charges directly related to such rental or hire; and
for payment by such contractor and subcontractors of
any sums due trustees or other persons authorized to
collect such payments from the contractor or
subcontractors, based upon the labor performed or
furnished as aforesaid, for health and welfare plans,
supplementary unemployment benefit plans and other
fringe benefits which are payable in cash and provided
for in collective bargaining agreements between
organized labor and the contractor or subcontractors
. . . .
Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 149, § 29.
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Resolution of the controversy eluded the parties. The
individual plaintiffs, the union, and MCCCA (hereinafter
collectively the appellants) then sued USF&G in the state
superior court. The surety removed the action, see 28 U.S.C. §
1441, and immediately sought judgment on the pleadings. The
appellants opposed this initiative and moved to remand the
action to the state court. On November 3, 1998, the federal
district court denied the motion to remand. Some seven months
later, it granted USF&G's motion for judgment on the pleadings.
Relying on Williams, the court anchored both orders in ERISA
preemption. This appeal followed.
II. DISCUSSION
We review the district court's preemption ruling de
novo. See Demars v. Cigna Corp., 173 F.3d 443, 445 (1st Cir.
1999); Graham v. Balcor Co., 146 F.3d 1052, 1054 (9th Cir.
1998).
ERISA is a comprehensive statutory scheme that governs
employee benefit plans. It was enacted in response to growing
concerns about "the mismanagement of funds accumulated to
finance employee benefits and the failure to pay employees
benefits from accumulated funds." Massachusetts v. Morash, 490
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U.S. 107, 115 (1989). The statute brooks no interference; it
contains an express preemption clause providing that it shall
"supersede any and all State laws insofar as they may now or
hereafter relate to any [covered] employee benefit plan." 29
U.S.C. § 1144(a). Thus, when state-law claims "relate to" ERISA
plans, those claims are transmuted into ERISA claims. See Whitt
v. Sherman Int'l Corp., 147 F.3d 1325, 1329 (11th Cir. 1998);
Parrino v. FHP, Inc., 146 F.3d 699, 703 (9th Cir.), cert.
denied, 525 U.S. 1001 (1998). In that situation, "any civil
complaint raising [such] a state law claim . . . is of necessity
so federal in character that it arises under federal law for
purposes of 28 U.S.C. § 1331 and permits removal to federal
court." Plumbing Indus. Bd. v. E.W. Howell Co., 126 F.3d 61, 66
(2d Cir. 1997).
Despite this prophylaxis, ERISA preemption is not
inexorable. As the language of section 1144(a) makes plain, the
incidence of ERISA preemption turns on the parameters of the
phrase "relate to." See California Div. of Labor Standards
Enforcement v. Dillingham Constr., 519 U.S. 316, 324 (1997).
That locution is not self-defining, and the Justices have been
at least mildly schizophrenic in mapping its contours. The
Court initially glossed the phrase by portraying the scope of
ERISA preemption as "deliberately expansive." Pilot Life Ins.
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Co. v. Derdeaux, 481 U.S. 41, 46 (1987). As time passed, it
grew more guarded, emphasizing the "starting presumption that
Congress does not intend to supplant state law," New York State
Conf. of Blue Cross & Blue Shield Plans v. Travelers Ins. Co.,
514 U.S. 645, 654 (1995); accord De Buono v. NYSA-ILA Med. &
Clin. Servs. Fund, 520 U.S. 806, 813 (1997), and warning that,
unless congressional intent to preempt clearly appears, ERISA
will not be deemed to supplant state law in areas traditionally
regulated by the states, see Dillingham, 519 U.S. at 325;
Travelers, 514 U.S. at 655.
Importantly, these variations in emphasis have led the
Court to conclude in recent years that the phrase "relate to,"
as used in ERISA's preemption provision, cannot be read
literally. "If 'relate to' were taken to extend to the furthest
stretch of its indeterminacy, then for all practical purposes
preemption would never run its course . . . ." Travelers, 514
U.S. at 655. To scale the phrase down to size, the Court has
devised a disjunctive test: "A law relate[s] to a covered
employee benefit plan for purposes of § 514(a) if it [1] has a
connection with or [2] a reference to such a plan." Dillingham,
519 U.S. at 324 (citations and internal quotation marks omitted)
(alterations in original). We apply this test to the
Massachusetts bond statute, mindful that a state law which comes
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within the compass of either branch of the test is subject to
preemption.
A. Connection.
Travelers plainly signaled a significant analytic shift
in regard to the "connection with" portion of the ERISA
preemption inquiry,3 abandoning strict textualism in favor of a
more nuanced approach:
For the same reasons that infinite relations
cannot be the measure of pre-emption,
neither can infinite connections. We simply
must go beyond the unhelpful text and the
frustrating difficulty of defining its key
term, and look instead to the objectives of
the ERISA statute as a guide to the scope of
the state law that Congress understood would
survive.
Travelers, 514 U.S. at 656; accord Dillingham, 519 U.S. at 324.
Cataloguing the objectives of the ERISA statute is a
fairly straightforward exercise. When Congress conceived the
ERISA scheme, it made manifest its intention to "protect . . .
the interests of participants in employee benefit plans and
their beneficiaries . . . by establishing standards of conduct,
responsibility, and obligation for fiduciaries of employee
benefit plans, and by providing for appropriate remedies." 29
3
This aspect of the case does not require us to consider
USF&G's stare decisis argument. Our decision in Williams
focused solely on the "reference to" furculum of ERISA
preemption analysis, see 45 F.3d at 591, and we will discuss it
under that rubric. See infra Part II(B).
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U.S.C. § 1001(b). Achieving this end requires the avoidance of
"a multiplicity of regulation" and, concomitantly, the creation
of a climate that "permit[s] the nationally uniform
administration of employee benefit plans." Travelers, 514 U.S.
at 657. Using this template, the Massachusetts bond statute, on
its face, in no way inhibits the accomplishment of ERISA's
overall goals.
It is well accepted, however, even under the new
regime, that state laws which furnish alternative enforcement
mechanisms threaten the uniformity that Congress labored to
achieve and thus are preempted by ERISA. 4 See id.; see also
Ingersoll-Rand Co. v. McClendon, 498 U.S. 133, 142-45 (1990).
This category comes to mind because the most obvious tie between
4
In Ingersoll-Rand, the Supreme Court recognized that a
state law can be preempted as an alternative enforcement
mechanism to ERISA § 502(a). See Ingersoll-Rand v. McClendon,
498 U.S. 133, 142-45 (1990). In Travelers and its progeny, the
Court has yet to state unequivocally where § 502(a) preemption
should be placed within the reshaped ERISA doctrine. The Second
Circuit, however, has treated the alternative enforcement
mechanism inquiry as a separate branch of ERISA preemption
analysis. See Howell, 126 F.3d at 68. This is by no means
inevitable. Conceivably, alternative enforcement mechanism
preemption can be considered as part and parcel of a
"connection" or "reference" analysis, or fit under § 514(a) as
a category like "connection" and "reference," or (as Howell
suggests) constitute a preemption prong independent of § 514(a).
In this case, it makes no difference under which heading we
place the inquiry, and so, while we discuss this subject under
the "connection" rubric for the sake of convenience, we leave
the question open.
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the Massachusetts bond statute and ERISA plans as a class
concerns the former's role as a vehicle of enforcing funding
obligations. The question, then, is whether the bond statute
impermissibly supplies an alternative enforcement mechanism for
ERISA plan benefits (and thereby triggers preemption). See
Travelers, 514 U.S. at 658; Parrino, 146 F.3d at 705; see also
Turner v. Fallon Community Health Plan, Inc., 127 F.3d 196, 199
(1st Cir. 1997).
We answer that question in the negative. ERISA
preemption proscribes the type of alternative enforcement
mechanism that purposes to provide a remedy for the violation of
a right expressly guaranteed and exclusively enforced by the
ERISA statute. See Ingersoll-Rand, 498 U.S. at 145. Those
state laws which touch upon enforcement but have no real bearing
on the intricate web of relationships among the principal
players in the ERISA scenario (e.g., the plan, the
administrators, the fiduciaries, the beneficiaries, and the
employer) are not subject to preemption on this basis. See
Woodworker's Supply, Inc. v. Principal Mut. Life Ins. Co., 170
F.3d 985, 990 (10th Cir. 1999). It follows that a state statute
which only creates claims against a surety does not constitute
an impermissible alternative enforcement mechanism as that term
is used in ERISA jurisprudence. See Trustees for Mich.
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Laborers' Health Care Fund v. Seaboard Sur. Co., 137 F.3d 427,
429 (6th Cir. 1998); Bleiler v. Cristwood Constr., Inc., 72 F.3d
13, 15 (2d Cir. 1995).
That ends this aspect of the matter. The Massachusetts
bond statute does not constitute a proscribed alternate
enforcement mechanism. By the same token, it has no other
meaningful nexus with ERISA; it does not, for example, interfere
with the administration of covered employee benefit plans,
purport to regulate plan benefits, or impose additional
reporting requirements. Last — but far from least — it
regulates an area of the law traditionally thought to be the
states' preserve: enforcing contracts under state law for the
citizenry's protection. See Operating Eng'rs Health & Welfare
Trust Fund v. JWJ Contracting Co., 135 F.3d 671, 678 (9th Cir.
1998); Romney v. Lin, 105 F.3d 806, 811 (2d Cir. 1997).
Consequently, we conclude that the Massachusetts bond statute
does not have a sufficient "connection with" covered employee
benefit plans to warrant ERISA preemption.
B. Reference.
Discerning no impermissible connection, we turn to the
second branch of the ERISA preemption analysis and ask whether
the Massachusetts bond statute refers to covered employee
benefit plans so directly as to justify preemption. Prior to
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the Supreme Court's decision in Travelers, this court answered
that query affirmatively, holding that the bond statute singled
out ERISA plans and was therefore preempted. See Williams, 45
F.3d at 591. In USF&G's view, that ought to be the end of the
matter. Because special circumstances obtain here, we disagree.
We do not gainsay that the principle of stare decisis
forms an integral part of our system of justice. Withal, that
system is not only precedent-based but also hierarchical. When
emergent Supreme Court case law calls into question a prior
opinion of another court, that court should pause to consider
its likely significance before giving effect to an earlier
decision. See, e.g., Odum v. Boone, 62 F.3d 327, 332 n.2 (10th
Cir. 1995); Pritzker v. Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner & Smith,
Inc., 7 F.3d 1110, 1115 (3d Cir. 1993). Indeed, Williams itself
acknowledged that there would be occasions, albeit "relatively
rare," on which a newly constituted panel should eschew prior
circuit precedent in deference to intervening authority. 45
F.3d at 592. Our task, then, is to determine whether Williams,
though not directly overruled or superseded, fairly can be said
to have fallen by the wayside. We conclude that it has.
Let us be perfectly clear. We value finality,
stability, and certainty in the law, particularly in the field
of statutory construction. See Hubbard v. United States, 514
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U.S. 695, 711 (1995). But stare decisis is neither a
straightjacket nor an immutable rule; it leaves room for courts
to balance their respect for precedent against insights gleaned
from new developments, and to make informed judgments as to
whether earlier decisions retain preclusive force. See United
States v. Connor, 926 F.2d 81, 83 (1st Cir. 1991). We explain
below why we believe that this case represents one of those
uncommon instances in which intervening developments in the law
make reconsideration appropriate.
The place to begin such an odyssey normally would be
with Williams itself. Here, however, we retreat further into
the past, cognizant that Williams relied heavily on an earlier
precedent, McCoy v. Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 950
F.2d 13 (1st Cir. 1991). Given that symbiosis, gaining
perspective on Williams necessitates an appreciation of McCoy.
In McCoy, we ruled that ERISA preempted the operation
of a Massachusetts mechanics' lien statute, Mass. Gen. Laws ch.
254, because the language of the statute "expressly single[d]
out ERISA plans for special treatment." McCoy, 950 F.2d at 19.
We noted that the mechanics' lien statute, by its terms, inured
to the advantage of "the trustee or trustees of any fund or
funds, established pursuant to section 302 of the Taft Hartley
Law (29 U.S.C. 186), providing coverage or benefits to [an
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employee]." Id. (quoting statute). On that basis, we concluded
that:
[A]ny plan that grants benefits under 29
U.S.C. § 186, which is another way of
describing any plan that grants benefits
under section 302 of the Taft-Hartley Act,
is by definition an ERISA plan. Put
bluntly, by singling out "section 302" plans
for special treatment, the Massachusetts
mechanics' lien law, in the same stroke,
singles out ERISA plans for special
treatment. It is, therefore, preempted as
it applies to ERISA-regulated plans.
Id. at 19-20. We attributed this conclusion in large part to
what we termed "considered dictum," id. at 19, appearing in
Mackey v. Lanier Collection Agency, 486 U.S. 825, 838 n.12
(1988) (declaring that "any state law which singles out ERISA
plans, by express reference, for special treatment is pre-
empted").5
McCoy set the stage for Williams. There, we harkened
back to McCoy and depicted the mechanics' lien statute and the
bond statute as "sisters under the skin." Williams, 45 F.3d at
592. Because we "perceive[d] no rational basis on which to
distinguish between [them] for the purpose of gauging ERISA's
5
Footnote 12 of Mackey (and, thus, the McCoy rationale)
likely endures. See Dillingham, 519 U.S. at 324. The
mechanics' lien statute does not; the Massachusetts legislature
amended it in 1996 to eliminate any mention of "trustees" and
"section 302 of the Taft Hartley Act." See Mass. Gen. Laws ch.
254, § 1 (Supp. 2000).
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preemptive reach," we concluded that ERISA preempted the latter
statute. Id. at 591. It is this holding that we reexamine
today.
The key precedents are the Supreme Court's subsequent
opinions in Travelers and Dillingham. The extent to which the
analytical shift chronicled in these opinions applies to the
"reference to" aspect of the ERISA preemption inquiry is less
than obvious. The Travelers Court quickly ruled out any
possibility that the state law it was called upon to consider
made reference to an ERISA plan and refined the ERISA preemption
analysis in the context of the "connection with" inquiry. See
Travelers, 514 U.S. at 656. The Dillingham Court recounted the
reasoning of Travelers without explicitly limiting that
reasoning to the "connection with" inquiry, but its actual
treatment of the "reference to" question relied entirely on pre-
Travelers precedent and made only passing mention of ERISA's
objectives. See Dillingham, 519 U.S. at 325-28. Thus, both
opinions stop short of explicitly endorsing a new analytic
modality for the "reference to" inquiry. See Prudential Ins.
Co. v. National Park Med. Ctr., 154 F.3d 812, 820-22 (8th Cir.
1998).
USF&G contends that, absent an outright endorsement,
we should disregard the reasoning of Travelers and Dillingham in
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pursuing the "reference to" question. We think not. Although
the Travelers Court had no occasion to link its newly conceived
"objectives" analysis to the "reference to" inquiry, the two
building blocks on which that analysis rests — the starting
presumption that Congress did not intend to supplant state law
and the requirement that no preemption be deemed to occur in
areas of traditional state regulation except in accord with the
clear and manifest purpose of Congress — logically undergird
both inquiries. See Travelers, 514 U.S. at 654-56 (dealing with
baseline presumptions before beginning its bifurcated
"connection with" and "reference to" analyses). We thus proceed
to apply the teachings of Travelers and Dillingham as we
understand them.
To begin with, Dillingham makes clear that two types
of state laws — those that impose requirements by reference to
ERISA plans and those that specifically exempt ERISA plans from
otherwise generally applicable provisions — as well as state
causes of action that are predicated on the existence of ERISA
plans all refer to, and thus relate to, ERISA plans for purposes
of 29 U.S.C. § 1144(a). See Dillingham, 519 U.S. at 324-25.
Put another way, in the post-Travelers era the "reference to"
inquiry will result in preemption "[w]here a State's law acts
immediately and exclusively upon ERISA plans . . . or where the
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existence of ERISA plans is essential to the law's operation."
Id. at 325 (citations omitted).
Examining Williams through the prism of Travelers and
Dillingham, a rational distinction between the mechanics' lien
statute and the bond statute, not previously thought to be
important, bubbles to the surface: unlike the mechanics' lien
statute, the bond statute makes no direct reference to section
302. Instead, it states that bonds for public works projects
shall cover, in addition to labor and materials,
any sums due trustees or other persons
authorized to collect such payments from the
contractor or subcontractors, based upon the
labor performed or furnished as aforesaid,
for health and welfare plans, supplementary
unemployment benefit plans and other fringe
benefits which are payable in cash and
provided for in collective bargaining
agreements between organized labor and the
contractor or subcontractors . . . .
Mass. Gen. Laws ch. 149, § 29. The language concerning trustees
is not ERISA-specific, but stands at the end of a long list of
items that contractors are required to secure (e.g., amounts due
for labor performed, materials furnished, transportation,
equipment rental, and the like). The diversity of this list is
telling (especially since most of these items have nothing
whatever to do with ERISA). Furthermore, the bond statute
treats contributions to fringe benefit plans in exactly the same
manner as it treats the other (non-ERISA-related) elements that
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fall within the statutory sweep. Given the Dillingham screen,
this combination of factors stretches any inference that the
bond statute singles out ERISA plans for special treatment past
the breaking point.6 See Seaboard Sur., 137 F.3d at 429.
Dillingham confirms in another way that a reviewing
court should differentiate between the mechanics' lien statute
and the bond statute for purposes of the "reference to" inquiry.
The Supreme Court's approach there reflects a conservative view
of the inquiry, suggesting that a reference must be patent
before ERISA preemption looms. See Dillingham, 519 U.S. at 324-
25. The precedents that Dillingham cites, see id., illustrate
this point.7 In each of those cases, an ERISA plan lay at the
6
Temporal considerations bolster this conclusion.
Massachusetts adopted the bond statute in 1957 — a quarter-
century before Congress enacted ERISA. This chronology
undercuts any inference that the drafters of the statute
intended to target ERISA plans. See JWJ Contracting, 135 F.3d
at 679.
7
The Court listed three examples. (1) The reference in
Mackey was too explicit to be construed any other way: the
statute at issue there targeted "[f]unds or benefits of a
pension, retirement, or employee benefit plan or program subject
to the provisions of the federal Employee Retirement Income
Security Act . . . ." Mackey, 486 U.S. at 828 n.2 (quoting Ga.
Code Ann. § 18-4-22.1). (2) In Ingersoll-Rand, the plaintiff's
cause of action was based on an allegation that his employer
discharged him to avoid making contributions to his pension
fund, and, thus, "in order to prevail, [the] plaintiff must
plead, and the court must find, that an ERISA plan exists and
the employer had a pension-defeating motive in terminating the
employment." Ingersoll-Rand, 498 U.S. at 140. (3) So too
District of Columbia v. Greater Washington Board of Trade, 506
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center of the inquiry. In contrast, the bond statute functions
irrespective of the existence or non-existence of an ERISA plan.
The sockdolager is that emergent Supreme Court
precedent, by disavowing a strictly textual approach to the
interpretation of ERISA's preemption provision, encourages us
for the first time to conduct the "reference to" inquiry in
light of the actual operation of the challenged state statute.
See De Buono, 520 U.S. at 815; Dillingham, 519 U.S. at 324-25.
Here, that glimpse is revealing. The bond statute neither
imposes requirements on ERISA plans nor exempts such plans from
otherwise applicable statutory provisions. In operation,
therefore, the statute comports fully with ERISA's objectives.
Furthermore, it does not dictate the form that a covered plan
may take, specify the mode or manner of plan administration, or
jeopardize the sort of uniformity that Congress aspired to
achieve. Given these facts, the statutory reference to the term
"trustees" seems too tenuous to trigger ERISA preemption. See
Howell, 126 F.3d at 68. Indeed, the case at hand is, in this
respect, reminiscent of Dillingham, in which the Supreme Court
held that a statutory mention of an apprenticeship program was
U.S. 125 (1992), in which the Court held preempted a state
statute that required employers to provide health insurance
coverage for eligible employees "at the same benefit level" as
that already provided by existing ERISA plans. Id. at 130.
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not sufficient to cause preemption under the "reference to"
prong. See 519 U.S. at 325.
USF&G's argument that the bond statute singles out
ERISA plans because it is limited to public (as opposed to
private) construction contracts lacks force. It is common
ground that state laws of general application are safe from
ERISA preemption even if they impose some incidental burdens on
the administration of covered plans. See Washington Physicians
Serv. Ass'n v. Gregoire, 147 F.3d 1039, 1043 (9th Cir. 1998),
cert. denied, 525 U.S. 1141 (1999); Howell, 126 F.3d at 67; cf.
Travelers, 514 U.S. at 659-60 (explaining that the fact that a
law has an indirect economic influence on ERISA plans does not,
in and of itself, justify preemption). USF&G's argument amounts
to a claim that the bond statute is something other than a law
of general application.
In our view, the concept of "general application"
cannot be parsed that closely. A state law that applies to a
wide variety of situations, including an appreciable number that
have no specific linkage to ERISA plans, constitutes a law of
general application for purposes of 29 U.S.C. § 1144(a). See,
e.g., Mackey, 486 U.S. at 838 n.12; Shea v. Esensten, 208 F.3d
712, 717 (8th Cir. 2000); Arizona State Carpenters Pension Trust
Fund v. Citibank (Ariz.), 125 F.3d 715, 724 (9th Cir. 1997).
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Under this definition, the bond statute ranks as a law of
general application for ERISA preemption purposes because it
applies to a sufficiently broad, sufficiently generalized
universe of situations — all Massachusetts public works projects
— without mentioning ERISA and without regard to whether any
affected person is (or is not) involved with a covered plan.
See De Buono, 520 U.S. at 815; Howell, 126 F.3d at 67-68.
To sum up, the bond statute, gauged by the principles
embodied in recent Supreme Court case law, neither singles out
ERISA plans for special treatment nor depends on their existence
as an essential part of its operation. Rather, the statute is
"indifferent to . . . ERISA coverage." Dillingham, 519 U.S. at
328. It is properly classified, therefore, as "one of 'myriad
state laws' of general applicability that impose some burdens on
the administration of ERISA plans but nevertheless do not
'relate to' them within the meaning of the governing statute."
De Buono, 520 U.S. at 815. Thus, it does not trigger
preemption. See Travelers, 514 U.S. at 656; JWJ Contracting,
135 F.3d at 679; Howell, 126 F.3d at 68.
III. CONCLUSION
We need go no further. The issue here is whether ERISA
preempts the appellants' state-law cause of action. Believing,
as we do, that Williams no longer aids us in our consideration
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of this issue, we abrogate its central holding. See supra note
1 & accompanying text.
Taking a fresh look at the Massachusetts bond statute
and giving due weight to Travelers and its progeny, we conclude
that USF&G has not overcome the starting presumption against
preemption. Accordingly, the bond statute does not "relate to"
any covered employee benefit plan within the meaning of 29
U.S.C. § 1144(a). It follows that the entry of judgment on the
pleadings must be reversed and the case remanded for further
proceedings consistent with this opinion.8
Reversed and remanded.
8On remand, the lower court should consider whether any
other basis for federal jurisdiction exists (and if it discerns
none, should restore the case to a state forum).
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