Roberto Ramos v. SimplexGrinnell LP

OPINION OF THE COURT

Smith, J.

The United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit has asked us what deference a court should pay to an agency’s decision, made for its own enforcement purposes, to construe a statute prospectively only. The agency in question, the New York State Department of Labor, has submitted an amicus brief to us in which it renounces any claim to deference in this litigation. This leads us to give a narrow answer to the Second Circuit’s question: We will not give the agency more deference than it claims for itself.

I

In this lawsuit, the federal courts have been called…