Charas

These consolidated eases cause us to consider once again the circumstances under which the Airline Deregulation Act of 1978, 49 U.S.C. app. § 1305(a)(1) (“ADA”), preempts certain state law claims. Although we have addressed the scope of this statutory preemption before, we have taken these cases en banc sua sponte to rethink our previous decisions. 1 We now hold that in enacting the ADA, Congress intended to preempt only state laws and lawsuits that would adversely affect the economic deregulation of the airlines and the forces of competition within the airline industry. Congress did not intend to preempt passengers’ run-of-the-mill personal injury claims. Accordingly, we hold that Congress used the word “service” in the phrase “rates, routes, or service” in the ADA’s preemption clause to refer to the prices, schedules, origins and destinations of the point-to-point transportation of passengers, cargo, or mail. In the context in which it was used in the Act, “service” was not intended to include an airline’s provision of in-flight beverages, personal assistance to passengers, the handling of luggage, and similar amenities. We expressly overrule our decisions in Harris v. American…