In the case of General Motors Corporation, et al. v. Evert Romein et al., 1991, the U.S Supreme Court ruled in favor of workers who were seeking retroactive compensation for disability benefits that had been reduced by a Michigan law enacted in 1981. The law was later declared unconstitutional and repealed in 1987, leading to disputes over whether employers should pay back the difference to affected employees. General Motors (GM) and Ford Motor Company argued against this on grounds that it violated their due process rights under the Fourteenth Amendment as they could not have anticipated such an outcome when making payments based on existing laws at that time. However, Justice John Paul Stevens delivered a unanimous decision stating that GM's and Ford’s constitutional rights were not violated because businesses must always be prepared for changes in regulations affecting their operations.

In the dissenting opinion for General Motors Corporation v. Evert Romein et al., Justice Scalia argued that Michigan's amendment to its Worker's Disability Compensation Act, which retroactively required employers to pay additional compensation benefits they had previously been exempted from paying, violated the Contract Clause of the U.S. Constitution. He contended that this clause prohibits states from passing laws impairing contractual obligations and believed that Michigan’s law did just that by altering past legal arrangements between employers and employees regarding workers' compensation benefits. Furthermore, he disagreed with the majority's view on what constituted a "substantial impairment" of contract rights under previous Supreme Court interpretations of the Contract Clause. In his view, any alteration in terms agreed upon in a contract represents substantial impairment; it does not need to be severe or extreme as suggested by other justices.