Atlantic Co. v. Walling
Opinion of the Court
Alleging that as to some of its employees, defendant was violating the minimum wage requirement of Sec. 6, the maximum hours provision of Sec. 7, the record keeping provisions of Sec. 11(c) and the provisions of Sec. 15(a), appellee brought this suit, under the authority of Sec. 17 of the Fair Labor Standards Act, 29 U.S.C.A. Sec. 201 et seq., to restrain these violations. The defendant, as to some of the employees dealt with in the complaint, denied that they were engaged in commerce. Admitting as to some that they were so engaged, it denied that there was any violation of the act. There was a full hearing, an opinion
We think the district judge was right in his answers to both of the questions and that the decree should be affirmed, both on the main and on the cross-appeal. In a thoughtful and carefully worked out opinion, the district judge examined and disposed adversely of the defendant’s contention that Congress, in using and defining the term “commerce”
On the cross-appeal, the district judge was right in the view he took that the contracts for a base pay equal to and for overtime pay in excess of that required by the act were valid agreements under, and payment of the salaries provided for in, them, was in compliance with the act. Fleming v. Belo Corp., 5 Cir., 121 F.2d 207; Walling v. Belo Corp., 316 U.S. 624, 62 S.Ct. 1223, 86 L.Ed. 1716. The administrator’s view that the case is like, and is ruled by, Warren-Bradshaw Drilling Co. v. Hall, 5 Cir., 124 F.2d 42, and Overnight Motor Transportation Co. v. Missel, 316 U.S. 572, 62 S.Ct. 1216, 86 L.Ed. 1682, will not at all do. In those cases, there was no agreement for a base pay and for overtime under, and in accordance with, the act. There, on the contrary, the employment was conducted in complete disregard of, and upon the view that it was not under, the act. It was only when compensation under the act was sought that the claim was put forward by the employer that he was paying the employees under the act and- in accordance with it. We held in the Belo case, and we reaffirmed that holding in the Bradshaw case before the opinion in the Missel case came down, that an employer could not justify, as he tried in the Bradshaw case to do, by the claim that since the total compensation paid was in fact more than the minimum statutory rate and time and one-half for overtime, he had complied with the act. We made it clear in those cases, as the Supreme Court did in the Missel case, that such a claim was unfounded. The Belo case, however, made it equally clear that where there was a definite and fixed agreement that the compensation was being paid under, and in accordance with, the act, and there was an apportionment of it between base pay and overtime, it was to write, and not to construe, the statute, to hold that the parties had not done what they had agreed they were doing, establish a regular weekly rate and a rate' for-over
Fleming v. Atlantic Go., 40 F.Supp. 654.
Typical of these is the contract with Shelor:
“Terms of Employment of W. P. Shelor.
“It is agreed that the terms of my employment by Atlantic Company effective this date, are as follows:
“Number of hours to be worked weekly 60 hours.
“Rate of pay:
First 40 hours per week at 30 cents
per hour ....................$12.00
20 hours overtime at 52%$ per
hour ......................... 10.50
Total weekly compensation .... $22.50 “I understand that this contract may be terminated by either party on 24 hours notice.
“W. P. Shelor, Employee.
“Accepted:
“Atlantic Company,
“By C. A. Nix, Manager.
“Date: 2/16, 1940.“
Other contracts were the same in form and provided the same base pay of 30$ for 40 hours. They varied only in the total weekly salary and this the overtime rate.
Fred Koon: “Rate of Pay:
First 40 hours per week at
30$ per hour ............$12.00
20 hours overtime at 55$ per hour .................... 11.00
Total weekly compensation $23.00”
C. E. Pope: “Rate of Pay:
First 40 hours per week at
30$ per hour .............$12.00
20 hours overtime at 53$ per hour .................... 10.60
Total weekly compensation $22.60”
F. L. Stevenson: “Rate of Pay:
First 40 hours per week at
30$ per hour .............$12.00
20 hours overtime at 53$ per hour .................... 10.60
Total weekly compensation $22.60”
S. F. Hamby: “Rate of Pay:
First 40 hours per week at
30$ per hour.............$12.00
20 hours overtime at 77%$ per hour................. 15.50
Total weekly compensation $27.50”
Paul H. Bell: “Rate of Pay:
First 40 hours per week at
30$ per hour .............$12.00
20 hours overtime at 1.13%$ per hour.................22.62
Total weekly compensation $34.62”
Sec. 3(b): “As used in this act, ‘Commerce’ means trade, commerce, transportation, transmission or communication among the several states or from any state to any place outside thereof.”
Section 3(i) reads: “(i) ‘Goods means goods (including ships and marine equipment), wares, products, commodities, merchandise or articles or subjects of commerce of any character, or any part of ingredient thereof, but does not include goods after their delivery into the actual physical possession of the ultimate consumer thereof other than a producer, manufacturer, or processor thereof.”
Concurring in Part
(dissenting in part).
I disagree only as to the employes making ice, some of which is sold in the state of manufacture to railroads and the Fruit Growers Express to be used in icing refrigerator cars and trucks which transport perishable goods to other states. The persons who ice the cars are engaged in interstate transportation, and thus in commerce, but not those making ice. It seems to me to stretch the statute beyond the intent of Congress to say that a manufacturer is producing “goods for commerce”, and is under the Fair Labor Standards Act because transportation agencies, who are transporting other goods in commerce, buy locally some supplies from that manufacturer for consumption by themselves. The principle at issue applies to everything an interstate carrier by rail or truck uses, or even a passenger automobile, or a pedestrian crossing a state line, to facilitate the journey. Coal, water, oil, gasoline, tires, all are consumed on the journey just as this ice is. The food served in a dining car would fall in the same category. There is hardly any end to it. These transportation agencies are not hauling in interstate commerce the ice or oil or gasoline they consume, but are using them to haul other goods, just as they use their rails or other equipment. When Congress spoke of goods produced for commerce it meant the things which are to be commercially transported, and not the things fortuitously used and consumed in transporting them.
Reference
- Full Case Name
- ATLANTIC CO. v. WALLING, Adm’r of Wage and Hour Division, Dept. of Labor. WALLING, Adm’r of Wage and Hour Division, Dept. of Labor, v. ATLANTIC CO.
- Cited By
- 46 cases
- Status
- Published