On June 6, 2022, the U.S. Supreme Court released a unanimous (8–0 with Justice Coney Barrett not participating) decision in Southwest Airlines Co. v. Saxon (No. 21-309). The Court held that Latrice Saxon, a ramp supervisor for the airline, belongs to a “class of workers engaged in foreign or interstate commerce” that is exempt from the Federal Arbitration Act (FAA). Section 1 exempts from mandatory enforcement of pre-dispute arbitration agreements “contracts of employment of seamen, railroad employees, or any other class of workers engaged in foreign or interstate commerce.”
Saxon brought a putative class action in the federal courts against Southwest Airlines under the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938, contending that the airline did not pay proper overtime wages to ramp supervisors like her. The Seventh Circuit rejected Southwest’s effort to enforce an arbitration agreement in Saxon’s employment contract, holding that section 1 excluded the claims from FAA coverage. Southwest Airlines then petitioned the Supreme Court.
Justice Thomas’s opinion had two major parts. First, it addressed how to define a “class of workers” and, second, how to determine whether that class is “engaged in foreign or interstate commerce.” The Court concluded that Saxon was indeed a member of a “class of workers” based on the work she did, not the activities of Southwest Airlines.
the FAA speaks of “‘workers,’” not “ ‘employees’ or ‘servants.’ ” . . . . The word “workers” directs the interpreter’s attention to “the performance of work.” . . . . see also Webster’s New International Dictionary 2350 (1922) (Webster’s) (worker: “One that works”); . . . Further, the word “engaged”—meaning “[o]ccupied,” “employed,” or “[i]nvolved,” Webster’s 725; see also, e.g., Black’s Law Dictionary 661 (3d ed. 1933) (defining “engage”)—similarly emphasizes the actual work that the members of the class, as a whole, typically carry out. Saxon is therefore a member of a “class of workers” based on what she does at Southwest, not what Southwest does generally.
Significantly, the Court pointed to the declaration by Saxon that ramp supervisors “frequently load and unload cargo.”
Southwest has not meaningfully contested that ramp supervisors like Saxon frequently load and unload cargo. See 993 F. 3d, at 494, 497 (noting Saxon’s “uncontroverted declaration assert[ing] that she and the other ramp supervisors . . . frequently fill in as ramp agents” for up to three shifts per week). Thus, . . . we accept that Saxon belongs to a class of workers who physically load and unload cargo on and off airplanes on a frequent basis.
The Court then turned to whether Saxon’s class of workers was “engaged in foreign or interstate commerce” for purposes of FAA section 1. Here too, Justice Thomas began with a textual approach and looked to dictionary definitions of the central terms.
Again, to be “engaged” in something means to be “occupied,” “employed,” or “involved” in it. “Commerce,” meanwhile, includes, among other things, “the transportation of . . . goods, both by land and by sea.” Black’s Law Dictionary 220 (2d ed. 1910) (Black’s); see also, e.g., Webster’s 448 (commerce: “the exchange of merchandise on a large scale between different places or communities”).
For the Court, that approach signaled that “any class of workers directly involved in transporting goods across state or international borders falls within §1’s exemption.”
We have said that it is “too plain to require discussion that the loading or unloading of an interstate shipment by the employees of a carrier is so closely related to interstate transportation as to be practically a part of it.” . . . . We think it equally plain that airline employees who physically load and unload cargo on and off planes traveling in interstate commerce are, as a practical matter, part of the interstate transportation of goods. They form “a class of workers engaged in foreign or interstate commerce.”
However, Justice Thomas’s conclusions were carefully limited. In a footnote, the Court referenced two arguably disagreeing court of appeals decisions to make the point that it will not always be clear on the facts “when the class of workers carries out duties further removed from the channels of interstate commerce or the actual crossing of borders.”
We recognize that the answer will not always be so plain when the class of workers carries out duties further removed from the channels of interstate commerce or the actual crossing of borders. Compare, e.g., Rittmann v. Amazon.com, Inc., 971 F. 3d 904, 915 (CA9 2020) (holding that a class of “last leg” delivery drivers falls within §1’s exemption), with, e.g., Wallace v. Grubhub Holdings, Inc., 970 F. 3d 798, 803 (CA72020) (holding that food delivery drivers do not). In any event, we need not address those questions to resolve this case.
The Court’s effort to avoid ruling broadly on those types of issues leaves considerable opportunity for continuing litigation over the scope of the section 1 exemption. The Court did, though, signal that such disputes are to be resolved on the basis of the nature of the performance of work by the workers in question, not on the basis of the nature of the business of the companies in question.
At bottom, the Supreme Court unanimously held that “Latrice Saxon frequently loads and unloads cargo on and off airplanes that travel in interstate commerce. She therefore belongs to a ‘class of workers engaged in foreign or interstate commerce’ to which §1’s exemption applies.”
