Title: Thomas Smith Farms, Inc. v. Alday

State: florida

Issuer: Florida Supreme Court

Document:

182 So. 2d 405 (1966)
THOMAS SMITH FARMS, INC., Petitioner,
v.
James R. ALDAY and Florida Industrial Commission, Respondents.
No. 34433.

Supreme Court of Florida.
February 2, 1966.
*406 Steve M. Watkins, of Truett & Watkins, Tallahassee, for petitioner.
Dye & Joanos, Patrick H. Mears, Tallahassee, and J. Franklin Garner, Lakeland, for respondents.
DREW, Justice.
The claimant was injured when he fell from a mule barn he was constructing for his employer, a corporate farmer engaged primarily in growing tobacco. Claimant was a full-time employee hired to repair buildings and tenant houses and to erect new buildings on the farm although it was established that during the year he had been employed he had also worked in the tobacco barn for not more than 60 hours on noncarpentry work. The employer controverted the claim on the ground that, since its sole operation was farming, its employees were excluded from workmen's compensation coverage.
The deputy commissioner found that the claimant was in the employ of a bona fide farmer and was engaged in agricultural work and therefore dismissed the claim. On appeal to the Full Commission that body, finding the claimant to be engaged in non-agricultural work, reversed the order of the deputy and remanded the case to determine whether three or more employees of the employer were engaged in non-agricultural work. The Commission based this holding on the ruling in this Court in Cassady, Sheriff v. Hiatt & Lee[1] that:
Concededly, we were dealing with the Unemployment Compensation Law in this case, but the reasons compelling the conclusion are equal  if not greater  when concerned with the Workmen's Compensation Law. We would not be consistent with our oft repeated holding that this latter act should always be construed liberally in favor of the workman if, in this instance, we should  as petitioner urges  adopt a construction that would eliminate from the protection of this law a large group of workmen.
*407 In its opinion the Full Commission quoted at length from its earlier opinion of Rodrigez v. Flavor Pict Co-op, Dec. No. 2-1405 (Dec. 1964) which this Court tacitly approved in Flavor Pict Co-op v. Rodrigez[2] wherein we refused to hear argument on the grounds that there was no deviation from the essential requirements of law. Having read again the opinion of the Full Commission in Rodrigez we are impressed anew with its historical concept and cogent reasoning and herewith adopt as the opinion of this Court the following quoted portions:
Our feeling that this embodies the correct interpretation of "agricultural labor" as excluded from the term "employment"[3] in the Workmen's Compensation Act is buttressed by the fact that both this Court and the Full Commission have been relying on the definition found in Cassady, Sheriff v. Hiatt & Lee[4] in both Unemployment Compensation and Workmen's Compensation cases for almost a quarter of a century. During this period many sessions of the Legislature have come and gone but none has exercised its legislative prerogative to correct our interpretation.
We approve the order of the Full Commission.
THORNAL, C.J., and THOMAS and ERVIN, JJ., concur.
CALDWELL, J., dissents with opinion.
CALDWELL, Justice (dissenting):
I dissent. The claimant was engaged in agricultural work. The mule barn was essential to the operation of the farm and a part of it. Whether some or all farm labor should be exempt is a policy question to be determined by the Legislature. Absent Florida precedent I think we should follow that established in other jurisdictions. In the Miller case [Miller & Lux, Inc. v. Industrial Accident Commission of State of California], 179 Cal. 764, 178 P. 960 (1919), the court found the weight of authority to be that one employed by a farmer to devote his entire time to the repair of farm machinery is engaged in agricultural pursuit. That conclusion is supported by decisions in Idaho and Arizona. The Koger case of New Mexico [Koger v. A.T. Woods, Inc.] 38 N.M. 241, 31 P.2d 255, 256, 257 (1934), held the mechanic employed to attend engines used in irrigation to be an agricultural laborer. In Illinois, Hill v. Industrial Commission, 346 Ill. 392, 178 N.E. 905 (1931), it was held agricultural exemption should apply to any work done on a farm. In Pennsylvania, Warner v. Longstreth, 108 Pa.Super. 124, 164 A. 806 (1933), exemption was held to cover all things ordinarily done by the farmer incidental to farming. In New York, where the compensation act did not define "farm labor", it is held that *412 labor necessary to the continued operation of the farm was farm labor and exempt and later, in Coleman v. Batholomew, 175 App. Div. 122, 161 N.Y.S. 560 (1960), that the repair of farm buildings was a routine work of a farm laborer.
[1]  1942, 150 Fla. 721, 8 So. 2d 661.
[2]  Fla. 1965, 175 So. 2d 36.
[3]  F.S. § 440.02(1) (c) 3, F.S.A.
[4]  Supra.