1 (Slip Opinion) OCTOBER TERM, 2021

Syllabus

NOTE: Where it is feasible, a syllabus (headnote) will be released, as is being done in connection with this case, at the time the opinion is issued. The syllabus constitutes no part of the opinion of the Court but has been prepared by the Reporter of Decisions for the convenience of the reader. See United States v. Detroit Timber & Lumber Co., 200 U. S. 321, 337. 

## SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES

Syllabus

SOUTHWEST AIRLINES CO. v . SAXON

CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE SEVENTH CIRCUIT

No. 21–309. Argued March 28, 2022—Decided June 6, 2022
Respondent Latrice Saxon, a ramp supervisor for So uthwest Airlines,

trains and supervises teams of ramp agents who physically load and unload cargo on and off airplanes that travel across the country. Like many ramp supervisors, Saxon also frequently loads and unloads cargo alongside the ramp agents. Saxon ca me to believe that Southwest was failing to pay proper overtime wage s to ramp supervisors, and she brought a putative class action against Southwest under the Fair La

bor Standards Act of 1938. Because Saxon’s employment contract re

quired her to arbitrate wage disputes individually, Southwest sought to enforce its arbitration agreement and moved to dismiss. In re

sponse, Saxon claimed that ramp supervisors were a “class of workers engaged in foreign or interstate commerce” and therefore exempt from the Federal Arbitration Act’s coverage. 9 U. S. C. §1. The District Court disagreed, holding that only th ose involved in “actual transpor

tation,” and not those who merely ha ndle goods, fell within §1’s exemp

tion. The Court of Appeals reversed. It held that “[t]he act of loading cargo onto a vehicle to be transported interstate is itself commerce, as that term was understood at the time of the [FAA’s] enactment in 1925.” 993 F. 3d 492, 494.
Held : Saxon belongs to a “class of work ers engaged in foreign or inter

state commerce” to which §1’s exemption applies. Pp. 3–11.

(a) This Court interprets §1’s la nguage according to its “ordinary, contemporary, common meaning.” Sandifer v. United States Steel Corp., 571 U. S. 220, 227. To discern that ordinary meaning, those words “ ‘must be read’ ” and interpreted “ ‘in their context. ’ ” Parker Drilling Management Services, Ltd. v. Newton , 587 U. S. ___, ___. Pp. 3–7.2 SOUTHWEST AIRLINES CO. v . SAXON

Syllabus

(1) The parties dispute how to define the relevant “class of work

ers.” Saxon argues that because th e air transportati on industry en

gages in interstate commerce, airline employees, as a whole, constitute a “class of workers” covered by §1. By contrast, Southwest maintains that the relevant class includes on ly those airline em ployees actually engaged day-to-day in interstate commerce. This Court rejects Saxon’s industrywide approach. By referring to “workers” rather than “em

ployees,” the FAA directs attention to “the performance of work.” New Prime Inc. v. Oliveira , 586 U. S. ___, ___. And the word “engaged” sim

ilarly emphasizes the actual work that class members typically carry out. Saxon is therefore a member of a “class of workers” based on what she frequently does at Southwest— that is, physically loading and un

loading cargo on and off airplanes— and not on what Southwest does generally. Pp. 3–4. (2) The parties also dispute whether the class of airplane cargo loaders is “engaged in foreign or interstate commerce.” It is. To be “engaged” in “commerce” means to be directly involved in transporting goods across state or international borders. Thus, any class of workers so engaged falls within §1’s exempt ion. Airplane cargo loaders are such a class.

Context confirms this reading. In Circuit City Stores, Inc. v. Adams

, 532 U. S. 105, the Court applied two well-settled canons of statutory interpretation to hold that §1 exem pted only “transportation workers,” rather than all employees. The Co urt indicated that any such ex

empted worker must at least play a direct and “necessary role in the free flow of goods” across borders. Id., at 121. Cargo loaders exhibit this central feature of a transportation worker.

A final piece of statutory context further confirms that cargo loading is part of cross-border “commerce.” Section 1 of the FAA defines ex

empted “maritime transactions” to include “agreements relating to wharfage . . . or any other matters in foreign commerce.” Thus, if an “agreemen[t] relating to wharfage”— i.e., money paid to access a cargoloading facility—is a “matte[r] in foreign commerce,” it stands to rea

son that an individual who actually loads cargo on vehicles traveling across borders is himself engaged in such commerce. Pp. 4–7.

(b) Both parties proffer arguments disagreeing with this analysis, but none is convincing. Pp. 7–11. (1) Saxon thinks the relevant “c lass of workers” should include all airline employees, not just cargo load ers. For support, she argues that “railroad employees” and “seamen”—t wo classes of workers listed im

mediately before §1’s catchall prov ision—refer generally to employees in those industries. Saxon’s premis e is flawed. “Seamen” is not an industrywide category but instead a subset of workers engaged in the maritime shipping industry. For example, “seamen” did not include3 Cite as: 596 U. S. ____ (2022)

Syllabus

all those employed by companies en gaged in maritime shipping when the FAA was enacted. Pp. 8–9. (2) Southwest’s three counterarguments all fail. First, Southwest narrowly construes §1’s catchall category—“any other class of workers engaged in foreign or interstate commerce”—to include only workers who physically transpor t goods or people across foreign or interna

tional boundaries. Southwest relies on the definition of “seamen” as only those “employed on board a vessel,” McDermott Int’l, Inc. v. Wilan

der, 498 U. S. 337, 346, and argues that the catchall category should be read along the same lines to ex clude airline workers, like Saxon, who do not ride aboard an airplane in interstate or foreign transit. But Southwest’s acknowledgment that th e statute’s reference to “railroad employees” is somewhat ambiguous in effect concedes that the three statutory categories in §1—“seamen , railroad employees, or any other class of workers engaged in foreign or interstate commerce”—do not share the attribute that Southwest would like read into the catchall provision. Well-settled canons of statutory interpretation neither de

mand nor permit limiting a broadly worded catchall phrase based on an attribute that inheres in only one of the list’s preceding specific terms. Second, Southwest argues that cargo loading is similar to other activities that this Court has found to lack a necessary nexus to inter

state commerce in other contexts. But the cases Southwest invokes all addressed activities far more removed from interstate commerce than physically loading cargo directly on and off an airplane headed out of State. See, e.g., Gulf Oil Corp. v. Copp Paving Co ., 419 U. S. 186. Fi

nally, Southwest argues that the FAA’s “proarbitration purposes” counsel in favor of an interpretation that errs on the side of fewer §1 exemptions. Here, however, plain te xt suffices to show that airplane cargo loaders, and thus ramp supe rvisors who frequently load and un

load cargo, are exempt from the FAA’s scope under §1. Pp. 9–11. 993 F. 3d 492, affirmed.

T HOMAS , J., delivered the opinion of th e Court, in which all other Mem

bers joined, except B ARRETT , J., who took no part in the consideration or decision of the case._________________

_________________ 1 Cite as: 596 U. S. ____ (2022)

Opinion of the Court

NOTICE: This opinion is subject to formal revision before publication in the preliminary print of the United States Reports. Readers are requested to notify the Reporter of Decisions, Supreme Court of the United States, Wash

ington, D. C. 20543, of any typographical or other form al errors, in order that corrections may be made before the preliminary print goes to press. 

## SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES

No. 21–309

SOUTHWEST AIRLINES CO., PETITIONER v. LATRICE SAXON

ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE SEVENTH CIRCUIT
[June 6, 2022]

J USTICE T HOMAS delivered the opinion of the Court. Latrice Saxon works for Southwest Airlines as a ramp su

pervisor. Her work frequently requires her to load and un

load baggage, airmail, and commercial cargo on and off air

planes that travel across the country. The question presented is whether, under §1 of the Federal Arbitration Act, she belongs to a “class of workers engaged in foreign or interstate commerce” that is exempted from the Act’s cov

erage. We hold that she does.

I Southwest Airlines moves a lot of cargo. In 2019, South

west carried the baggage of over 162 million passengers to domestic and international destinations. Dept. of Transp., Bureau of Transp. Statistics (BTS), Passengers Southwest Airlines—All Airports (May 2, 2022) (online source ar

chived at www.supremecourt.gov ). In total, Southwest transported more than 256 million pounds of passenger, commercial, and mail cargo. BTS, Air Carriers: T–100 Do

mestic Market (U. S. Carriers) (May 2, 2022) (online source archived at www.supremecourt.gov). To move that cargo, Southwest employs “ramp agents,”2 SOUTHWEST AIRLINES CO. v . SAXON

Opinion of the Court
who physically load and unload baggage, airmail, and freight. It also employs “ramp supervisors,” who train and supervise teams of ramp agen ts. Frequently, ramp super

visors step in to load and unload cargo alongside ramp agents. See 993 F. 3d 492, 494 (CA7 2021). Saxon is a ramp supervisor for Southwest at Chicago Midway International Airport. As part of her employment contract, she agreed to arbitrate wage disputes individu

ally. Nevertheless, when Saxo n came to believe that South

west was failing to pay proper overtime wages to her and other ramp supervisors, she brought a putative class action against Southwest under the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938, 52 Stat. 1060, 29 U. S. C. §201 et seq. Southwest sought to enforce its arbitration agreement with Saxon under the Federal Arbitration Act (FAA), 9 U. S. C. §1 et seq. , and moved to dismiss the lawsuit. In re

sponse, Saxon invoked §1 of the FAA, which exempts from the statute’s ambit “contracts of employment of seamen, railroad employees, or any other class of workers engaged in foreign or interstate commerce.” Saxon argued that ramp supervisors, like seamen and railroad employees, were an exempt “class of workers engaged in foreign or in

terstate commerce.” Ibid. The District Court disagreed, holding that only those in

volved in “actual transportation,” and not the “mer[e] han

dling [of] goods,” fell within the exemption. 2019 WL 4958247, *7 (ND Ill., Oct. 8, 2019). The Court of Appeals reversed. It held that “[t]he act of loading cargo onto a ve

hicle to be transported interstate is itself commerce, as that term was understood at the time of the [FAA’s] enactment in 1925.” 993 F. 3d, at 494. Citing Saxon’s “uncontroverted declaration” that ramp superv isors at Midway “frequently” load and unload cargo, the Court of Appeals reserved the question “whether supervision of cargo loading alone” would also fall within the FAA’s §1 exemption. Id. , at 494, 497.3 Cite as: 596 U. S. ____ (2022)

Opinion of the Court

The Seventh Circuit’s decisi on conflicted with an earlier decision of the Fifth Circuit. See Eastus v. ISS Facility Ser

vices, Inc. , 960 F. 3d 207 (2020). We granted certiorari to resolve the disagreement. 595 U. S. ___ (2021).

II In this case, we must decide whether Saxon falls within a “class of workers engaged in foreign or interstate com

merce.” 9 U. S. C. §1. We in terpret this language according to its “ ‘ordinary, contemporary, common meaning.’ ” San

difer v. United States Steel Corp. , 571 U. S. 220, 227 (2014) (quoting Perrin v. United States , 444 U. S. 37, 42 (1979)); see also New Prime Inc. v. Oliveira , 586 U. S. ___, ___–___ (2019) (slip op., at 6–7). To di scern that ordinary meaning, those words “‘must be read’ ” and interpreted “ ‘in their con

text,’ ” not in isolation. Parker Drilling Management Ser

vices, Ltd. v. Newton , 587 U. S. ___, ___ (2019) (slip op., at 5) (quoting Roberts v. Sea-Land Services, Inc. , 566 U. S. 93, 101 (2012)).

We begin by defining the relevant “class of workers” to which Saxon belongs. Then, we determine whether that class of workers is “engaged in foreign or interstate com

merce.”

A First, the parties dispute how to define the relevant “class of workers.” Saxon argues that because air transportation “[a]s an industry” is engaged in interstate commerce, “air

line employees” constitute a “ ‘class of workers’ ” covered by §1. Brief for Respondent 17. Southwest, by contrast, main

tains that §1 “exempts classes of workers based on their conduct, not their employer’s ,” and the relevant class there

fore includes only those airline employees who are actually engaged in interstate commerce in their day-to-day work. Reply Brief 4. The Court of Appeals rejected Saxon’s indus

trywide approach, see 993 F. 3d, at 497, and so do we.4 SOUTHWEST AIRLINES CO. v . SAXON

Opinion of the Court
As we have observed before, the FAA speaks of “ ‘work

ers,’ ” not “ ‘employees’ or ‘servants.’ ” New Prime , 586 U. S., at ___–___ (slip op., at 9–10). The word “workers” directs the interpreter’s attention to “the performance of work

. ” Id. , at ___ (slip op., at 10) (emphasis altered); see also Web

ster’s New International Dictionary 2350 (1922) (Webster’s) (worker: “One that works”); Funk & Wagnall’s New Stand

ard Dictionary 2731 (1913) (worker: “One who or that which performs work”). 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. On that point, Southwest has not meaningfully contested that ramp supervisors like Sa xon frequently load and un

load cargo. See 993 F. 3d, at 494, 497 (noting Saxon’s “un

controverted declaration assert[ ing] that she and the other ramp supervisors . . . frequently fill in as ramp agents” for up to three shifts per week). Thus, as relevant here, we accept that Saxon belongs to a class of workers who physi

cally load and unload cargo on and off airplanes on a fre

quent basis. 1

B Second, the parties dispute whether that class of airplane cargo loaders is “engaged in foreign or interstate commerce” under §1. We hold that it is. As always, we begin with the text. Again, to be “en

gaged” in something means to be “occupied,” “employed,” or “involved” in it. “Commerce,” meanwhile, includes, among other things, “the transportation of . . . goods, both by land

——————

1 Like the Seventh Circuit, we “need not consider . . . whether supervi

sion of cargo loading alone would su ffice” to exempt a class of workers under §1. 993 F. 3d 492, 497 (2021).5 Cite as: 596 U. S. ____ (2022)

Opinion of the Court
and by sea.” Black’s Law Dictionary 220 (2d ed. 1910) (Black’s); see also, e.g., Webster’s 448 (commerce: “the ex

change of merchandise on a large scale between different places or communities”). Thus, any class of workers di

rectly involved in transporting goods across state or inter

national borders falls within §1’s exemption. Airplane cargo loaders are such a class. 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.” Baltimore & Ohio Southwest

ern R. Co. v. Burtch , 263 U. S. 540, 544 (1924). We think it equally plain that airline employees who physically load and unload cargo on and off pl anes traveling in interstate commerce are, as a practical matter, part of the interstate transportation of goods. They form “a class of workers en

gaged in foreign or interstate commerce.” 2 Context confirms this reading. In Circuit City Stores, Inc.

v. Adams , 532 U. S. 105 (2001), we considered whether §1 exempts all employment contracts or only those contracts involving “transportation workers.” Id., at 109. In conclud

ing that §1 exempts only transportation-worker contracts, we relied on two well-settled canons of statutory interpre

tation. First, we applied the meaningful-variation canon. See, e.g. , A. Scalia & B. Garner, Reading Law 170 (2012) (“[W]here [a] document has used one term in one place, and a materially different term in another, the presumption is

——————

2 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 dr ivers falls within §1’s exemption), with, e.g., Wallace v. Grubhub Holdings, Inc. , 970 F. 3d 798, 803 (CA7 2020) (holding that food delivery driv ers do not). In any event, we need not address those question s to resolve this case.6 SOUTHWEST AIRLINES CO. v . SAXON

Opinion of the Court
that the different term denotes a different idea”). We ob

served that Congress used “m ore open-ended formulations” like “ ‘affecting’ ” or “ ‘involving’ ” commerce to signal “con

gressional intent to regulate to the outer limits of authority under the Commerce Clause.” Circuit City , 532 U. S.

, at 115–116, 118. By contrast, Congress used a “narrower” phrase—“ ‘engaged in commerce’”—when it wanted to reg

ulate short of those limits. Id., at 118

. Second, we applied the ejusdem generis canon, which instructs courts to inter

pret a “general or collective term” at the end of a list of spe

cific items in light of any “common attribute[s]” shared by the specific items. Ali v. Federal Bureau of Prisons , 552 U. S. 214, 225 (2008). As applied to §1, that canon coun

seled that the phrase “ ‘class of workers engaged in . . . com

merce’ ” should be “controlled and defined by reference” to the specific classes of “ ‘seamen’ ” and “ ‘railroad employees’ ” that precede it. Circuit City , 532 U. S., at 115. Taken together, these canons showed that §1 exempted only contracts with transportation workers, rather than all employees, from the FAA. See id., at 119. And, while we did not provide a complete de finition of “transportation worker,” we indicated that any such worker must at least play a direct and “necessary role in the free flow of goods” across borders. Id., at 121. Put another way, transporta

tion workers must be actively “engaged in transportation” of those goods across borders via the channels of foreign or interstate commerce. Ibid

. Cargo loaders exhibit this central feature of a transpor

tation worker. As stated above, one who loads cargo on a plane bound for interstate transit is intimately involved with the commerce ( e.g., transportation) of that cargo. “[T]here could be no doubt that [interstate] transportation [is] still in progress,” and that a worker is engaged in that transportation, when she is “doing the work of unloading” or loading cargo from a vehicle carrying goods in interstate transit. Erie R. Co. v. Shuart , 250 U. S. 465, 468 (1919).7 Cite as: 596 U. S. ____ (2022)

Opinion of the Court
A final piece of statutory context further confirms that cargo loading is part of cross-border “commerce.” The first sentence of §1 of the FAA defines exempted “maritime transactions” to include, among other things, “agreements relating to wharfage, supplies furnished vessels or repairs to vessels, collisions, or any other matters in foreign com

merce.” (Emphasis added.) The use of “other” in the catchall provision indicates that Congress considered the preceding items to be “matters in foreign commerce.” And agreements related to the enumerated “matte[r] in foreign commerce” of “wharfage,” to take one example, included agreements for mere access to a wharf—which is simply a cargo-loading facility. See Black’s 1226 (wharfage: “[m]oney paid for landing wares at a wharf, or for shipping or taking goods into a boat or barge from thence”); Web

ster’s 2323 (similar); see also, e.g., Black’s 1226 (wharf: “A perpendicular bank or mound . . . extending some distance into the water, for the convenience of lading and unlading ships and other vessels”). It stands to reason, then, that if payments to access a cargo-loading facility relate to a “matte[r] in foreign commerce,” then an individual who ac

tually loads cargo on foreign-bound ships docked along a wharf is himself engaged in su ch commerce. Likewise, any class of workers that loads or unloads cargo on or off air

planes bound for a different State or country is “engaged in foreign or interstate commerce.” In sum, text and context point to the same place: Work

ers, like Saxon, who load carg o on and off airplanes belong to a “class of workers in foreign or interstate commerce.”

III Both Saxon and Southwest proffer arguments that disa

gree with portions of our analysis. Neither of them con

vinces us to change course. A For her part, Saxon thinks that we should define the8 SOUTHWEST AIRLINES CO. v . SAXON

Opinion of the Court
“class of workers” as all airline employees who carry out the “customary work” of the airline, rather than cargo loaders more specifically. Tr. of Oral Arg. 56. That larger class of employees potentially includes everyone from cargo loaders to shift schedulers to those wh o design Southwest’s website. See id., at 51–52; but cf. ibid. (conceding that those who run the Southwest credit-card points program likely would not count). To support this reading, Saxon invokes the ejusdem generis canon. She argues, first, that “railroad employees” and “seamen” refer generally to em ployees in those industries providing “dominant mode[s] of transportation” in inter

state and foreign commerce. Brief for Respondent 17. She then reasons, second, that all “workers who do the work of the airlines have the same relationship to commerce as those who do the work of the railroad or ship.” Ibid. Saxon’s attempted invocation of ejusdem generis is una

vailing because it proceeds from the flawed premise that “seamen” and “railroad employees” are both industrywide categories. The statute’s use of “seamen” shows why that premise is mistaken. In 1925, seamen did not include all those employed by companies engaged in maritime ship

ping. Rather, seamen were on ly those “whose occupation [was] to assist in the management of ships at sea; a mari

ner; a sailor; . . . any person (except masters, pilots, and ap

prentices duly indentured and registered) employed or en

gaged in any capacity on board any ship.” Webster’s 1906; see also, e.g., Black’s 1063 (seamen: “[s]ailors; mariners; persons whose business is navigating ships”). Because “seamen” includes only those who work on board a vessel, they constitute a subset of workers engaged in the maritime shipping industry. Regardless of whether “rail

road employees” include all rail-transportation workers, the narrow definition of “seamen” shows that the two terms cannot share a “common attribute” of identifying transpor

tation workers on an industrywide basis. Ali , 552 U. S., at9 Cite as: 596 U. S. ____ (2022)

Opinion of the Court

224. We therefore reject Saxon’s argument that §1 exempts virtually all employees of major transportation providers.

B
While Saxon defines the relevant class of workers too broadly, Southwest construes §1’s catchall category—“any other class of workers engaged in foreign or interstate com

merce”—too narrowly. The airline argues that only work

ers who physically move goods or people across foreign or international boundaries—pilo ts, ship crews, locomotive engineers, and the like—are “engaged in foreign or inter

state commerce.” So construed, §1 does not exempt cargo loaders because they do not physically accompany freight across state or international boundaries. Southwest’s reading rests on three arguments. None per

suades us. First, taking its turn with ejusdem generis , the airline argues that because “seamen” are “employed on board a vessel,” McDermott Int’l, Inc. v. Wilander , 498 U. S. 337, 346 (1991) (emphasis added), and “ ‘railroad employees’ is somewhat ambiguous,” Brief for Petitioner 26, we should limit the exempted class of railroad employees to those who are physically on board a locomotive as it crosses state lines. Then, having limited railroad employees in that way, Southwest likewise urges us to narrow §1’s catchall provi

sion to exclude those airline-transportation workers, like Saxon and other cargo loaders, who do not ride aboard an airplane in interstate or foreign transit. Southwest’s application of ejusdem generis is as flawed as Saxon’s. It purports to import a limitation from the defini

tion of “seamen” into the definition of “railroad employees” and then engrafts that limit onto the catchall provision. But by conceding that “railroad employees” is ambiguous, Southwest sinks its own ejusdem generis argument. Again, the “inference embodied in ejusdem generis [is] that Con

gress remained focused on [some] common attribute” shared by the preceding list of specific items “when it used10 SOUTHWEST AIRLINES CO. v . SAXON

Opinion of the Court
the catchall phrase.” Ali , 552 U. S., at 225. By recognizing that the term “railroad employees” is at most ambiguous, Southwest in effect concedes that it does not necessarily share the attribute that Southwest would like us to read into the catchall provision. Ejusdem generis neither de

mands nor permits that we limit a broadly worded catchall phrase based on an attribute that inheres in only one of the list’s preceding specific terms. Second, Southwest argues that cargo loading is similar to other activities that this Co urt has found to lack a neces

sary nexus to interstate comm erce in other contexts. But the cases Southwest invokes all addressed activities far more removed from interstate commerce than physically loading cargo directly on and off an airplane headed out of State. In Gulf Oil Corp. v. Copp Paving Co ., 419 U. S. 186 (1974), for instance, this Court held that a firm making in

trastate sales of asphalt was not “engaged in [interstate] commerce,” id., at 194 (internal quotation marks omitted), merely because the asphalt was later used to make inter

state highways, id . at 198. Being only “perceptibly con

nected to . . . instrumentalitie s” of interstate commerce was not enough. Ibid . Similarly, in United States v. American Building Maintenance Industries , 422 U. S. 271 (1975), this Court held that “simply supplyi ng localized [janitorial] ser

vices to a corporation engaged in interstate commerce does not satisfy the ‘in commerce’ requirement” in §7 of the Clay

ton Act, 38 Stat. 731, as amended, 15 U. S. C. §18. 422 U. S., at 283. In each case, the Court explained that the relevant firm was not “engaged in” interstate commerce be

cause it did not perform “activities within the flow of inter

state commerce.” Id . at 276 (internal quotation marks omitted); Gulf Oil , 419 U. S., at 195. But unlike those who sell asphalt for intrastate construc

tion or those who clean up after corporate employees, our case law makes clear that airp lane cargo loaders plainly do perform “activities within the flow of interstate commerce”11 Cite as: 596 U. S. ____ (2022)

Opinion of the Court
when they handle goods traveling in interstate and foreign commerce, either to load them for air travel or to unload them when they arrive. See Burtch , 263 U. S., at 544. Third, Southwest falls back on statutory purpose. It ob

serves that §2 of the FAA broa dly requires courts to enforce arbitration agreements in any “contract evidencing a trans

action involving commerce,” while §1 provides only a nar

rower exemption. This structure, in its view, demonstrates the FAA’s “proarbitration purposes” and counsels in favor of an interpretation that errs on the side of fewer §1 exemp

tions. Brief for Petitioner 16, 30–33. To be sure, we have relied on statutory purpose to inform our interpretation of the FAA when that “purpose is readily apparent from the FAA’s text.” AT&T Mobility LLC v. Con

cepcion , 563 U. S. 333, 344 (2011). But we are not “free to pave over bumpy statutory text s in the name of more expe

ditiously advancing a policy goal.” New Prime , 586 U. S., at ___ (slip op., at 14). Here, §1’s plain text suffices to show that airplane cargo loaders are exempt from the FAA’s scope, and we have no warrant to elevate vague invocations of statutory purpose over the words Congress chose.

* * * Latrice Saxon frequently loads and unloads cargo on and off airplanes that travel in interstate commerce. She there

fore belongs to a “class of work ers engaged in foreign or in

terstate commerce” to which §1 ’s exemption applies. Ac

cordingly, we affirm the judgment of the Court of Appeals.

It is so ordered.

J USTICE B ARRETT took no part in the consideration or de

cision of this case.