Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/21pdf/21-309_o758.pdf
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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 agents.  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 Saxon 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 supervisors 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.