Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/21pdf/21-309_o758.pdf
Page Number: 7.0

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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 Saxon 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 suffice” to exempt a class of workers 
under §1.  993 F. 3d 492, 497 (2021).