Opinion ID: 4740
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: the seaman exemption

Text: This Court has long been accustomed to a very broad 11 definition of the word seaman for purposes of the Jones Act. This case reminds us, however, that the definition of seaman under the Jones Act is limited to that Act and its remedial goals.11 In contrast, the remedial goals of the Fair Labor Standards Act lead us to read narrowly its exemptions, including the definition of seaman.12 A seaman is removed entirely from the Act's overtime provisions. An employer has the burden of proving that its employees stand outside of this Act's very broad protection.13 Because employment solely on seagoing vessels does not necessarily make one a seaman under the FLSA, a court must look to the actual work performed. Our review of a district court's investigation of this question is limited to its findings of fact, which we accept unless they are clearly erroneous.14 We review de novo the application of those facts to the law.15 In this case the district court found that Blue Water's cooks perform work essential to the operation of seagoing vessels traveling between Louisiana and the outer Continental Shelf. It 11 This Court has already decided that a seaman under the Jones Act is not a seaman under the FLSA. Dole v. Petroleum Treaters, Inc., 876 F.2d 518 (5th Cir. 1989). 12 Arnold v. Ben Kanowsky, Inc., 361 U.S. 388, 392 (1960). 13 Idaho Sheet Metal Works, Inc. v. Wirtz, 383 U.S. 190, 206 (1966). 14 Icicle Seafoods, Inc. v. Worthington, 475 U.S. 709, 714 (1986). 15 Id. 12 also found that, [w]hile aboard the vessel, the cooks are subject to the authority, direction, and control of the master of the vessel. Yet from these facts the district court found that the cooks are not seaman because their services are not rendered primarily as an aid in the operation of a vessel as a means of transportation.16 This Court has decided two cases involving the seaman exemption.17 Although neither case offers us much help here, our more recent case directs us to the interpretive bulletins of the Wage and Hour Division of the Department of Labor, which, in turn, rely heavily on our earlier case; those bulletins also provide an answer in this case. We give great weight to the consistent interpretations of those bulletins.18 They allow the holding that in some cases a seagoing cook may not be a seaman. The regulations state that a seaman is an employee who performs, as master or subject to the authority, direction, and control of the master aboard a vessel, service which is rendered primarily as an aid in the operation of [a] vessel as a means of 16 Quoting 29 C.F.R. § 783.31; Petroleum Treaters, 876 F.2d at 521. 17 Petroleum Treaters, 876 F.2d 518; Walling v. W. D. Haden Co., 153 F.2d 196 (5th Cir.), cert. denied, 328 U.S. 866 (1946). 18 Tony & Susan Alamo Found. v. Secretary of Labor, 471 U.S. 290, 297 (1985); Petroleum Treaters, 876 F.2d at 521-22) (The fact that the interpretation has not varied since the FLSA's enactment also entitles it to 'great respect'. Chemehuevi Tribe of Indians v. Federal Power Comm'n, 420 U.S. 395 (1975).) 13 transportation.19 They also state that [w]hether an employee is 'employed as a seaman', within the meaning of the Act, depends upon the character of the work he actually performs and not on what it is called or the place where it is performed.20 When a worker performs both seaman's work and nonseaman's work, he is a seaman unless his nonseaman's work is substantial in amount.21 Labor defines substantial as work that occupies more than 20 percent of the time worked by the employee during the workweek.22 The regulations also provide: The term seaman includes members of the crew such as sailors, engineers, radio operators, foremen, pursers, surgeons, cooks, and stewards if, as is the usual case, their service is of the type described in § 783.31. In some cases it may not be of that type, in which even the special provisions relating to seaman will not be applicable.23 A cook is usually a seaman because he usually cooks for seamen. In this case that commonplace may well be untrue. It would appear that Blue Water's cooks primarily feed workers who are not involved in the navigation of the boat on which they live and from which they work.24 Even though the district court was 19 29 C.F.R. § 783.31 (1991), citing (among other cases) Walling v. W.D. Haden Co. 20 29 C.F.R. § 783.33 (1991), again citing W.D. Haden Co. 21 29 C.F.R. § 783.37 (1991). 22 Id. 23 29 C.F.R. § 783.32 (1990) (emphasis added). 24 For example, in W.D. Haden, 153 F.2d at 199, we emphasized that the Act does not exempt seaman, but those employed as seaman, a distinction we found more than 14 correct to look to whether the cooks' services do in fact aid the operation of vessels as means of transportation, it did not state its findings in terms sufficient to satisfy the standards of Labor's interpretive bulletins, to which we defer. We remand so that the district court may determine if the cooks spend more than 20% of their time preparing food for non-crew members. If they do, they are not seamen under the FLSA.