Court Opinion

ID: 9484101
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 09:40:26.702647+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:50:01.046166
License: Public Domain

ALARCON, Circuit Judge,
dissenting.
PREFATORY STATEMENT
We must decide whether Congress intended to limit recovery under the LHWCA *1554to employees injured on piers customarily used by an employer for loading, unloading, repairing, dismantling, or building a vessel. The majority appears to have concluded that the word “piers,” as used in section 903(a), not only includes a pier used solely for oil production, but also covers piers that support “offices, homes, restaurants, retail outlets, and parking lots.” Majority Opinion at 1553.
I respectfully dissent because the majority’s interpretation of the word “pier” is inconsistent with the intent of Congress as clearly expressed in section 903(a). The majority’s expansive reading of the word “pier” leads to the absurd result that injuries in constructing or repairing a pier that supports an oil production facility or a restaurant are covered pursuant to the LHWCA. We are required by traditional canons of statutory construction to avoid a literal interpretation of a statute that leads to an absurd result or that is contrary to Congress’ constitutional power. See Haggar Co. v. Helvering, 308 U.S. 389, 394, 60 S.Ct. 337, 339, 84 L.Ed. 340 (1940) (“A literal reading of [statutes] which would lead to absurd results is to be avoided when they can be given a reasonable application consistent with their words and with the legislative purpose.”).
If we conclude, as we must, that the word “pier,” as used in maritime law, has a different meaning than its more expansive dictionary denotation, the legislative history of the statute unmistakably demonstrates that both houses of Congress intended to limit the word “pier” to a situs used in loading, unloading, repairing, or building a vessel.
Instead of reversing the decision of the Benefits Review Board, I would adopt the Fifth Circuit's well reasoned analysis of this issue in Jacksonville Shipyards, Inc. v. Perdue, 539 F.2d 533 (5th Cir.1976), overruled on other grounds, Texports Stevedore Co. v. Winchester, 632 F.2d 504, 516 (5th Cir.1980), and avoid a needless intercircuit conflict in this nation’s maritime law. Jacksonville Shipyards was decided 16 years ago. Congress has had ample opportunity to amend the statute to nullify the Fifth Circuit’s construction of section 903(a) if it believed that its intent had been misunderstood.
I.
PERTINENT FACTS
The facts are not in dispute. The majority’s terse description of the accident site needs amplification in order to demonstrate that Elwood Pier No. 1 is not used for loading oil on a tanker. The majority describes the injury site as follows:
Elwood Pier No. 1 is a structure built on pilings extending from land to sea in the Santa Barbara channel. Oil is pumped from a nearby well and piped into Elwood Pier No. 1 where it is separated into water, gas, and crude oil. The crude oil is stored until it is pumped into a pipeline to be picked up by a tanker.
Majority Opinion at 1548. (emphasis added).
In fact, the record shows that the crude oil is not stored on Elwood Pier No. 1 “until it is pumped into a pipeline to be picked up by a tanker.” The Administrative Law Judge’s (ALJ) uncontested findings reflect the following:
[Elwood Pier No. 1] was a rectangular structure which was entirely on the beach at low tide, and which extended partly into the ocean water at high tide. Access was from a road near the beach by a ramp which crossed the beach. There was no producing oil well on that pier. Elwood Pier No. 2, a separate structure several hundred feet away did produce well fluids. These well fluids were piped to the accident pier. The accident pier [Elwood Pier No. 1] contained automated equipment which separated the well fluids produced at Pier No. 2 into gas, water, and crude oil. The gas was vented to the air. The water flowed naturally back into hydrocarbonized water. The crude oil was stored in the storage tank on the accident pier until it was pumped in a pipeline, approximately three miles to the Elwood Marine Terminal on a weekly basis.
*1555(citations to the record in the administrative proceedings omitted) (emphasis added).
The record supports the AU’s finding concerning the oil production activities performed on Elwood Pier No. 1. Its sole function is to separate the water and gas contained in petroleum drilled from the earth’s upper strata. The crude oil produced by Elwood Pier No. l’s automated equipment is not loaded onto tankers at that site. The photographs of Elwood Pier No. 1 show that it does not have any ramps or other means of loading crude oil on a tanker. The uncontradicted evidence shows that the loading of the crude oil on tankers occurred three miles away at a totally separate marine terminal. The injuries suffered by Mr. Hurston in this matter did not occur at the marine terminal used to load tankers with crude oil. Mr. Hur-ston was injured while Elwood Pier No. 1 was being repaired.
II.
DEFERENCE TO THE DIRECTOR’S INTERPRETATION IS NOT COMPELLED IN THIS MATTER
The Director of the Office of Workers’ Compensation Programs contends that the words “adjoining pier,” as used in section 903(a), refer to any structure built on pilings extending from land to navigable water, regardless of the structure’s use. The majority begins its discussion of the issue presented in this appeal by reminding us that we must accord considerable weight to the Director’s construction of section 903(a) because he is charged with administering the statute. Quoting Force v. Director, Office of Workers’ Compensation Programs, 938 F.2d 981, 984 (9th Cir.1991), the majority states that “since ‘the statute is easily susceptible to the Director’s interpretation, we need go no further.’ ” Majority Opinion at 1549. Nevertheless, the majority found it necessary to “go further” for an additional twelve pages in the original typescript version of the opinion to justify its construction of the statute.
We are not required to defer to an agency interpretation of a statute where Congress’ intent is clear, or the administrator’s construction is unreasonable. “If the intent of Congress is clear, that is the end of the matter; for the court, as well as the agency, must give effect to the unambiguously expressed intent of Congress.” Chevron U.S.A. Inc. v. National Resources Defense Council, Inc., 467 U.S. 837, 842-43, 104 S.Ct. 2778, 2781, 81 L.Ed.2d 694 (1984) (emphasis added). The Court explained a reviewing court’s duty as follows:
The judiciary is the final authority on issues of statutory construction and must reject administrative constructions which are contrary to clear congressional intent. If a court, employing traditional tools of statutory construction,' ascertains that Congress had an intention on the precise question at issue, that intention is the law and must be given effect.
Id. at 843 n. 9, 104 S.Ct. at 2781 n. 9 (citations omitted). This has been the law since Marbury v. Madison, 5 U.S. (1 Cranch) 137, 2 L.Ed. 60 (1803). In Marbury, the Court proclaimed: “It is, emphatically, the province and duty of the judicial department, to say what the law is.” Id. at 177.
More recently, in Presley v. Etowah County Comm’n, — U.S.-, 112 S.Ct. 820, 117 L.Ed.2d 51 (1992), the Court emphasized that “[djeference does not mean acquiescence.” Id. at -, 112 S.Ct. at 831. In Presley, the Court refused to defer to the Attorney General’s construction of a statute because Congress had clearly expressed its intent. Id. at-, 112 S.Ct. at 832. As I will now demonstrate, applying the traditional tools of statutory construction, the Director’s interpretation of section 903(a) is contrary to the intent of Congress. Therefore, I cannot defer to his reading of the statute.
III.
CONGRESSIONAL AUTHORITY OVER EMPLOYEE COMPENSATION IS LIMITED TO MARITIME INJURIES
Before focusing on section 903(a), a brief history of LHWCA will serve to demon*1556strate the intent of Congress in extending coverage to maritime workers for injuries that occur on piers. See Commissioner of Internal Revenue v. Engle, 464 U.S. 206, 217, 104 S.Ct. 597, 604, 78 L.Ed.2d 420 (1984) (the circumstances surrounding the enactment of a statute are relevant to the interpretation of a statute).
Article III, section 2 of the United States Constitution provides: The Judicial Power shall extend ... to all cases of admiralty and maritime jurisdiction. The Supreme Court has construed Article III, section 2 as authorizing Congress to enact legislation regarding matters within admiralty and maritime jurisdiction. In re Garnett, 141 U.S. 1, 12-14, 11 S.Ct. 840, 842-43, 35 L.Ed. 631 (1891). Congress passed the LHWCA pursuant to its admiralty and maritime jurisdiction. Crowell v. Benson, 285 U.S. 22, 40, 52 S.Ct. 285, 288, 76 L.Ed. 598 (1932).
The Court has made clear that the states do not have the authority to apply workers’ compensation laws to maritime workers. Southern Pac. Co. v. Jensen, 244 U.S. 205, 217, 37 S.Ct. 524, 529, 61 L.Ed. 1086 (1917). In Jensen, the Court held New York’s workers’ compensation law was inapplicable to an injury to a longshoreman that occurred on a gangway between a ship and a pier. Id. The Court ruled that the worker’s employment was within Congress’s admiralty and maritime jurisdiction. Id.
After the Jensen decision, Congress attempted to provide compensation for workers injured in the course of maritime employment by explicitly authorizing states to apply their workers’ compensation laws to maritime workers. Congress passed legislation purporting to preserve “to claimants the rights and remedies under the workmen's compensation laws of any state.” Grant Gilmore & Charles L. Black, The Law of Admiralty 407 (2d ed. 1975). In Knickerbocker Ice Co. v. Stewart, 253 U.S. 149, 40 S.Ct. 438, 64 L.Ed. 834 (1920), the Supreme Court held that this legislation was an invalid attempt to delegate federal power to the states. Id. at 164, 40 S.Ct. at 441. The Court reasoned:
The Constitution itself adopted and established, as part of the laws of the United States, approved rules of the general maritime law and empowered Congress to legislate in respect of them and other matters within the admiralty and maritime jurisdiction. Moreover, it took from the States all power, by legislation or judicial decision, to contravene the essential purposes of, or to work material injury to, characteristic features of such law or to interfere with its proper harmony and uniformity in its international and interstate relations. To preserve adequate harmony and appropriate uniform rules relating to maritime matters and bring them within control of the Federal Government was the fundamental purpose; and to such definite end Congress was empowered to legislate within that sphere.
Id. at 160, 40 S.Ct. at 440 (emphasis added).
Congress again attempted to make state workers’ compensation laws apply to maritime workers in 1922. The Supreme Court struck down this congressional attempt to delegate its maritime power in Washington v. W.C. Dawson & Co., 264 U.S. 219, 44 S.Ct. 302, 68 L.Ed. 646 (1924). In that matter, the Court reiterated the principle that Congress cannot delegate to the states the power to apply state workers’ compensation laws to maritime workers. Id. at 228, 44 S.Ct. at 305. The Court concluded that
[t]he confusion and difficulty, if vessels were compelled to comply with the local statutes at every port, are not difficult to see. Of course, some within the States may prefer local rules; but the Union was formed with the very definite design of freeing maritime commerce from intolerable restrictions incident to such local control. The subject is national. Local interests must yield to the common welfare. The Constitution is supreme.

Id.

In response to the Supreme Court’s repeated holdings that Congress was responsible for workers within its admiralty jurisdiction, Congress enacted a maritime workers’ compensation system. The Longshore *1557and Harbor Workers’ Compensation Act (LHWCA) was designed to fill the void created by the inability of the states to provide workers’ compensation for maritime workers. Northeast Marine Terminal Co., Inc. v. Caputo, 432 U.S. 249, 258, 97 S.Ct. 2348, 2354, 53 L.Ed.2d 320 (1977). The 1927 Act provided coverage only for injuries occurring “upon the navigable waters of the United States” and allowed compensation awards only “if recovery ... through workmen’s compensation proceedings [could] not validly be provided by state, law.” Id.
In Nacirema Operating Co., Inc. v. Johnson, 396 U.S. 212, 90 S.Ct. 347, 24 L.Ed.2d 371 (1969), the Supreme Court held that injuries to longshoremen that occurred on a pier were not compensable because Congress intended to provide compensation only for workers injured in the areas in which state workers’ compensation schemes could not reach. Id. at 223-24, 90 S.Ct. at 354. The Court concluded that Congress did not intend to cover workers whose injuries occurred on the landward side of the Jensen line. Id. at 219, 90 S.Ct. at 352. The Court reasoned that although stopping coverage at the Jensen line may be arbitrary and unfair, it was up to Congress to expand coverage, not the courts. Id. at 223-24, 90 S.Ct. at 354.
In 1972, Congress responded to the Supreme Court’s invitation to amend the LHWCA. The legislative history of the 1972 amendment shows that Congress intended to limit the extension of its coverage to employees who are injured in the course of their maritime employment while on structures that are on land. The House Report provides in pertinent part: '
[C]overage of the present Act stops at the water’s edge; injuries occurring on land are covered by State Workmen’s Compensation laws. The result is a disparity in benefits payable for death or disability for the same type of injury depending on which side of the water's edge and in which State the accident occurs....
... It is also to be noted that with the advent- of modern cargo-handling techniques, such as containerization and the use of LASH-type vessels, more of the longshoreman’s work is performed on land than heretofore.

The Committee believes that the compensation payable to a longshoreman or a Ship repairman or builder should not depend on the fortuitous circumstance of whether the injury occurred on land or over water.:..

The intent of the Committee is to permit a uniform compensation system to - apply to employees who would otherwise be covered by this Act for part of their activity.
H.R.Rep. No. 1441, 92nd Cong., 2d Sess., reprinted in 1972' U.S.C.C.A.N. 4698, 4707-08 (emphasis added).
To further its intent to protect longshoremen, ship repairmen, and shipbuilders, whether they are injured on a vessel or working on an adjoining pier as in Nacire-ma, Congress enacted Section 3(a). Section 3(a) reads as follows:
[cjompensation shall be payable under this chapter in respect of disability or death of an employee, but only if the disability or death results from an injury occurring upon the navigable waters of the. United States (including any adjoining pier, wharf, dry dock, terminal, building way, marine railway, or other adjoining area customarily used by an employer in loading, unloading, repairing, dismantling, or building a vessel.
33 U.S.C. § 903(a).
A. Plain Meaning of the Word “Pier" As Used in Maritime Commerce
As used in maritime commerce, the word “pier” refers to “a platform extending from a shore over water supported by piles or pillars, used to secure, shelter, and provide access to vessels.” Webster’s II New Riverside University Dictionary (1984). The majority correctly notes that “pier” can also be used to refer to “a place to promenade.” Majority Opinion at 1551.1 *1558To ascribe to Congress an intent to compensate employees injured on a promenade pier with no connection to maritime commerce totally ignores the fact that Congress enacted the LHWCA under its admiralty jurisdiction to protect employers injured while engaged in maritime activities. The majority’s conclusion that Congress intended to include injuries occurring on promenade piers within the coverage of the LHWCA ignores the .long established principle that the states have exclusive jurisdiction to enact legislation to compensate employees injured on a non-maritime structure constructed on land. The, Supreme Court has instructed that courts should avoid a literal interpretation of language used by Congress if such construction would require an absurd result and would be an impermissible exercise of legislature power. Haggar Co., 308 U.S. at 394, 60 S.Ct. at 339. I would interpret the word “pier” as used in section 903(a) to comport with its maritime usage, and thereby avoid a construction that would ascribe to Congress an intent to cover areas over which it has no jurisdiction.
B. Each of the Specified Structures are Connected to Maritime Commerce
In enacting section 903(a), Congress extended coverage beyond the sea to certain specified structures, each of which has a connection to maritime commerce. The structures listed in section 3(a) are pier, wharf, dry dock, terminal, building way, and marine railway. With the exception of the word “pier,” each of the other structures is connected to maritime commerce or navigation.
A wharf is a “structure on the margin or shore of navigable waters, alongside of which vessels can be brought for the sake of being conveniently loaded or unloaded, or a space of ground, artificially prepared, for the reception of merchandise from a ship or vessel, so as to promote the discharge of such vessel.” Black’s Law Dictionary 1595 (6th ed. 1990). A dry dock is a structure whose purpose is to pull or raise a vessel from the water to examine or repair it. O’Leary v. Puget Sound Bridge & Dry Dock Co., 349 F.2d 571, 573 (9th Cir.1965). A terminal is used to dock ships and to store cargo awaiting loading aboard a ship, or to store off-loaded cargo awaiting inland shipment. Cuzzolino v. Maher Terminals, Inc., 6 BRBS 658, 659 (1977). A building way is a structure used solely for the construction and launching of a new vessel. O’Leary, 349 F.2d at 573. A marine railway is a permanently fixed system of tracks or rails which extends from a point on the shore above the water line to a point offshore well below the waterline. A cradle capable of carrying a ship sits upon the railway and moves along the tracks. Id. Chains or cables attached to the cradle enable it to carry a docked ship into or out of the water. Id.
“The maxim noscitur a sociis, that a word is known by the company it keeps, while not an inescapable rule, is often wisely applied where a word is capable of many meanings in order to avoid the giving of unintended breadth to the Acts of Congress.” Jarecki v. G.D. Searle & Co., 367 U.S. 303, 307, 81 S.Ct. 1579, 1582, 6 L.Ed.2d 859 (1961). This traditional rule of statutory construction should require this court to limit the word “pier” to its maritime connotation. See Schreiber v. Burlington N., Inc., 472 U.S. 1, 8, 105 S.Ct. 2458, 2462, 86 L.Ed.2d 1 (1985) (“it is a ‘familiar principle of statutory construction that words grouped in a list should be given related meaning.’ ” (quoting Securities Indus. Ass’n v. Bd. of Governors, FRS, 468 U.S. 207, 218, 104 S.Ct. 3003, 3009, 82 L.Ed.2d 158 (1984)).
C. Section 903(a) Expressly Limits the Extension of the LHWCA to Adjoining Areas Connected to Maritime Commerce
As explained above, each of the specified structures is connected with the loading or unloading of vessels, or ship repair and *1559construction. Section 903(a) also extended coverage to injuries occurring on other unspecified structures adjoining navigable waters used by an employer in “loading, unloading, repairing, dismantling, or building a vessel.” Under the majority’s construction of section 903(a), injuries on non-maritime structures resembling a pier are covered by the LHWCA. A fair reading of the express limitation in section 903(a) to “other adjoining areas customarily used by an employer in loading, unloading, repairing, dismantling, or building a vessel” should lead to the conclusion that Congress, mindful of the: limits of its maritime jurisdiction, explicitly limited the structures covered by the LHWCA to those used in maritime commerce, (emphasis added).
D. The Legislative History Limits Section 903(a) to Structures Connected with Maritime Commerce
Even if we assume that it is unclear whether Congress intended to limit the scope of section 903(a) to structures having a direct nexus to maritime commerce, the legislative history indicates that Congress intended the word “pier” to limit the reach of section 903(a) to areas connected with maritime activity. See Blum v. Stenson, 465 U.S. 886, 896, 104 S.Ct. 1541, 1547, 79 L.Ed.2d 891 (1984) (“[w]here ... resolution of a question of federal law turns on a statute and the intention of Congress, we look first to the statutory language and then to the legislative history if the statutory language is unclear.”).
The legislative history of section 903(a) demonstrates that Congress was concerned with protecting maritime workers. Congress made plain its intention to extend coverage to maritime employees injured while engaged in maritime activities either on navigable waters or on adjoining structures customarily used in connection with loading, unloading, constructing, or repairing vessels. Congress was not concerned with protecting workers covered by state workers’ compensation statutes. The House Report stated
[t]he Committee believes that the compensation payable to a longshoreman or a ship repairman or builder should not depend on the fortuitous circumstance of whether the injury occurred on land or over water. Accordingly, the bill would amend the Act to provide. coverage of longshoremen, harbor workers, ship repairmen, ship builders, shipbreakers, and other amployees [sic] engaged in maritime employment ... if the injury occurred either upon the navigable waters of the United States or any adjoining pier, wharf, dry dock, terminal, building way, marine railway, or other area adjoining such navigable waters customarily used by an employer in loading, unloading, repairing, or building a vessel.
The intent of the Committee is to permit a uniform compensation system to apply to employees who would otherwise be covered by this Act for part of their ■activity. To take a typical example, cargo, whether in break bulk or containerized form, is typically unloaded from the ship and immediately transported to a storage or holding area - on the pier, wharf, or terminal adjoining navigable waters. The employees who perform this work would be covered under the bill for injuries sustained by them over the navigable waters or on the adjoining land area. The Committee does not intend to cover employees who are not engaged in loading, unloading, repairing, or building a vessel, just because they are injured in an area adjoining navigable waters used for such activity. Thus, employees whose responsibility is only to pick up stored cargo for further transshipment would not be covered, nor would purely clerical employees whose jobs do not require them to participate in the loading or unloading of cargo. However, checkers, for example, who are directly involved in the loading or unloading functions are covered by the new amendment.
H.R.Rep. No. 1441, 92nd Cong., 2d Sess., reprinted in 1972 U.S.C.C.A.N. 4698, 4708 (emphasis added).
The House Report states with estimable clarity that it is not the intent of Congress “to cover employees who are not engaged in- loading, unloading, repairing, or building *1560a vessel, just because they are injured in an area adjoining navigable waters.” Id. Mr. Hurston was injured while working on an oil production facility adjoining navigable waters. Elwood Pier No. 1 is not covered by section 903(a) because it is not a structure used in connection with servicing a vessel.
The Senate legislative history contains a similar restriction on the situs or area covered by section 903(a). Senator Williams commented as follows in introducing the Senate version of the amendment to the LHWCA:
Compensation payable to a longshoreman or a ship repairman or builder should not depend on the fortuitous circumstances of whether the injury occurred on land or over water....
It is our intent to permit a uniform compensation system to apply to employees who would otherwise be covered by this act for part of their activity. To take a typical example, cargo, whether in break bulk or containerized form, is typically unloaded from the ship and immediately transported to a storage or holding area on the pier, wharf, or terminal adjoining navigable waters. The employees who performed this work would be covered under the bill for injuries sustained by them over the navigable waters or on the adjoining land area. We did not intend to cover employees who are not engaged in loading, unloading, repairing, or building a vessel, just because they are injured in an area adjoining navigable waters used for such activity.
118 Cong.Rec. 36271 (1972) (statement of Sen. Williams) (emphasis added).
It is clear from the legislative history that in amending the LHWCA to cover structures constructed on land, Congress intended to limit the adjoining areas to places where maritime employees work on vessels.
IV.
RELIANCE ON SUPREME COURT DICTUM
The majority states that “[i]n Caputo [432 U.S. 249, 97 S.Ct. 2348, 53 L.Ed.2d 320 (1977) ], the Supreme Court held that workers who were on a pier used only for storing containers were covered under the LHWCA.” Majority Opinion at 1552. In fact, the Court held that the area where the injury occurred was a situs covered by the LHWCA because “[t]he entire terminal facility adjoined the water and one of its two finger-piers clearly was used for loading and unloading vessels. ” Id. at 281, 97 S.Ct. at 2366. The majority’s reliance on dictum in Caputo is misplaced.
Chief Justice Marshall long ago cautioned against reliance on dictum:
It is a maxim not to be disregarded, that general expressions, in every opinion, are to be taken in connection with the case in which those expressions are used. If they go beyond the case, they may be respected, but ought not to control the judgment in a subsequent suit when the very point is presented for decision. The reason of this maxim is obvious. The question actually before this court is investigated with care, and considered in its full extent. Other principles which may serve to illustrate it, are considered in their relation to the case decided, but their possible bearing on all other cases is seldom completely investigated.
United States v. Ordonez, 737 F.2d 793, 803 n. 1 (9th Cir.1984) (quoting Cohens v. Virginia, 19 U.S. (6 Wheat.) 264, 399, 5 L.Ed. 257 (1821)) (emphasis added); see also United States v. U.S. Currency $83,-310.78, 851 F.2d 1231, 1234 (9th Cir.1988) (stating that because the Supreme Court did not decide whether a motion under Rule 41(e) of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure survives the filing of a civil forfeiture proceeding, a suggestion in a previous case by the Supreme Court that a Rule 41(e) motion could be used in a civil forfeiture proceeding was dicta and did not need to be followed).
V.
REMEDIAL LEGISLATION MUST BE CONSTRUED CONSISTENT WITH LEGISLATIVE INTENT
The majority states that the LHWCA should be construed liberally because it is *1561remedial legislation. Majority Opinion at 1552. This principle has its limits. The Supreme Court has instructed that “ ‘[a] canon of construction is not a license to disregard clear expressions of ... congressional intent.’ ” Andrus v. Glover Constr. Co., 446 U.S. 608, 619, 100 S.Ct. 1905, 1911, 64 L.Ed.2d 548 (1980) (quoting DeCoteau v. Dist. County Court, 420 U.S. 425, 447, 95 S.Ct. 1082, 1094, 43 L.Ed.2d 300 (1975)) (alteration in original); see also Ulane v. E. Airlines, Inc., 742 F.2d 1081, 1086 (7th Cir.1984) (“Although the maxim that remedial statutes should be liberally construed is well recognized, that concept has reasonable bounds beyond which a court cannot go without transgressing the prerogatives of Congress.”). Although this court should “take an expansive view of the extended coverage” under the LHWCA, Caputo, 432 U.S. at 268, 97 S.Ct. at 2359, it is equally clear that “Congress did not seek to cover all those who breathe salt air.” Herb’s Welding, Inc. v. Gray, 470 U.S. 414, 423, 105 S.Ct. 1421, 1427, 84 L.Ed.2d 406 (1985). Courts must interpret statutes to comport with congressional intent even if a statute is remedial in nature. Interpreted in light of Congress’ admiralty powers, this remedial legislation was clearly not intended by Congress to reach outside the scope of structures with maritime uses.
VI.
THE MAJORITY HAS CREATED A NEEDLESS INTERCIRCUIT CONFLICT
The fallacy in the Director’s interpretation of the congressional purpose in amending the LHWCA to cover injuries to maritime workers that occur on structures constructed on land is readily apparent from an examination of the facts of this case. Mr. Hurston was dispatched from his union to work on Elwood Pier No. 1 as a pile driver. His employer was engaged in replacing rusted sheet piling on the seaward wall of an oil production facility. The old sheet piles were dug out with a baekhoe at low tide. Mr. Hurston was injured when a 1,000 pound sheet pile fell from a crane that was stationed on top of the oil production facility platform.
An inspection of the photograph (Exhibit B in the administrative record) of Elwood Pier No. 1, attached as an appendix to this dissent, discloses that it has no ramps, runways, gangways, passageways, pumps, or pipes for loading crude oil in a tanker. The loading of tankers occurs three miles away on a terminal equipped for that purpose. Thus, at the time of the injury, Hurston was miles from a structure covered by section 903(a). Nevertheless; solely because the oil production platform stands on pilings in an area adjoining navigable waters, the Director argues that Hurston should be compensated under a statute enacted under Congress’ maritime jurisdiction to cover injuries sustained by a longshoreman, ship repairman, or ship builder while working on a vessel.
Ironically, had Hurston been injured while working on a crude oil production facility on an offshore rig, the majority would have been compelled to hold that he was not covered by the LHWCA because “[h]is work [as a pile driver] had nothing to do with the loading or unloading process.” Herb’s Welding, 470 U.S. at 425, 105 S.Ct. at 1428. The majority’s conclusion that an injury by an employee not engaged in loading or unloading a vessel on an on-shore oil production structure is covered by the LHWCA appears to be inconsistent with the holding in Herb’s Welding.
Instead of attempting to extend the reach of the LHWCA beyond Congress’ maritime jurisdiction to a land structure that has no connection with the loading, construction, or maintenance of a vessel, I would avoid an intercircuit conflict and adopt the splendid analysis of this issue in Jacksonville Shipyards, Inc. v. Perdue, 539 F.2d 533 (5th Cir.1976). In Jacksonville Shipyards, the Fifth Circuit construed the situs requirement of section 903(a) as follows:
Our interpretation of the new situs provision follows the same general lines as our construction of Section 902(3). Just as we choose to ignore the labels which an employer or a uniorí has be*1562stowed upon an employee, and instead rely upon the employee’s work function at the time of the injury, likewise we will look past an area’s formal nomenclature and examine the facts to see if the situs is one “customarily used by an employer in loading, unloading, repairing or building a vessel.” The clear statutory scheme is to cover employees who are injured while performing certain types of work in an area which is customarily used for such work. Whether or not an employer or local custom has decided to designate an area as a “terminal”, for example, is not dispositive of the situs issue. We will require that a putative situs actually be used for loading, unloading, or one of the other functions specified in the Act. As with the “maritime employment” test, we also interpret the Act as requiring that the situs meet the statutory requirements as of the time of the injury. It will not suffice if the area was so used only in the past, or if such uses are merely contemplated for the future.
Id. at 541 (emphasis added).
The Fifth Circuit’s reasoning applies with equal vigor to the facts of this case. The fact that the oil production facility is called “Elwood Pier No. 1” is not controlling. Congress provided that only those structures adjoining navigable waters that involve one of the functions expressly set forth in section 903(a) come within the situs requirement of the LHWCA. Jacksonville Shipyards was decided almost 17 years ago. Congress has not amended section 903(a) to reject the Fifth Circuit’s functional approach to the situs requirement. By rejecting the functional test set forth in section 903(a), the majority has disregarded congressional intent and created a new operational hazard for maritime employers whose activities span the Fifth and Ninth Circuits.
CONCLUSION
To paraphrase attorney Brendon Sullivan, federal appellate judges are not mere potted plants in reviewing an agency administrator’s construction of a statute. We should reject the Director’s construction of section 903(a) because it conflicts with the maritime definition of a pier and attributes to Congress an intent to violate the limits of its maritime jurisdiction by extending coverage to a situs that is not used for loading, unloading, repairing, dismantling, or building a vessel.
I would affirm the Benefits Review Board’s order denying benefits under the LHWCA.
*1563[[Image here]]

. The dictionary cited by the majority defines a pier as “a structure extending into navigable *1558water for use as a landing place or promenade or to protect or form a harbor." Webster’s Seventh New Collegiate Dictionary (1971).