Court Opinion

ID: 9643324
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 20:25:41.446519+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:10:59.412295
License: Public Domain

WOODBURY, Circuit Judge
(dissenting).
Even though the jurisdictional limitation contained in § 2(d) of the Portal-to-Portal Act may add nothing to its constitutional validity, nevertheless' that section remains; a part of that Act with the result that the statute is in fact both substantive and jurisdictional. It not only limits the substantive; *535right to overtime compensation conferred by the Fair Labor Standards Act as that Act was construed by the Supreme Court in the Mt. Clemens Pottery Co. case, but it also takes away the power of any court even to consider claims outside the substantive right as limited therein. To be sure the substantive provision of § 2(a) and the jurisdictional provision of § 2(d) •overlap. But I cannot regard the jurisdictional provision as adding nothing in practical effect to the substantive provision.
The jurisdictional provision of § 2(d), it ■seems to me, has the effect of requiring a plaintiff to allege, in addition to a substantive claim upon which relief can be granted, a claim which is within the jurisdiction of the court to consider. And this is not a distinction without a difference, for a general allegation of a substantive right may be adequate under the liberal provisions of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, but inadequate under the stricter requirement that a plaintiff “must allege in his pleading the facts essential to show jurisdiction.” McNutt v. General Motors Acceptance Corp., 298 U.S. 178, 189, 56 S.Ct. 780, 785, 80 L.Ed. 1135.
It may be true that the plaintiffs’ general .allegations are enough to show jurisdiction in the first instance if allowed to pass unchallenged. But “The trial court is not bound by the pleadings of the parties, but may, of its own motion, if led to believe that its jurisdiction is not properly invoked, “inquire into the facts as they really exist.’ ” McNutt v. General Motors Acceptance Corp., supra, 298 U.S. 184, 56 S.Ct. 783, and cases cited. And apparently the court below, either by the defendant’s motion to dismiss or sua sponte, it makes no differ•ence which, was led to believe that its jurisdiction was not being properly invoked. At any rate, its jurisdictional suspicions were sufficiently aroused to induce it to grant the defendant’s motion to dismiss for lack of jurisdiction, with.leave however, to the plaintiffs to amend by setting forth “clearly, concisely and exactly the specific contract or custom upon which they rely,” or by attaching to their amendment or incorporating therein by specific reference '“an express contract or custom” binding the defendant to pay them overtime compensation “for the activities for which this claim is filed.” And this the plaintiffs failed to do, but responded only with further generalities. Under these circumstances the suspicions of the court below as to its jurisdiction in the premises could only be confirmed, and therefore in my view it properly dismissed the plaintiffs’ complaint for failure to allege facts essential to its jurisdiction.
Whether Congress intended its jurisdictional provision to provide a means for weeding out in advance of trial claims for overtime compensation for activities which are preliminary or postliminary to a principal activity, unless based on an express contract or custom, as is possible, or intended its jurisdictional provision only as a peg upon which to hang a holding that the Act is constitutional, is unimportant. The presence of that provision in the Portal-to-Portal Act, it seems to me, necessarily has the effect of requiring a plaintiff to plead specifically, if challenged by the defendant or the court, the facts essential to show that his claim is not outside the substantive limitations of the Act, and to warrant dismissal for lack of jurisdiction if he is either unwilling or unable to do so.