Reliance Storage & Inspection Co. v. Hubbard
| Decision Date | 03 July 1943 |
| Docket Number | Civ. A. No. 68. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Western District of Virginia |
| Parties | RELIANCE STORAGE & INSPECTION CO., Inc., v. HUBBARD. |
E. Walton Brown, of Danville, Va., for plaintiff.
Aiken & Sanford, of Danville, Va., for defendant.
For a number of years, plaintiff, Reliance Storage & Inspection Company, Inc., has been engaged in the business of storing in Danville, Virginia, for compensation, leaf tobacco purchased by the large tobacco companies in the warehouses of Danville and elsewhere, packed in hogsheads and hauled to the building of plaintiff for storage. The hogsheads of tobacco are hauled to plaintiff's building by the owners, and left in storage there until the owners desire to remove them for further ageing or manufacture. The period of storage in plaintiff's building averages about six months. All the tobacco stored by the plaintiff is ultimately manufactured and sold by the owners in the form of cigarettes or other tobacco products, both within the State of Virginia and throughout the world.
The defendant, for the period from October 24, 1938, through July 10, 1942, was employed by the plaintiff as nightwatchman, with the customary duties of such employment, to protect the building and the stored tobacco from fire, theft and depredation. Defendant's employment was for longer hours, and at lesser wages, than those required by the Fair Labor Standards Act, 29 U.S.C.A. §§ 201-219.
Plaintiff instituted this action for a declaratory judgment to determine whether or not defendant was within the coverage of the Act. Defendant filed his counterclaim, asserting that he was within the coverage of the Act and setting out in detail the amount of money which he asserted the plaintiff was indebted to him. Both plaintiff and defendant have filed their motions, with supporting affidavits, for summary judgments in their favor.
I am satisfied that the employee here was engaged in "commerce" and also "in the production of goods for commerce", as these terms are used in Sections 206 and 207 of the Act. The Supreme Court has held that leaf tobacco "enters the stream of commerce", at "the marketing warehouse", which is described as the "throat". Mulford v. Smith, 307 U.S. 38, 47, 59 S.Ct. 648, 652, 83 L.Ed. 1092. Certainly, it would seem beyond question that, after leaf tobacco has been purchased by such companies as Liggett & Myers, Imperial Tobacco Company, P. Lorillard & Company, and R. J. Reynolds Tobacco Company, packed in hogsheads, and hauled from the tobacco warehouses to a place of storage, for ultimate manufacture and sale in the form of cigarettes and other manufactured tobacco products throughout the world, it has entered the stream of commerce, and one who stores it, as does plaintiff here, while it is awaiting manufacture, is engaged in commerce, and the employee who protects it is also engaged in commerce.
In Section 203(j) of the Act, it is provided that: "* * * an employee shall be deemed to have been engaged in the production of goods if such employee was employed in producing, manufacturing, mining, handling, transporting, or in any other manner working on such goods, or in any process or occupation necessary to the production thereof, in any State."
It seems to me clear that the doctrine enunciated by Kirschbaum v. Walling, 316 U.S. 517, 62 S.Ct. 1116, 86 L. Ed. 1638, requires the conclusion that the employee here was engaged in an "occupation necessary to the production" of the manufactured product of the stored tobacco. See also Lefevers v. General Export, etc., Co., D.C., 36 F.Supp. 838, and Interpretative Bulletin No. 1 of the Wage & Hour Division of the United States Department of Labor, which, although not binding on the Courts, is entitled to great weight. United States v. American Trucking Associations, 310 U.S. 534, 60 S.Ct. 1059, 84 L.Ed. 1345.
It therefore...
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