Addison v. Holly Hill Fruit Products

• Decision Date: 05 June 1944
• Docket Number: No. 217,217
• Citation: 64 S.Ct. 1215,153 A.L.R. 1007,88 L.Ed. 1488,322 U.S. 607
• Parties: ADDISON et al. v. HOLLY HILL FRUIT PRODUCTS, Inc
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

322 U.S. 607

64 S.Ct. 1215

88 L.Ed. 1488

ADDISON et al.

v HOLLY HILL FRUIT PRODUCTS, Inc.

No. 217.

Argued Jan. 10, 1944.

Decided June 5, 1944.

Rehearing Denied Oct. 9, 1944.

See 64 S.Ct. 27.

Messrs. Ellis F. Davis, of Kissimmee, Fla., and George Palmer Garrett, of Orlando, Fla., for petitioners.

Mr. G. L. Reeves, of Tampa, Fla., for respondent.

Mr. Douglas B. Maggs, of Washington, D.C., for the Administrator of the Wage and Hour Division, U.S. Dept. of Labor, amicus curiae, by special leave of Court.

Mr. Justice FRANKFURTER delivered the opinion of the Court.

This is a suit brought by employees of Holly Hill Fruit Products, Inc. for wage payments under the Fair Labor Standards Act, 52 Stat. 1060, 29 U.S.C. § 201 et seq., 29 U.S.C.A. § 201 et seq. A judgment for the employees, the petitioners here, was reversed by the Circuit Court of Appeals, which held that Holly Hill's employees were by virtue of § 13(a)(10) of the Act, 29 U.S.C.A. § 210(a)(10), exempted from its scope, in that they were 'within the area of production (as defined by the Administrator), engaged in * * * canning of agricultural * * * commodities for market * * *.' The court below reached this con- clusion by holding that a portion of the definition of 'area of production' made by the Administrator of the Wage and Hour Division was invalid and that the remaining portion afforded exemption. 136 F.2d 323. We brought the case here, 320 U.S. 725, 64 S.Ct. 59, to settle a much litigated question of importance in the administration of the Fair Labor Standards Act.

Holly Hill, a citrus fruit cannery employing some two hundred workers, is located in Davenport, Florida, a town with a population of about 650 people. During the two seasons in controversy—November 14, 1938, to May 26, 1939, and November 16, 1939 to March 30, 1940—the Administrator promulgated three regulations based on the scope he gave to his authority under § 13(a)(10) to define 'area of production'. The validity of aspects of these regulations is the crucial issue.

By regulation of October 20, 1938, the Administrator defined 'area of production' as used in § 13(a)(10) to include an individual engaged in canning 'if the agricultural or horticultural commodities are obtained by the establishment where he is employed from farms in the immediate locality and the number of employees in such establishment does not exceed seven'. 29 Code Fed. Reg. (Supp.1938) § 536.2(b). Effective April 20, 1939, an alternative definition, applicable to perishable or seasonal fresh fruits and vegetables, brought workers into the 'area of production' if employed 'in an establishment which is located in the open country or in a rural community and which obtains all of its products from farms in its immediate locality.' It was provided that "open country' or 'rural community' shall not include any city or town of 2,500 or greater population according to the 15th United States Census, 1930, and 'immediate locality' shall not include any distance of more than ten miles.' 29 Code Fed. Reg. (Supp.1939) § 536.2(e), pp. 2239-40. Finally, this alternative definition, no longer limited to fruits and vegetables, was in substance incorporated into the regulations effective June 17, 1939, but in addition it was provided that an individual might also be within the 'area of production' 'if he performs those (canning) operations on materials all of which come from farms in the general vicinity of the establishment where he is employed and the number of employees engaged in those operations in that establishment does not exceed seven'. 29 Code Fed. Reg. (Supp.1939) § 536.2(a) (d), p. 2240.

Before coming to the main question, that of the validity of adding a limitation on the allowable number of employees in one canning establishment within the exempted geographic bounds, we shall dispose of the applicability of the Administrator's other exempting definitions to Holly Hill's employees.

The definitions which contain no employee limitation impose two essential conditions on an exemption sought under § 13(a)(10): the establishment must be located in a city or town having a population smaller than 2500,¹ and all of its products must be obtained from within ten miles of the establishment. Since Davenport contains less than 2500 persons, the first condition is met and we need not pass on its validity.² As to the second condition, the only evidence introduced indicates that during the 1938-1939 season, about 2% of the fruit used came from beyond ten air miles of the plant, and that for the 1939-1940 season, about 3.75% came from groves more than ten air miles from Holly Hill. Since all of the fruit did not come from within ten miles, Holly Hill did not satisfy this condition of the administrator's definitions. There can be no doubt that this conclusion is justified by a literal reading of the regulations, and the court below, in holding that the Administrator's requirement that all the goods come from within ten miles must be construed to mean 'substantially all', entered the Administrator's domain. What was said in another connection is relevant here. 'Looked at by itself without regard to the necessity behind it the line or point seems arbitrary. It might as well or nearly as well be a little more to one side or the other. But when it is seen that a line or point there must be, and that there is no mathematical or logical way of fixing it precisely, the decision of the (Administrator) must be accepted unless we can say that it is very wide of any reasonable mark.' Mr. Justice Holmes, dissenting, in Louisville Gas & Electric Co. v. Coleman, 277 U.S. 32, 41, 48 S.Ct. 423, 426, 72 L.Ed. 770.³

We come then to the validity of the October 20, 1938, regulation and that of the alternative in the June 17, 1939, regulation which provide in substance that an individual is employed within the 'area of production' if an establishment obtains the commodities from the 'immediate locality' (1938) or all the materials come from the 'general vicinity' (1939), and in addition the number of employees in the establishment 'does not exceed seven'. In short, when Congress exempted 'any individual employed within the area of production (as defined by the Administrator)' (§ 13(a)(10)), did it authorize the Administrator not only to designate territorial bounds for purposes of exemption but also to except establishments from such exemption according to the number of workers employed.

Congress provided for eleven exemptions from the controlling provisions relating to minimum wages or maximum hours of the Fair Labor Standards Act. ⁴ Employment in agriculture is probably the most far-reaching exemption. Closely related to it is the exemption which is our immediate concern—those workers engaged in processes necessary for the marketing of agricultural products and employed 'within the area of production' of such commodities. Such was the phrase and such its conjunction with the exemption for agriculture of which it formed an integral part as the bill passed both Houses, except that the enumerated exempted employments subsidiary to agriculture varied in the two bills.⁵ The parenthetical qualification '(as defined by the Administrator)' emerged from the conference committee of the two Houses.⁶

The textual meaning of 'area of production' is thus reinforced by its context: 'area' calls for delimitation of territory in relation to the complicated economic factors that operate between agricultural labor conditions and the labor market of enterprises concerned with agricultural commodities and more or less near their production. The phrase is the most apt designation of a zone within which economic influences may be deemed to operate and outside of which they lose their force. In view, however, of the variety of agricultural conditions and industries throughout the country the bounds of these areas could not be defined by Congress itself. Neither was it deemed wise to leave such economic determination to the contingencies and inevitable diversities of litigation. And so Congress left the boundary-making to the experienced and informed judgment of the Administrator. Thereby Congress gave the Administrator appropriate discretion to assess all the factors relevant to the subject matter, that is the fixing of minimum wages and maximum hours.

In delimiting the area the Administrator may properly weigh and synthesize all such factors. So long as he does that and no more, judgment belongs to him and not to the courts. For Congress has cast upon him the authority and the duty to dfine the 'area of production' of agricultural commodities with reference to which exemption in subsidiary employments may operate. But if Congress intended to allow the Administrator to discriminate between smaller and bigger establishments within the zone of agricultural production, Congress wholly failed to express its purpose. Where Congress wanted to make exemption depend on size, as it did in two or three instances not here relevant, it did so by appropriate language.⁷ Congress referred to quantity when it desired to legislate on the basis of quantity.

Congressional purpose as manifested by text and context is not rendered doubtful by legislative history. Meagre as that is, it confirms what Congress has formally said. The only extrinsic light cast on Congressional purpose regarding 'area of production' is that cast by the sponsors of this provision for enlarging the range of agricultural exemption. Senator Schwellenbach frankly stated that the largest apple packing plant in the world would be exempt if the 'work done in that plant is as described in the amendment'. 81 Cong.Rec. 7877. And in the House, Representative Biermann, while explaining his amendment in somewhat Delphic terms, did indicate plainly enough that he had in mind not differences between establishments within the same territory but between rural communities and urban centers: 'may I say that all over this...