Herman v. Continental Grain Co.

• Decision Date: 18 January 2000
• Docket Number: No. Civ.A. 99-A-616-N.,Civ.A. 99-A-616-N.
• Citation: 80 F.Supp.2d 1290
• Parties: Alexis HERMAN, Secretary of Labor, United States Department of Labor, Plaintiff, v. CONTINENTAL GRAIN CO., d/b/a Wayne Farms, Defendant.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Middle District of Alabama

Page 1290

80 F.Supp.2d 1290

Alexis HERMAN, Secretary of Labor, United States Department of Labor, Plaintiff, v. CONTINENTAL GRAIN CO., d/b/a Wayne Farms, Defendant.

No. Civ.A. 99-A-616-N.

United States District Court, M.D. Alabama, Northern Division.

January 18, 2000.

Henry L. Solano, Jaylynn K. Fortney, Atlanta, GA, for plaintiff.

Robert D. Segall, Montgomery, AL, Michael B. Wallace, Jackson, MS, for defendant.

MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER

ALBRITTON, Chief Judge.

I. INTRODUCTION

This cause is before the court on a Motion to Dismiss (Doc. # 15) filed by the Defendant, Continental Grain Company ("Continental"). The Secretary of the Department of Labor, Alexis M. Herman, (the "Secretary") filed this action on June 16, 1999, alleging that Continental violated the Fair Labor Standards Act ("FLSA" or the "Act"), 29 U.S.C. 201 et seq., by failing to pay its "live haul crews" overtime wages.

While this case was before Magistrate Judge Walker, Continental requested a temporary stay pending resolution of its Motion to Intervene in a declaratory judgment action involving similar issues that was brought by Sanderson Farms against the Secretary in the Southern District of Mississippi. On September 30, 1999, Continental's Motion to Intervene in the Sanderson case was denied by a Magistrate Judge in the Southern District of Mississippi. Accordingly, Magistrate Judge Walker denied Continental's Motion for a Temporary Stay in these proceedings.¹

Continental's Motion to Dismiss followed on October, 20, 1996. The Secretary filed her Response on November 15, 1999, and Continental filed its Reply on November 22, 1999, at which time the Motion was taken under submission.

For the reasons discussed below, Continental's Motion to Dismiss is due to be DENIED.

II. STANDARD FOR DISMISSAL

A Rule 12(b)(6) motion tests the legal sufficiency of a complaint. A court may dismiss a complaint only if it is clear that no relief could be granted under any set of facts that could be proven consistent with the allegations set forth in the Complaint. Hishon v. King & Spalding, 467 U.S. 69, 73, 104 S.Ct. 2229, 81 L.Ed.2d 59 (1984); see also Wright v. Newsome, 795 F.2d 964, 967 (11th Cir.1986) (citation omitted) ("[W]e may not ... [dismiss] unless it appears beyond doubt that the plaintiff can prove no set of facts in support of the claims in the complaint that would entitle him or her to relief."). In deciding a motion to dismiss, the court will accept as true all well-pleaded factual allegations and view them in a light most favorable to the non-moving party. Hishon, 467 U.S. at 73, 104 S.Ct. 2229. This standard imposes an "exceedingly low" threshold on the nonmoving in order to survive a motion to dismiss for failure to state a claim that reflects the liberal pleading requirements set down in the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure. Ancata v. Prison Health Services, Inc., 769 F.2d 700, 703 (11th Cir. 1985) (citation omitted).

III. ALLEGATIONS

The allegations in the Secretary's Complaint are as follows:

The Secretary has brought this action pursuant to her statutory authority to enforce violations of the FLSA. The Secretary alleges that Continental, a poultry producer, has failed to comply with the applicable overtime compensation statutes with respect to its employees engaged in "live haul crew work[,] which includes catching and transportation of chickens for shipment in interstate commerce...."² Complaint at 2.

Specifically, the Secretary brought this action pursuant to § 17 of the FSLA, 29 U.S.C. § 217, and §§ 15(a)(1) and 15(a)(2) of the Act, 29 U.S.C. § 215, to enjoin Continental from violating the overtime pay provisions of the Act as described in 29 U.S.C. § 207. The Secretary also brought this action pursuant to § 16(c) of the Act, 29 U.S.C. § 216(c), which makes an employer who violates the compensation provisions of the Act liable for unpaid wages "and an additional equal amount as liquidated damages."³ The Secretary alleges further a violation of 28 U.S.C. § 211(c), which mandates that a covered employer "make keep, and preserve such records of the persons employed by him and of the wages, hours, and other practices of employment maintained by him, and shall make such reports therefrom to the Administrator as he shall prescribe by regulation...." These regulations are found at 29 U.S.C. § 516 et seq.

IV. DISCUSSION

Continental has filed a Motion to Dismiss for failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted on the basis that the Continental employees described in the Complaint are exempt from the mandatory overtime compensation provisions of the Act by virtue of 29 U.S.C. § 213(b)(12). Section 213(b)(12) exempts "any employee employed in agriculture" from the Act's overtime compensation provisions. For the purposes of the FLSA, "agriculture" is defined in § 203(f) as follows:

"Agriculture" includes farming in all its branches and among other things includes the cultivation and tillage of the soil, dairying, the production, cultivation, growing, and harvesting of any agricultural or horticultural commodities (including commodities defined as agricultural commodities in section 1141j(g) of Title 12), the raising of livestock, bees, fur-bearing animals, or poultry, and any practices (including any forestry or lumbering operations) performed by a farmer or on a farm as incident to or in conjunction with such farming operations, including preparation for market, delivery to storage or to market or to carriers for transportation to market.

29 U.S.C. § 203(f) (emphasis added).

It is the scope of the "employed in agriculture" exemption in § 213(b)(12) and the companion definition of "agriculture" in § 203(f) that are presently at issue. In briefs submitted to the court, Continental claims that the workers described in the Complaint are employees that fall within the statutory exemption. The Secretary maintains that (1) this is an inappropriate issue to be considered on a Motion to Dismiss because it would require the court to adduce facts that are not contained in the Complaint and (2) the specified employees are not in a class of employees that is covered by the exemption. Both sides have presented various arguments for these assertions.

1. Fact Specific Nature of Exemption

In the present context, the salient feature of the precedents that have grappled with the dividing line between the agricultural and the non-agricultural for the purposes of the FLSA has been the fact intensive inquiry they have undertaken. As is discussed below, courts often hinge the distinction between the qualifying and the non-qualifying employee on the exact nature of the work performed, the organization and structure of the employer's business, and the relationship between the two. The Secretary has emphasized the "fact intensive" nature of the exemption question and argued that, as a result, it is inappropriate to apply the exemption on a Motion to Dismiss. For the reasons discussed below, the court agrees with the Secretary that, in this case, the determination of whether an employee is exempt would involve resort to facts not apparent from the face of the Complaint.

Recently, the United States Supreme Court revisited the question of the dividing line between the exempt and the non-exempt under the FLSA in Holly Farms Corp. v. NLRB, 517 U.S. 392, 116 S.Ct. 1396, 134 L.Ed.2d 593 (1996). Holly Farms was not an FLSA case, but instead involved a dispute over the classification of certain workers under the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA). See Holly Farms, 517 U.S. at 394, 116 S.Ct. 1396. Nonetheless, as the Court explained, "annually since 1946, Congress has instructed, in riders to Appropriations Acts for the Board: `[A]gricultural laborer,' for NLRA § 2(3) purposes, shall derive its meaning from the definition of `agriculture' supplied by § 3(f) of the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 (FLSA)." Id. at 397, 116 S.Ct. 1396 (citing Bayside Enterprises, Inc. v. NLRB, 429 U.S. 298, 300, 97 S.Ct. 576, 50 L.Ed.2d 494 (1977)). Therefore, the Court turned to interpretation of the scope of the definition of "agriculture" in the FLSA.

In Holly Farms, the Court relied heavily on its prior decision in Bayside. There the Court explained that the definition of agriculture "includes farming in both a primary and a secondary sense." Bayside, 429 U.S. at 300, 97 S.Ct. 576. "Primary farming includes the occupations explicitly listed in the first part of § 3(f): `the cultivation and tillage of the soil, dairying, the production, cultivation, growing, and harvesting of any agricultural or horticultural commodities ... [and] the raising of livestock, bees, fur-bearing animals, or poultry.'<sup>4</sup> Secondary farming has a broader meaning, encompassing, as stated in the second part of § 3(f): `any practices ... performed by a farmer or on a farm as an incident to or in conjunction with such farming operations, including preparation for market, delivery to storage or to market or to carriers for transportation to market.'" Id.; see Bayside, 429 U.S. at 300 n. 7, 97 S.Ct. 576. Farmers Reservoir & Irrigation Co. v. McComb, 337 U.S. at 763, 69 S.Ct. 1274 (secondary farming embraces "any practices, whether or not themselves farming practices, which are performed either by a farmer or on a farm, incidently to or in conjunction with `such' farming operations"). Holly Farms, 517 U.S. at 398, 116 S.Ct. 1396; see also Farmers Reservoir & Irrigation Co., 337 U.S. at 763, 69 S.Ct. 1274 (first noting that "agriculture," as defined in the FLSA, "has two distinct branches," a "primary meaning" that "includes farming in all its branches," some of which were specifically listed in the statute, and a "[s]econd ... broader meaning" that embraced "things or other than farming as so illustrated" to "include[] any practices, whether or not themselves farming practices, which are performed either by a farmer or on a farm, incidently to or in conjunction with `such' farming operations")...