Travers v. Fed. Express Corp.

• Decision Date: 10 August 2021
• Docket Number: No. 20-2703,20-2703
• Citation: 8 F.4th 198
• Parties: Gerard TRAVERS, on behalf of himself and all others similarly situated, Appellant v. FEDERAL EXPRESS CORPORATION
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Third Circuit

8 F.4th 198

Gerard TRAVERS, on behalf of himself and all others similarly situated, Appellant

v.FEDERAL EXPRESS CORPORATION

No. 20-2703

United States Court of Appeals, Third Circuit.

Argued March 16, 2021

Filed: August 10, 2021

Jonathan E. Taylor [ARGUED], Peter Romer-Friedman, Gupta Wessler PLLC, 2001 K Street, N.W., Washington, DC 20006, R. Joseph Barton, Colin M. Downes, Block & Leviton LLP, 1735 20th Street, N.W., Washington, DC 20009, Counsel for Appellant

John Paul Schnapper-Casteras, Schnapper-Casteras PLLC, 1717 K Street, N.W., Suite 900, Washington, DC 20006, Counsel for Amicus Curiae in Support of Appellant Reserve Officers Association of the United States

Anton Metlitsky [ARGUED], Mark W. Robertson, O'Melveny & Myers LLP, 7 Times Square, Times Square Tower, 33rd Floor, New York, NY 10036, Jason Zarrow, O'Melveny & Myers LLP, 400 South Hope Street, Los Angeles, CA 90071, Colleen Hitch Wilson, Federal Express Corporation, 3620 Hacks Cross Road, Building B, 3rd Floor, Memphis, TN 38125, Counsel for Appellee

Erik R. Zimmerman, Spencer T. Wiles, Robinson, Bradshaw & Hinson, P.A., 1450 Raleigh Road, Suite 100, Chapel Hill, NC 27517, Counsel for Amici Curiae in Support of Appellee Chamber of Commerce of the United States of America and Airlines for America

Before: SHWARTZ, PORTER, and MATEY, Circuit Judges.

OPINION OF THE COURT

MATEY, Circuit Judge.

Those who serve in the military must also balance civilian life, including time away from a civilian job. To help servicemembers strike that balance, Congress enacted the Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act of 1994 ("USERRA"). Gerard Travers appeals the dismissal of his lawsuit alleging that USERRA requires employers like FedEx to pay reservists for short-term military leave. We conclude the best reading of USERRA directs employers to provide the benefit of compensation when they choose to pay other employees for comparable forms of leave. So we will vacate the contrary order of the District Court.

I. BACKGROUND

Travers served in the United States Navy and the Naval Reserve. He also works for FedEx and fulfilled his Reserve duties during leaves from work. Travers received no compensation from FedEx for those absences because the company does not pay employees for military leave. But FedEx does pay employees who miss work for other reasons, like jury duty, illness, and bereavement, to name a few. Relying on USERRA, Travers challenged FedEx's decision. The District Court dismissed Travers's complaint, concluding that paid leave was not a "right and benefit" under USERRA. Travers now appeals.¹

II. ANALYSIS

USERRA is one of several statutes benefitting veterans. Our limited task: "interpret the words consistent with their ‘ordinary meaning ... at the time Congress enacted the statute[,]’ " as that is the "fundamental canon of statutory construction." Wis. Cent. Ltd. v. United States , ––– U.S. ––––, 138 S. Ct. 2067, 2070, 2074, 201 L.Ed.2d 490 (2018) (first alteration in original) (quoting Perrin v. United States , 444 U.S. 37, 42, 100 S.Ct. 311, 62 L.Ed.2d 199 (1979) ). We "begin and end our inquiry with the text." Star Athletica, L.L.C. v. Varsity Brands, Inc. , ––– U.S. ––––, 137 S. Ct. 1002, 1010, 197 L.Ed.2d 354 (2017). Of course, "the words of a statute must be read in their context and with a view to their place in the overall statutory scheme." Parker Drilling Mgmt. Servs. v. Newton , ––– U.S. ––––, 139 S. Ct. 1881, 1888, 204 L.Ed.2d 165 (2019) (quoting Roberts v. Sea-Land Servs., Inc. , 566 U.S. 93, 101, 132 S.Ct. 1350, 182 L.Ed.2d 341 (2012) ). So we reach for our "toolkit" containing "the standard tools of interpretation" needed to consider the text, structure, and history of the law. Kisor v. Wilkie , ––– U.S. ––––, 139 S. Ct. 2400, 2414–15, 204 L.Ed.2d 841 (2019) ; Parker Drilling , 139 S. Ct. at 1892 ("[T]he standard we adopt today is supported by the statute's text, structure, and history, as well as our precedents."). Doing so allows us to determine the best ordinary reading of the statute. United States v. Smukler , 991 F.3d 472, 483 (3d Cir. 2021). Tools in hand, we begin by considering how USERRA defines the benefits Congress provides to working servicemembers.

A. USERRA's Protected Benefits

1. The Statutory History

With American participation in the Second World War looming, Congress enacted the Selective Training and Service Act of 1940 ("STSA") requiring all men between the ages of twenty-one and thirty-six to register for military duty. Pub. L. No. 783, 54 Stat. 885. The first peacetime draft law in the nation's history,² the STSA protected the jobs of those who would soon join the Allied powers overseas.³ Id. § 8(b), (c), 54 Stat. at 890. Along with requiring employers to restore veterans "to a position of like seniority, status, and pay," id. § 8(b), 54 Stat. at 890, the STSA allowed veterans to take military leave and entitled them to "insurance or other benefits offered by the employer ... at the time such person was inducted into such forces[.]" Id. § 8(c), 54 Stat. at 890. In these ways, the STSA advanced the principle that one "who was called to the colors was not to be penalized on his return by reason of his absence from his civilian job." Fishgold v. Sullivan Drydock & Repair Corp. , 328 U.S. 275, 284, 66 S.Ct. 1105, 90 L.Ed. 1230 (1946).

As active conflicts continued to summon Americans to service,⁴ Congress responded. The Selective Service Act of 1948⁵ bolstered employment rights for veterans by guaranteeing a servicemember any position "he would have enjoyed if he had continued in such employment continuously from the time of his entering the armed forces until the time of his restoration to such employment." Pub. L. No. 759, § 9(c)(2), 62 Stat. 604, 616. But the entitlement to benefits remained unchanged. See id. § 9(c)(1), 62 Stat. at 615. Then, "[i]n 1951, in order to strengthen the Nation's Reserve Forces, Congress extended reinstatement rights to employees returning from training duty" in the Universal Military Training and Service Act. Monroe v. Standard Oil Co. , 452 U.S. 549, 555, 101 S.Ct. 2510, 69 L.Ed.2d 226 (1981) ; Pub. L. No. 51, § 1(s), 65 Stat. 75, 86–86 (1951). Additional protections followed over the next decade as Congress included short term leave for military obligations of less than three years. Pub. L. No. 86-632, § 1 para. 3, 74 Stat. 467, 467 (1960) (protecting an employee's "return to his position with such seniority, status, pay, and vacation as he would have had if he had not been absent for such purposes"); see also Monroe , 452 U.S. at 555, 101 S.Ct. 2510.

"The end of the Vietnam War provided the need and the opportunity to revisit the protections and benefits granted to returning service members."⁶ In response, Congress enacted USERRA's immediate predecessor, the Veterans’ Reemployment Rights Act ("VRRA") as part of the Vietnam Era Veterans’ Readjustment Assistance Act of 1974. Pub. L. No. 93-508, 88 Stat. 1578. Among other provisions, the VRRA entitled veterans, including reservists, to "like seniority, status, and pay" when returning to civilian work, as well as the ability to "participate in insurance or other benefits offered by the employer[.]" Id. § 404(a), 88 Stat. at 1595.

Finally, in 1994, Congress enacted USERRA to replace the VRRA. Pub. L. No. 103-353, 108 Stat. 3149 (1994). Containing "the most expansive protection [to servicemembers] yet enacted,"⁷ USERRA crystalized the language Travers and FedEx dispute, entitling reservists and other military personnel to certain employment benefits while on leave. To that text we next turn.

2. Text, Not Labels

Two of USERRA's provisions are at issue: § 4316(b)(1), which entitles employees taking military leave to the "other rights and benefits" their employers give to employees taking similar kinds of leave; and § 4303(2), which defines those "other rights and benefits."

Section 4316(b)(1) provides:

[A] person who is absent from a position of employment by reason of service in the uniformed services shall be—

(A) deemed to be on furlough or leave of absence while performing such service; and

(B) entitled to such other rights and benefits not determined by seniority as are generally provided by the employer of the person to employees having similar seniority, status, and pay who are on furlough or leave of absence under a contract, agreement, policy, practice, or plan in effect at the commencement of such service or established while such person performs such service.

38 U.S.C. § 4316(b)(1) (emphasis added). Section 4303(2) defines "rights and benefits":

The term "benefit", "benefit of employment", or "rights and benefits" means the terms, conditions, or privileges of employment, including any advantage, profit, privilege, gain, status, account, or interest (including wages or salary for work performed) that accrues by reason of an employment contract or agreement or an employer policy, plan, or practice and includes rights and benefits under a pension plan, a health plan, an employee stock ownership plan, insurance coverage and awards, bonuses, severance pay, supplemental unemployment benefits, vacations, and the opportunity to select work hours or location of employment.

Id. § 4303(2). How are these guarantees best read?⁸

Start with § 4316(b)(1). It adopts a simple formula: employees who take military leave from their jobs must receive the same "rights and benefits" provided to employees absent for other reasons. And on that much, the parties agree. They part ways on how to describe the "right or benefit" Travers wants, a disagreement that veers away from the text of USERRA. Travers argues that the benefit is "paid leave," a "shorthand to describe ‘continu[ing] to receive pay while absent from work.’ " (Reply Br. at 9 (alteration in original) (quoting Opening Br. at 2).) FedEx responds that the company never provides anyone "paid leave" generally. Rather, FedEx offers pay for certain specific kinds of time away from the job, such as "paid...