Bienvenu v. Texaco, Inc ( 1999 )

Revised February 17, 1999
IN THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS
FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT
No. 96-60625
CARL BIENVENU,
Petitioner,
versus
TEXACO, INC; DIRECTOR, OFFICE OF WORKER’S COMPENSATION PROGRAMS,
U.S. DEPARTMENT OF LABOR; INSURANCE COMPANY OF NORTH AMERICA,
Respondents.
Petition for Review of an Order of the
Benefits Review Board
January 11, 1999
Before POLITZ, Chief Judge, and JOLLY, HIGGINBOTHAM, DAVIS, JONES,
SMITH, WIENER, BARKSDALE, EMILIO M. GARZA, DeMOSS, BENAVIDES,
STEWART, PARKER, and DENNIS, Circuit Judges.*
HIGGINBOTHAM and DAVIS, Circuit Judges:
Carl Bienvenu seeks benefits under the Longshore and Harbor
Workers' Compensation Act (LHWCA) for injuries sustained on
navigable waters during the course of his employment. His petition
requires us to enter the unsettled waters of our LHWCA
jurisprudence. In deciding that Bienvenu is entitled to LHWCA
*
Judges King and Duhe’ are recused.
benefits, we right our wayward precedent and chart a smoother
course for future panels to follow.
I.
Bienvenu worked for Texaco, Inc., in the Caillou Island
production field as a pumper specialist. By 1987 he had been
employed by Texaco in this field for about twenty-two years. The
Caillou Island production field is a five-mile by twelve-mile area
located within three miles of the Louisiana coast and contains
approximately 150 to 175 active fixed production platforms.
Bienvenu and his fellow employees lived in a base camp on pilings
over the water. Bienvenu worked seven days on and seven days off,
and on his work days he worked a twelve-hour shift. Bienvenu was
responsible for maintaining and calibrating automated equipment
located on fixed production platforms. Bienvenu had the almost
exclusive use of a vessel, the MISS JACKIE, along with a skipper to
transport him around the field to the platforms where he worked.
The ALJ found that during an average twelve-hour work day, Bienvenu
spent approximately 75% of his time performing his duties while
physically located on a fixed production platform; 16.7% of his
time in transit as a passenger on the MISS JACKIE; and 8.3% of his
time working on equipment on the back of the MISS JACKIE.
Bienvenu was injured twice during the course of his employment
while on board the MISS JACKIE in navigable waters. The first time
was while moving his tool box from the dock to the boat, and the
2
second time was while tying the MISS JACKIE to the dock. These
injuries forced him to stop working.
Bienvenu claimed benefits under the LHWCA. An ALJ denied
Bienvenu relief on the grounds that the LHWCA did not apply to him
since he was not engaged in “maritime employment.” The ALJ read
this Court’s prior decisions to mean that coverage under the Act
was dictated by the “amount of time devoted to specific work
activity by a Claimant." The ALJ ruled that Bienvenu was not a
"maritime employee" because he spent the vast majority of his
working hours on fixed platforms and was only fortuitously on
navigable waters when injured. The extension of the LHWCA to land-
based activities did not apply to Bienvenu since his work was not
an integral or essential part of loading or unloading a vessel.
Bienvenu timely appealed the ALJ’s decision to the Benefits
Review Board ("BRB"). The BRB failed to render a timely decision
and was deemed to have affirmed the ALJ’s ruling. See Omnibus
Consolidated Rescissions and Appropriations Act of 1996, Pub. L.
No. 104-134, 110 Stat. 1321-219. Bienvenu petitioned us for
review. A panel of this court reversed the ALJ’s decision because
Fifth Circuit precedent compelled a conclusion that Bienvenu passed
the status test since he was on navigable waters when injured.
Bienvenu v. Texaco, Inc., 124 F.3d 692, 692-93 (5th Cir.), reh’g en
banc granted, 131 F.3d 1135 (5th Cir. 1997).
II
3
In 1917, the Supreme Court held that state workers’
compensation systems could not reach longshoremen injured seaward
of the water’s edge. Southern Pac. Co. v. Jensen, 244 U.S. 205
(1917). In response, Congress passed the LHWCA in 1927. See Pub.
L. No. 803, 44 Stat. 1429. Technically, there were five
requirements for coverage under the LHWCA as originally enacted, as
later detailed by the Supreme Court in Director v. Perini North
River Associates, 459 U.S. 297, 306-07 (1983):
(1) The employee could not be a "master or member of a crew of
any vessel, nor any person engaged by the master to load or unload
or repair any small vessel under 18 tons net."
(2) The employee must suffer injury during the course of
employment.
(3) The employee had to be employed by a statutory "employer,"
defined to be "an employer any of whose employees are employed in
maritime employment, in whole or in part, upon the navigable waters
of the United States."
(4) The employee had to meet a situs requirement that injury
occurred upon navigable waters.
(5) No federal coverage unless compensation may not validly be
provided by state law.1
1
"Congress used [this phrase] . . . in a sense consistent with
the delineation of coverage as reaching injuries occurring on
navigable waters." Id. at 309 (quoting Calbeck v. Travelers Ins.
Co., 370 U.S. 114, 126 (1962)). The phrase was deleted in 1972.
See id. at 313-14.
4
In 1969, the Supreme Court, while recognizing the harshness of
the Jensen line, held that the LHWCA did not extend to injuries
occurring on a pier attached to land. Nacirema Operating Co. v.
Johnson, 396 U.S. 212, 218-20 (1969). The Court stated that the
"invitation to move that line landward must be addressed to
Congress, not to this Court." Id. at 224. Congress acted on this
invitation in 1972 when it amended the LHWCA. See LHWCA Amendments
of 1972, Pub. L. No. 92-576, 86 Stat. 1251. The 1972 Amendments
extended "coverage to more workers by replacing the single-situs
requirement with a two-part situs and status standard." P.C.
Pfeiffer Co. v. Ford, 444 U.S. 69, 73 (1979). The situs test now
reached shoreward to reach injuries "occurring upon the navigable
waters of the United States (including any adjoining pier, wharf,
dry dock, terminal, building way, marine railway, or other
adjoining area customarily used by an employer in loading,
unloading, repairing, dismantling, or building a vessel.)" 33
U.S.C. § 903(a). The status test defined an employee as "any
person engaged in maritime employment, including any longshoreman
or other person engaged in longshoring operations, and any
harborworker including a ship repairman, shipbuilder, and ship-
breaker." Id. § 902(3).
In Northeast Marine Terminal Co. v. Caputo, 432 U.S. 249
(1977), the Supreme Court first expounded on the status test. The
workers in that case were Blundo and Caputo. Blundo was injured
when he fell while checking cargo as it was removed from a
5
container. Caputo moved cargo from the hold of the vessel onto
shore and was hurt when rolling a dolly into a truck. Though the
1972 Act did not expressly state that workers in their positions
were covered, the Court held that both Blundo and Caputo were
entitled to benefits. Blundo was covered because "[o]ne of the
reasons Congress expanded coverage in 1972 was that
containerization permits loading and unloading tasks traditionally
conducted aboard ship to be performed on the land." Pfeiffer, 444
U.S. at 74. Caputo fell under the LHWCA because he spent some of
his time in "indisputably longshoring operations,"Caputo, 432 U.S.
at 273, and Congress had intended "to ensure that a worker who
could have been covered part of the time by the pre-1972 Act would
be completely covered by the 1972 Act." Pfeiffer, 444 U.S. at 75.
In Pfeiffer, the Supreme Court further elaborated on the
difference between the situs and status tests by noting that the
situs test limits the geographic coverage of the LHWCA, while the
status test is an occupational concept that focuses on the nature
of the worker’s activities. Id. at 78. The "crucial factor" in
determining the scope of maritime employment "is the nature of the
activity to which a worker may be assigned." Id. at 82. Though
the 1972 Amendments extend coverage, they do not provide benefits
to all workers in the situs area, such as truck drivers who pick up
goods for further trans-shipment. Id. at 83.
Four years after Pfeiffer, the Supreme Court returned to this
issue in Perini. In that case, a workman, Churchill, was employed
6
in the construction of a sewage treatment plant that extended over
the Hudson River. He was injured on the deck of a cargo barge
where he was supervising operations. The Court found no
congressional intent in the 1972 Amendments to withdraw LHWCA
coverage from workmen covered by the Act before 1972. The Court
held that when a worker is injured on the actual navigable waters
in the course of his employment on these waters, he satisfies the
status requirement, assuming that the other requirements of the
LHWCA are met. 459 U.S. at 324 & n.33. The Court expressed no
opinion on whether LHWCA coverage extends to a worker "injured
while transiently or fortuitously upon actual navigable waters or
to a land-based worker injured on land who then falls into actual
navigable waters." Id. at 324 n.34.
The Perini Court discussed three of its pre-1972 cases to
illustrate the scope of the Act’s coverage before the amendments
were adopted. See id. at 307-12 (discussing Davis v. Department of
Labor, 317 U.S. 249 (1942); Parker v. Motor Boat Sales, 314 U.S.
244 (1941); and Calbeck v. Travelers Ins. Co., 370 U.S. 114
(1962)). Parker is the case most relevant to our decision.2
In Parker, Mr. Armistead, a janitor employed by a retailer of
pleasure craft, was directed to assist a salesman place outboard
2
The employee in Davis was injured while standing on a barge
and dismantling a bridge. In Calbeck, the employee was completing
construction of a vessel afloat on navigable waters. Thus, the job
responsibilities of the employees in those cases required more
frequent work on navigable waters than those of the employee in
Parker.
7
motors on a boat. Mr. Cooper, the salesman, then allowed Mr.
Armistead to accompany him as he demonstrated the motor on the
customer’s boat. During the demonstration run, the vessel capsized
and Armistead was killed. The Court first reviewed the evidence to
determine whether the evidence was sufficient to support the deputy
commissioner’s finding that Armistead was acting within the course
of his employment. The Court found the following portions of the
record pertinent to this inquiry:
that on the morning of the accident Armistead was sent to
the river with specific instructions to help Cooper in
placing the outboard motors on the boat; that there were
no specific instructions as to whether or not Armistead
was to stay out of the boat; that either Armistead or
Cooper was told that Armistead was ‘to go and help’
Cooper; that Cooper, the superior of the two employees,
at least acquiesced in Armistead’s remaining in the boat
to ‘keep a lookout’ for hidden objects in the muddy
water; that Cooper regarded Armistead’s acting as look
out as ‘helpful’; that employees of the respondent would
sometimes make trips in boats for testing purposes, in
furtherance of respondent’s business; and that in one
such instance an employee had taken a boat on a trip of
at least fifty miles in respondent’s behalf.3
314 U.S. at 246.
The Court concluded that, based on the above evidence, the
deputy commissioner and the district court correctly found that
3
According to the Court of Appeals’ opinion in Parker, the
day of Armistead’s accident, as far as the record discloses, was
the only instance when his duties ever brought him into contact
with navigable waters. Motor Boat Sales, Inc. v. Parker, 116 F.2d
789, 792 (4th Cir.), rev’d, 314 U.S. 244 (1941). Unlike the worker
in Green v. Vermilion Corp., 144 F.3d 332 (5th Cir. 1998), Bienvenu
was not engaged in traditional longshoreman duties aboard the
vessel when the injuries occurred.
8
Armistead was covered under the LHWCA. The Court stated that
coverage would not be denied because
habitual performance of other and different duties on
land cannot alter the fact that at the time of the
accident he was riding in a boat on a navigable river,
and it is in connection with that clearly maritime
activity that the award was here made. Moreover, § 2(4)
of the Act, 33 U.S.C.A. § 902(4), expressly provides for
its application to ‘employees (who) are employed . . . in
whole or in part upon the navigable waters of the United
States.
Id. at 247 (footnote and citations omitted) (alterations in
original).
The Perini Court cited with approval Pennsylvania R. Co. v.
O’Rourke, 344 U.S. 334 (1953), which considered whether a railroad
worker injured on navigable water was covered by the LHWCA. The
claimant’s five-man train crew had duties that included work on the
railroad company’s car floats, which moved freight and passengers
to and from the yard by water. At the time of the accident, the
crew was removing boxcars from floats. O’Rourke climbed up on a
boxcar to release a brake and fell. The question presented was
whether O’Rourke could bring a damage action under the Federal
Employers’ Liability Act (FELA) or was relegated to a compensation
remedy under the LHWCA. The Court of Appeals held that the
claimant was not covered under the LHWCA because he was a railroad
worker and was not engaged in maritime employment. O'Rourke v.
Pennsylvania R. Co., 194 F.2d 612, 615 (2d Cir. 1952), rev’d, 344
U.S. 344 (1953).
In reversing the Court of Appeals, the Supreme Court stated:
9
We are clear, however, that the emphasis on the nature of
respondent’s duties here misses the mark. The statute
applies, by its own terms, to accidents on navigable
waters when the employer has any employees engaged in
maritime service. . . . The Court of Appeals, we think,
is in error in holding that the statute requires as to
the employee, both injury on navigable water and maritime
employment as a ground for coverage by the Compensation
Act. An injured worker’s particular activity at the time
of injury determines of course whether he was injured in
the course of his employment within § 902(2), and whether
he was a member of the crew of the vessel within the
exceptions of §§ 902(3) and 903(a)(1). This explains the
emphasis on the factor of the individual’s job in Parker
v. Motor Boat Sales, Inc. . . . ."
344 U.S. at 340.
The Court had the following to say about Parker.
The result in Parker, as well, is totally inconsistent
with any ‘duties test.’ Armistead, the employee there,
was a janitor with the motor boat company. He had been
ordered to ride in one of the boats during a test trip in
order to keep a lookout for hidden objects. Compensation
under the Harbor Workers Act could not have been paid in
connection with his death if we were to test its
applicability by the nature of his regular work.
Id. at 341 (citation omitted).
In 1985, the Supreme Court considered whether a welder
employed on a platform in Louisiana waters was covered under the
LHWCA. Herb's Welding, Inc. v. Gray, 470 U.S. 414 (1985). The
Court held that because Gray, the welder, was not injured on
navigable waters he could attain coverage only by qualifying for
the 1972 Amendments' expanded coverage for shore side workers. The
court concluded that Gray did not qualify for this expanded
coverage because he was not engaged in "maritime employment." This
employment was limited to longshoring, shipbuilding and ship
10
repairing. Gray’s welding work on stationary platforms did not fit
within this definition. See id. at 424-26.
The Court made clear, however, that this definition of
maritime employment did not apply to workers injured on navigable
waters: "This view of 'maritime employment’ does not preclude
benefits for those whose injury would have been covered before 1972
because it occurred ‘on navigable waters’." Id. at 424 n.10.
The Court also discussed the Court of Appeals' position that
because Gray would be covered while traveling by boat to work on
the platform, a finding of no coverage while Gray was on the
platform created a "curious hole" in coverage.
Gray traveled between platforms by boat and might have
been covered, before or after 1972, had he been injured
while in transit. See Director, OWCP v. Perini North
River Assoc., 459 U.S. at 324, 103 S.Ct. at 651. But see
id., at 324, n. 34, 103 S. Ct. at 651, n. 34. ("We
express no opinion whether such coverage extends to a
worker injured while transiently or fortuitously upon
actual navigable waters."). . . . Any coverage
attributable to the LHWCA itself was de minimis. We also
note in passing a substantial difference between a worker
performing a set of tasks requiring him to be both on and
off navigable waters, and a worker whose job is entirely
land-based but who takes a boat to work.
Id. at 427 n.13.
With this general background, we now turn to the arguments of
the parties in this case.
III.
A.
In light of Bienvenu's injury on navigable waters, Texaco
acknowledges, as it must, that Bienvenu need not establish that he
11
was engaged in maritime employment as that term is used in § 2(3)
of the Act. The Supreme Court's decisions in Perini and Herb's
Welding foreclose this argument. Those cases recognize that the
1972 Amendments were not intended to alter the scope of coverage
for workmen injured on navigable waters. As our discussion above
demonstrates, before 1972, any workman injured in the course of his
employment actually engaged in the performance of his assigned
duties on navigable waters enjoyed coverage under the LHWCA. He
was not required to perform the traditional maritime work described
in § 2(3) of the Act.
Relying on language in Perini, Texaco argues that workers like
Bienvenu who are injured on navigable waters must establish that
they were "required to perform their employment duties on navigable
waters."
Texaco argues that the one hour per day Bienvenu spent on the
deck of the MISS JACKIE, working on compressors and other platform
equipment, could have been performed on the platform had Bienvenu
chosen to do so and therefore that this work does not bring him
within the LHWCA coverage. We disagree with this reading of
Perini. The Perini Court, in discussing the pre-1972 law relative
to coverage under the Act, stated: "It becomes clear from this
discussion that the 1927 Act, as interpreted by Parker, Davis, and
Calbeck, provided coverage to those employees of statutory
‘employers,’ injured while working upon navigable waters in the
course of their employment." 459 U.S. at 311. In the very same
12
paragraph the Court cites with approval the following quote from
Gilmore and Black: "Any worker injured upon navigable waters in the
course of employment was ‘covered’ . . . without any inquiry into
what he was doing (or supposed to be doing) at the time of his
injury." Id. at 311 (citation omitted) (alteration in original).
Immediately following this discussion the Court uses the
language upon which Texaco relies: "As a marine construction worker
required to work upon navigable waters, and injured while
performing his duties on navigable waters, there can be no doubt
that Churchill would have been covered under the 1927 LHWCA." Id.
at 311-12.
We cannot read the above sentence as demanding that a worker
demonstrate that the duties he was performing aboard the vessel
were in response to a direct order from his superior. We believe
that all Perini requires is that the claimant show that he was
injured on navigable waters while in the course of his employment.4
4
Two other passages from Perini buttress this conclusion:
We are unable to find any congressional intent to
withdraw coverage of the LHWCA from those workers injured
on navigable waters in the course of their employment and
who would have been covered by the Act before 1972.
Id. at 315.
There is nothing in these comments or anywhere else
in the legislative reports, to suggest, as Perini claims,
that Congress intended the status language to require
that an employee injured upon the navigable waters in the
course of his employment had to show that his employment
possessed a direct (or substantial) relation to
navigation or commerce in order to be covered.
13
In this case, the ALJ found that Bienvenu spent one hour out
of a twelve-hour workday, or approximately 8.3% of his work time,
actually performing job responsibilities on navigable waters. From
the record, it is clear that Bienvenu had been performing the same
work from the MISS JACKIE for about eleven years. Surely if Texaco
had some objections to Bienvenu’s working on platform equipment
aboard the MISS JACKIE over this extended period of time it would
have made them known. Under these circumstances, Bienvenu was
entitled to assume that he had the discretion to perform his repair
and maintenance work on production equipment at the location he
deemed most efficient, including on the vessel. Bienvenu was in
the course of his employment when he performed the above-described
work on the MISS JACKIE and Bienvenu is covered under the LHWCA
unless Texaco prevails on its argument that Bienvenu was aboard the
MISS JACKIE fortuitously or transiently and for that reason has no
coverage. We now turn to this argument.
B.
As we discussed above, the Supreme Court in Perini reserved
the question of whether a workman aboard a vessel "transiently or
fortuitously" enjoyed coverage under the LHWCA. The Court in
Herb's Welding reiterated this reservation. 470 U.S. at 427 n.13.
The Director argues that while the Supreme Court reserved this
question in Perini, the cases it cited as representative of the
Id. at 318-19.
14
pre-1972 law on coverage indicate that the Court would reject any
such hole in coverage. While it is not free from doubt, we believe
that the signals from the Supreme Court in Perini and again in
Herb's Welding indicate that the Supreme Court would hold that a
workman who is aboard a vessel simply transiently or fortuitously,
even though technically in the course of his employment, does not
enjoy coverage under the LHWCA. We join the Eleventh Circuit in
reaching this conclusion. See Brockington v. Certified Elec.,
Inc., 903 F.2d 1523, 1528 (11th Cir. 1990); see also Zapata-Haynie
Corp. v. Barnard, 933 F.2d 256, 260 (4th Cir. 1991) (noting that
the plaintiff was "not merely fortuitously over water when his
injury occurred").
We therefore hold that a worker injured in the course of his
employment on navigable waters is engaged in maritime employment
and meets the status test5 only if his presence on the water at the
time of injury was neither transient or fortuitous. The presence,
however, of a worker injured on the water and who performs a "not
insubstantial" amount of his work on navigable waters is neither
transient nor fortuitous. Though we decline to set today the exact
amount of work performance on navigable waters sufficient to
trigger LHWCA coverage, instead leaving that task to the case-by-
case development for which the common law is so well-suited, see
5
See Perini, 459 U.S. at 324 ("[W]hen a worker is injured on
the actual navigable waters in the course of his employment on
those waters, he satisfies the status requirement . . . .").
15
Barrett v. Chevron, U.S.A., Inc., 781 F.2d 1067, 1073 (5th Cir.
1986) (en banc) (adopting case-by-case review to determine coverage
under the Jones Act), we will provide some guiding thoughts on the
matter.
First, the threshold amount must be greater than a modicum of
activity in order to preclude coverage to those employees who are
merely commuting from shore to work by boat. Also, the routine
activity of assisting in tying the vessel to the dock and loading
or unloading one’s tools and personal gear onto the vessel do not
count as meaningful job responsibilities. Moreover, we agree with
the Supreme Court in Herb's Welding that there is a substantial
difference between a worker "performing a set of tasks requiring
him to be both on and off navigable waters, and a worker whose job
is entirely land based but who takes a boat to work." 470 U.S. at
427 n.13. The time Bienvenu actually worked on production
equipment aboard the MISS JACKIE constituted 8.3% of his time at
work. This is not an insubstantial amount of Bienvenu's work time
and is sufficient to trigger LHWCA coverage.6
Our conclusion today that the Supreme Court would deny LHWCA
coverage to a worker injured on a vessel that he is aboard
6
Because Bienvenu's work on the production equipment aboard
the MISS JACKIE is sufficient to trigger LHWCA coverage, we do not
consider whether his time aboard the MISS JACKIE being shuttled
from platform to platform should be included in determining whether
he spent more than a modicum of his work time on navigable waters.
16
transiently or fortuitously permits us to clarify our case law on
this subject.7
In Fontenot v. AWI, Inc., 923 F.2d 1127 (5th Cir. 1991), we
held that a worker who spent 40% of his worktime on shore, 30% on
fixed platforms and 30% on oil exploration and production vessels,
was engaged in maritime employment because he "was injured while on
actual navigable waters, in the course of his employment." Id. at
1130. Our holding today is entirely consistent with our holding in
Fontenot given the substantial duties Fontenot had on navigable
waters.
In Randall v. Chevron U.S.A., Inc., 13 F.3d 888 (5th Cir.
1994), the petitioner's husband was killed while attempting to
transfer by swing rope from a fixed platform to a vessel. Mr.
Randall was a mechanic who performed all of his work duties on a
fixed platform and had no assigned duties on navigable waters. He
was simply transported to and from his workstation--a stationary
platform--by boat.
The Randall panel read Fontenot to base coverage under the
LHWCA solely upon Fontenot's injury on navigable waters without
regard to the extent of his duties on navigable waters. It
therefore concluded that Fontenot had decided that workers injured
7
Our decisions in Thibodaux v. Atlantic Richfield Co., 580
F.2d 841 (5th Cir. 1978), and Boudreaux v. American Workover, Inc.,
680 F.2d 1034 (5th Cir. Unit A 1982) (en banc), were decided before
the Supreme Court announced its decision in Director v. Perini and
answered most of the questions confronting us at that time.
17
while transiently or fortuitously upon navigable waters are covered
by the LHWCA. See id. at 897. Because the Randall panel found
itself bound by what it perceived as this holding in Fontenot, the
Randall panel concluded that the claimant was covered by the LHWCA.
This court, sitting en banc, of course is not bound by either
Fontenot or Randall. As our discussion above indicates, our
conclusion that workmen who are aboard vessels transiently or
fortuitously when they sustain injury are not covered by the LHWCA
is inconsistent with Randall's holding. Randall is therefore
overruled.
IV.
Judge DeMoss, in his dissent, argues that we ignored the 1984
Amendments to the LHWCA. We did not deal with the amendments,
codified at 33 U.S.C. § 902(3)(A)-(F), for a reason: They have
nothing to do with this case. The amendments exclude from coverage
under the Act persons engaged in six separate, narrowly defined
types of employment. These include: clerical workers (Section
902(3)(A)); workers at camps, restaurants, or retail outlets
(Section 902(3)(B)); marina workers (Section 902(3)(C)); workers
employed by vendors or suppliers (Section 902(3)(D)); aquaculture
workers (Section 902(3)(E)); and builders or repairers of
recreational vessels (Section 902(3)(F)). If a person who would
otherwise be covered under the LHWCA does the type of work
enumerated by one of these amendments and is covered by a state
workman’s compensation act, he is not covered by the LHWCA. But
18
Bienvenu’s employment as a pumper/gauger does not fit within any of
the job descriptions listed in the amendments.
Both Judge Jones and Judge DeMoss argue in dissent that unless
a worker devotes substantial time to longshore duties (Judge DeMoss
suggests 30%), he should not be covered under the LHWCA. Adoption
of such a rule would create serious problems. First, such a rule
is plainly inconsistent with Perini (worker injured on the
navigable water in the course of his employment satisfies the
status requirement). Indeed, Judge Jones's main point is that
Perini was wrongly decided. Second, imposing such a blanket
requirement would overrun the detailed provisions of the 1984
amendments. The very detailing of specific job descriptions by
Congress belies any speculation that Congress intended by the
amendments any such wholesale withdrawal of compensation coverage
-- recall that the exclusions under the amendments demand coverage
under state workers’ compensation. The dissent is silent about
workers beyond state territorial waters. Such workers to whom
coverage under the LHWCA is not expressly extended by statute (such
as the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act, 43 U.S.C. §§ 1331 et
seq.) presumably will be left without compensation.
Relatedly, Judge DeMoss argues that our opinion in this case
conflicts with this Court’s recent opinion in Green v. Vermilion
Corp., 144 F.3d 332 (5th Cir. 1998). In Green, we held that a
worker in a hunting camp was not covered under the LHWCA. The
distinction between the two cases is patent: Green was a "camp"
19
worker expressly excluded from coverage by Section 902 (3)(B);
Bienvenu does not fall within any of Section 902's narrowly defined
exclusions.
Judge DeMoss next takes the position that the Supreme Court’s
conclusion in Herb’s Welding, Inc. v. Gray, 470 U.S. 414, 105 S.
Ct. 1421 (1985), that the oil field welder in that case was not
engaged in maritime employment precludes Bienvenu’s recovery under
the LHWCA. He refuses to acknowledge the distinction between a
worker injured on land and a worker injured on navigable water. The
Court made it crystal clear that its denial of coverage to Gray was
because he fell outside of the 1972 Amendments’ expanded coverage
for shore side workers. The Court expressly held: "This view of
‘maritime employment’ does not preclude benefits for those whose
injury would have been covered before 1972 because it occurred ‘on
navigable waters.’" 470 U.S. at 424 n. 10, 105 S. Ct. at 1428 n.
10.
By arguing that workers injured on navigable water only
qualify for LHWCA coverage if they perform longshore duties, Judges
Jones and DeMoss fail to recognize the long established principle
that persons engaged in work aboard vessels are engaged in maritime
employment. See Gilmore & Black, The Law of Admiralty at 429-30.
That principle underlies the Perini Court’s conclusion that workers
engaged in the course of their employment satisfy the "status"
requirement. 459 U.S. at 311. Imposing such a duties test also
directly conflicts with the Supreme Court's holding in Penn. R. Co.
20
v. O'Rourke, 344 U.S. 334 (1953) (see discussion in text, supra),
which the Court relied on in Perini. Also, the Dissents’ proposed
holding that oilfield work aboard a vessel is not maritime
employment would mean that the hundreds of oilfield workers working
on drilling barges are not maritime employees. In The Offshore Co.
v. Robison, 266 F.2d 769 (5th Cir. 1959), and the hundreds of cases
that followed, we held that such workers qualify as seamen and can
recover under the Jones Act and the General Maritime law. The
Dissenters’ reasoning would lead to the anomalous holding that
oilfield work aboard a vessel is not maritime work if the employee
spends less than 30% of his time performing that work; yet a worker
who performs more than 30% of his work aboard a vessel is a seaman,
the highest form of maritime worker. See Seas Shipping Co., Inc.
v. Sieracki, 328 U.S. 85, 66 S. Ct. 872, 90 L. Ed. 1099 (1946)
(stevedore elevated to status of seaman for purposes of suing
shipowner for unseaworthiness).
The assertion that adopting an inquiry for longshoreman
coverage similar to that for seaman status affords a more clear and
litigation-dampening standard is both stunning and perverse. It is
stunning to those familiar with the huge number of cases spawned in
our struggle with that test. It is perverse to place the same
hurdle before an injured worker who claims to be a seaman, with the
uncapped liability system they enjoy, and an injured worker seeking
workers’ compensation as a longshoreman. The "logic" of the
21
Dissents’ equating what is essentially a tort system with a
workers’ compensation scheme turns the fundamental purpose of a no-
liability, limited-damage compensation scheme upside down. Finally,
an en banc court is not the Congress.
For the reasons stated above, the judgments of the BRB and
ALJ are REVERSED and the case is REMANDED to the ALJ for further
proceedings.
22
EDITH H. JONES, Circuit Judge, dissenting:
Even though I must agree with the majority opinion that
we are bound by Perini’s general interpretation of the 1972
amendments to the LHWCA, I disagree with their conclusion that
Bienvenu, an oil pumper who spent his entire career maintaining oil
and gas equipment on production platforms within Louisiana’s three-
mile limit, was not "transiently" injured on board the Miss Jackie.
The majority’s decision to the contrary sets such a low threshold
for LHWCA coverage that it is easy to envision increased litigation
over LHWCA coverage for other land-based workers who are maritime
commuters. Of course, as the Supreme Court said, "there will
always be a boundary to coverage, and there will always be people
who cross it during their employment." Herb’s Welding, Inc. v.
Gray, 470 U.S. 414, 428, 105 S. Ct. 1421, 1429 (1985) (citation
omitted). The true boundary, in my view, should not lie at the
nethermost conceivable description of maritime commuter-workers,
but at the line drawn by Congress’s adoption of a maritime
employment status test in the 1972 amendments to the LHWCA.8 This
leads me respectfully to disagree with the interpretation of the
8
See Longshoremen’s and Harbor Workers’ Compensation Act §
2(3), 33 U.S.C. § 902(3) ("The term ‘employee’ means any person
engaged in maritime employment, including any longshoreman or other
person engaged in longshoring operations, and any harbor-worker
including a ship repairman, shipbuilder, and ship-breaker . . .
.").
23
LHWCA adopted in Perini. Although our lower court may not defy the
High Court’s ruling, it is useful to observe how interpretation of
the statute could be brought more in line with its plain meaning.
Because much light has been shed on this debate by both
the majority and dissenting opinions, I will frame my views
succinctly. First, I accept that Perini insists upon continued
LHWCA coverage, irrespective of the 1972 amendment’s definition of
maritime employment, for any worker "injured while performing his
job upon actual navigable waters." Perini, 459 U.S. at 299, 103 S.
Ct. at 638.9 Although it is a close call, I disagree with the
majority’s conclusion that because Bienvenu voluntarily performed
as much as 8.3% of his work duties on the vessel, i.e. repairing or
maintaining equipment and tools, he was not merely "transiently"
aboard and thus excluded from LHWCA coverage. Perini’s significant
footnote disclaims any intent to rule on whether LHWCA "coverage
extends to a worker injured while transiently or fortuitously upon
actual navigable waters . . . ." 459 U.S. 297, 326 n.34, 103 S.
9
Judge DeMoss’s dissent correctly shows, however, that Perini
and cases on which it relies, such as Parker, should not be relied
upon to the extent that Congress specifically overruled them in the
1984 amendments to the LHWCA. Moreover, while some may argue that
Congress did not expressly overrule Perini in the 1984 LHWCA
amendments, thus implicitly adopting the Perini construction of
LHWCA coverage, this argument must fail in light of the express
status test embodied in the 1972 amendments and retained, with
further restrictions, by the 1984 amendments. Based on the
language of the statute, the 1984 amendments could just as easily
be interpreted as a congressional reaffirmance of a strict status
test for LHWCA coverage, regardless of situs.
24
Ct. 634, 651 n.34 (1983). In Herb’s Welding, the Court reiterates
a likely limit to LHWCA coverage in another footnote which observes
that Gray, a welder on fixed offshore oil and gas platforms
traveled between platforms by boat and might have been
covered, before or after 1972, had he been injured while
in transit. Even if he would have been covered for some
small fraction of his time independent of the Lands Act,
however, he is a far cry from the paradigmatic
longshoreman who walked in and out of coverage during his
workday and spent substantial amounts of his time "on
navigable waters." Any coverage attributable to the
LHWCA itself was de minimis. We also note in passing a
substantial difference between a worker performing a set
of tasks requiring him to be both on and off navigable
waters, and a worker whose job is entirely land-based but
who takes a boat to work.
Herb’s Welding, Inc., 470 U.S. at 427 n.13, 105 S. Ct. at 1429 n.13
(citing Perini, 459 U.S. at 324, 103 S. Ct. at 651). At the least,
"transiently" is closely related to "in transit", and both phrases
are closely related to the description of "a worker whose job is
entirely land-based but who takes a boat to work." Indeed, Gray,
like Bienvenu, ate and slept on a platform in Louisiana waters and
spent 75% of his time working on platforms in state territorial
waters. See Herb’s Welding, Inc., 470 U.S. at 416, 105 S. Ct. at
1423. On the basis of these careful disclaimers, there should be
substantial doubt whether a pumper like Bienvenu who "takes a boat
to work" should be covered by the LHWCA. The majority purports not
to answer this question, but their description of Bienvenu’s "work"
on board the Miss Jackie suffers from two flaws. First, it sets up
a test (a "modicum" of work, "not insubstantial" work) that can be
25
satisfied by artful pleading concerning the waterborne commuter’s
"work" performed en route to land-based jobs.10 Second, it
foreordains that employees like Bienvenu and Gray will continuously
walk in and out of LHWCA coverage throughout the work day. These
problems would be avoided by a holding that Bienvenu was only a
commuter by boat in the course of performing his duties as an oil
field worker. See Brockington v. Certified Elec., Inc., 903 F.2d
1523, 1528 (11th Cir. 1990) ("question of whether an individual is
a maritime employee for purposes of LHWCA coverage is controlled by
analysis of his ‘basic’ employment, rather than the employee’s
particular work at the moment of the accident").
Like the offshore welder Robert Gray, Bienvenu is hardly
engaged in "maritime employment" under either a layman’s conception
of the term or the tighter definition imposed by the LHWCA. And
from a common sense standpoint, it is hard to understand why Gray
should have been covered solely by state workers compensation
insurance, while Bienvenu is permitted also to benefit from the
10
The majority predicts that my position would create as many
problems as the ill-starred Robison test for seaman status. I
hesitated deliberately to engage in similar vague and dire
predictions about their view. But two observations are in order.
First, they invoke the Barrett v. Chevron litigation-based test as
a model for drawing lines among types of coverage in these cases;
we are all thus in the same boat. Second, I believe we are all
dealing with truly marginal cases in which coverage under a state
compensation scheme or LHWCA may be arguable but ought at least to
have some consistent rationale tied to real work "on the waters."
26
federal compensation program.11 The reason for these incongruous
results, I suggest, lies not in the statute written by Congress but
in the Supreme Court’s awkward interpretation of it in Perini.
Faced with 1972 LHWCA amendments that, for the first time,
expressly defined coverage in terms of an employee’s maritime work
status as well as the appropriate situs, the Court held that the
status determination was essentially relevant only to the landward
extension of LHWCA. Congress did not intend, the Court said, to
modify the essentially situs-based test for coverage of those
employed "on navigable waters" who would have been covered by the
Act before 1972.
But the language chosen by Congress reflects no such
bifurcated intent. Even if Perini correctly described Congress’s
legislative intent as expressed in committee reports, such
intentions do not substitute for the plain meaning of the statute.
See Free v. Abbott Lab. (In re Abbott Lab.), 51 F.3d 524, 528 (5th
Cir. 1995) ("We cannot search legislative history for congressional
11
The majority blithely ignore this incongruity, in which two
workers otherwise similarly situated receive different forms of
coverage based solely on the fortuitous location of the accident.
Surely that incongruity is quantitatively worse than that which
they espy in my position, whereby, they claim, offshore oilworkers
may receive either state compensation or Seaman’s benefits. I
disagree that such a consequence will be common. But if it did
occur, it would be based on a principled distinction concerning the
basic nature of the employee’s work and exposure to the risks of
the sea. The majority’s pinched definition of "transient" and
"fortuitous" accidents on the water leads, by contrast, to the type
of capricious result they reach today.
27
intent unless we find the statute unclear or ambiguous."). Since
Perini was decided, the Supreme Court has focused more carefully in
statutory construction cases on the language that Congress chose,
using that language as its basic guide to statutory
interpretation.12 It seems plain to me that the definition of
maritime employment added to the LHWCA in 1972 is not limited to
landward coverage questions but is also a requirement for coverage
of injuries on navigable waters. This interpretation was certainly
foreshadowed in early commentary on the 1972 amendments.13 Further,
12
See City of Chicago v. Environmental Defense Fund, 511 U.S.
328, 337, 114 S. Ct. 1588, 1593 (1994) ("[I]t is the statute, and
not the Committee Report, which is the authoritative expression of
the law . . . ."); Republic of Arg. v. Weltover, Inc., 504 U.S.
607, 618, 112 S. Ct. 2160, 2168 (1992) ("The question, however, is
not what Congress ‘would have wanted’ but what Congress enacted .
. . ."); Wisconsin Pub. Intervenor v. Mortier, 501 U.S. 597, 610
n.4, 111 S. Ct. 2476, 2484 n.4 (1991) ("No matter how clearly its
report purports to do so, a committee of Congress cannot take
language that could only cover ‘flies’ or ‘mosquitoes,’ and tell
the courts that it really covers ‘ducks.’"); Burlington N. R.R. Co.
v. Oklahoma Tax Comm’n, 481 U.S. 454, 461, 107 S. Ct. 1855, 1860
(1987) ("Unless exceptional circumstances dictate otherwise,
‘[w]hen we find the terms of a statute unambiguous, judicial
inquiry is complete.’").
13
See, e.g., Perini, 459 U.S. at 326-28, 103 S. Ct. at 651-53
(Stevens, J., dissenting) ("If we ignore history, and merely
concentrate on the text of the statute, the conclusion is
inescapable that [the LHWCA] merely provides coverage for people
who do the work of longshoremen and harbor workers . . . .");
Charles F. Tucker, Coverage and Procedures Under the Longshoremen’s
and Harbor Workers’ Compensation Act Subsequent to the 1972
Amendments, 55 Tul. L. Rev. 1056, 1060-68, 1088 (1981) ("For a
worker to be covered under the Act, he must not only meet the situs
requirement of section 903(a), but he must also meet the status
test of section 902(3) . . . ."); Roberto L. Corrado, Note,
Director, Office of Workers’ Compensation Programs v. Perini North
28
it is not an absurd construction of the Act to hold that a federal
program to compensate "longshore and harbor workers" should
encompass maritime employment in a traditional sense rather than,
e.g., oil field workers. Finally, this is not an abstractly unfair
construction of the statute, inasmuch as there is no longer any
doubt that workers like Bienvenu are covered by state compensation
schemes.
Thus, under a strictly textual reading of the LHWCA, if
we were not bound by Perini, I would hold that Bienvenu was not
engaged in maritime employment for coverage purposes. Even bound
by Perini, however, it seems to me that Bienvenu was injured
"transiently", as Perini and Herb’s Welding used that term, and
should not receive LHWCA coverage overlapping that provided under
state workers’ compensation. I respectfully dissent.
River Associates: Judicial Dilution of the Longshoremen’s and
Harbor Workers’ Compensation Act’s ‘Status’ Requirement, 33 Cath.
U. L. Rev. 245, 277 (1983) ("The Court’s overly expansive view of
the LHWCA controverts the plain meaning of the Act, and restricts
Congress’ attempt to apply a test of maritime status to all workers
injured on the actual navigable waters of the United States.");
Harold K. Watson, Comment, Broadened Coverage Under the LHWCA, 33
La. L. Rev. 683, 693 (1973) ("Now, in order to recover, the
employee must once again show his [own] status as a maritime
employee before the broadened situs-oriented coverage provision
will inure to his benefit."); see also, e.g., Arthur Larson & Lex
K. Larson, Larson’s Workers’ Compensation Law, §§ 89.27(c), 89.41
(1998) (discussing implications of 1972 amendments and development
of LHWCA coverage in light of Perini) ("[T]he boundary will no
doubt be drawn on a case-by-case basis, rather than on the basis of
some all-purpose general test or principle.").
29
DeMOSS, Circuit Judge, with whom, SMITH, Circuit Judge, joins
dissenting:
With all due respect for my colleagues in the majority, I am
unable to concur in their decision for the following reasons.
I. Chronology of significant events
Any explanation of my disagreements with the majority has to
begin with an overview of the key factual and legal events, which
I find determinative of the legal issues presented in this case.
First, I will briefly reprise the facts giving rise to Bienvenu’s
claims, as either stipulated to by the parties or found by the
administrative law judge.
This case began over eleven years ago. On April 10 and 11,
1987, Bienvenu suffered back sprains which resulted in his having
to stop working for Texaco on July 19, 1987. Soon thereafter, on
September 1, 1987, Bienvenu underwent back surgery. By January 31,
1989, Bienvenu had achieved maximum medical improvement following
his surgery.
Texaco’s workers’ compensation insurance carrier made payments
to Bienvenu pursuant to the Louisiana Workers’ Compensation Law.
During the period from July 19, 1987 to May 29, 1991, Bienvenu
received $261 per week; from May 30, 1991 to July 30, 1992 he
received $522 per week. In addition, all of Bienvenu’s medical
bills were paid by Texaco’s insurance carrier, as required by the
Louisiana Workers’ Compensation Law.
All was as it should have been until December 3, 1990, when
Bienvenu filed a claim for benefits under the federal Longshore and
Harbor Workers’ Compensation Act, 33 U.S.C. § 901 et seq.
(hereinafter, LHWCA). Almost two years later, on October 14, 1992,
an administrative law judge conducted a hearing regarding
Bienvenu’s LHWCA claim. The decision was handed down after yet
another year of delay, on November 30, 1993. See Bienvenu, No.
92-LHC-2801, slip op. at 4-5, 27 Ben. Rev. Bd. Serv. (MB) 547(ALJ),
550-51 (Dep’t Labor Nov. 30, 1993).
In addition to these factual events, there are two key legal
events that have a significant impact on Bienvenu’s claim. The
first of these is the enactment of amendments to the LHWCA,
effective on September 28, 1984. Longshore and Harbor Workers’
Compensation Act Amendments of 1984, Pub. L. 98-426, sec. 2(a), 98
Stat. 1639, 1639 (codified at 33 U.S.C. § 902(3)(A)-(F)). The
second is the decision by the Supreme Court in Herb’s Welding, Inc.
v. Gray, 470 U.S. 414, 105 S. Ct. 1421 (1985), which was argued on
October 3, 1984, and related to an accident which occurred on July
11, 1975, and therefore was not governed by the 1984 LHWCA
Amendments.
31
Today, more than eleven years after the injuries occurred,
more than thirteen years after the decision in Herb’s Welding, and
more than fourteen years after the 1984 LHWCA Amendments took
effect, we are still attempting to decide which compensation
statute is applicable to Bienvenu’s injuries. That fact, standing
alone, is a tragic commentary about the ambiguities of our LHWCA
jurisprudence. This ambiguity, and the attendant delay is,
unfortunately, an example of what the United States Congress
intended to prevent by adopting the 1984 LHWCA Amendments.
II. What effect did the 1984 amendments to the LHWCA have on the
question of whether relief should be under state workers’
compensation statutes or the LHWCA?
Amazingly, in Part II of its opinion, the majority reviews the
entire history of the LHWCA from the Supreme Court’s decision in
Southern Pacific Co. v. Jensen, 244 U.S. 205, 37 S. Ct. 524 (1917),
right down to the Supreme Court’s 1985 opinion in Herb’s Welding,
yet fails in recounting this historical background to mention once,
much less apply or construe, the 1984 LHWCA Amendments. This
legislation made significant changes in the structure and
applicability of the LHWCA. Most significantly, the 1984 LHWCA
Amendments defined six new categories of employment which were not
included in the definition of the term "person engaged in maritime
employment," if the individuals described therein "are subject to
32
coverage under a State workers’ compensation law." See 33 U.S.C.
§ 902(3).
The express statutory language of § 902(3) specifies that
persons employed to perform certain tasks (described in clauses A,
E, and F) or employed by certain employers (described in clauses B,
C, and D) are not included within the definition of the term
"person engaged in maritime employment" if the individuals
described by clauses (A) through (F) are subject to coverage under
a state workers’ compensation law. Thus, in resolving the question
of whether an injured worker is entitled to state compensation
benefits or to LHWCA compensation benefits, the first inquiry which
must logically be made is whether or not any one or more of clauses
(A) through (F) apply to his employment.************** If so, we must
then ask whether the worker was subject to state workers’
compensation law. If a worker was not covered by any state
compensation statute, then none of clauses (A) through (F) can act
to deny or remove him from coverage under the LHWCA. But if state
workers’ compensation covers the employee, and if any one or more
of the § 902(3) subclauses apply, then the injured worker is not "a
person engaged in maritime employment" and he is therefore not an
**************
No one contends that Bienvenu fits into the
enumerated categories of "any longshoreman or other person engaged
in longshoring operations, and any harbor-worker including a ship
repairman, shipbuilder, and ship-breaker" specified in § 902(3), as
to which there would be no doubt that the LHWCA is the exclusive
compensation regime.
33
"employee" as defined in § 902(3). If he is not an employee, he is
not entitled to compensation benefits under the LHWCA, regardless
of the location, or "situs," of his injury, because the situs test
specified in 33 U.S.C. § 903(a) is applicable only to the
"disability or death of an employee" as defined in the
LHWCA.*************** Consequently, the changes made by the 1984 LHWCA
Amendments constitute clear, deliberate action on the part of
Congress to withdraw LHWCA coverage from those individuals
described in clauses (A) through (F), even in the circumstance that
their injuries occurred upon "navigable waters" in the course of
their employment, and despite the fact that they might have been
covered by LHWCA prior to the enactment of the 1984 LHWCA
Amendments.
The withdrawal of LHWCA coverage on the condition that the
injured worker is "subject to coverage under a State workers’
***************
The statute provides:
Except as otherwise provided in this section,
compensation shall be payable under this chapter in
respect of disability or death of an employee, but
only if the disability or death results from an
injury occurring upon the navigable waters of the
United States (including any adjoining pier, wharf,
dry dock, terminal, building way, marine railway,
or other adjoining area customarily used by an
employer in loading, unloading, repairing,
dismantling, or building a vessel).
33 U.S.C. § 903(a). This limitation on LHWCA coverage is commonly
known as the "situs" requirement.
34
compensation law" is a significant change from prior law. The 1984
LWHCA Amendments reflect congressional recognition of the interplay
between the separate state and federal workers’ compensation
schemes, and legislatively dictate that in the circumstances in
which individuals falling within the purview of clauses (A) through
(F) are already subject to state workers’ compensation benefits,
those state workers’ compensation benefits are the exclusive
benefits for those particular workers.
While the 1984 LHWCA Amendments are plain on their face, and
there is no need to look at legislative history when there is no
ambiguity in the statutory language, I nevertheless think that a
look at legislative history is useful in this case in order to
understand what Congress was attempting to accomplish by the 1984
LHWCA Amendments. For example, the House Report states that the
1984 amendments were intended to
insure stability for both the employer and the
employee. The employer needs to know its
obligations with respect to workers’ compensation
for its employees, and make plans accordingly.
Employees should not fall within the coverage of
different statutes because of the nature of what it
is they were doing at the moment of injury.
H.R. Rep. No. 98-570, pt. 1, at 6 (1984), reprinted in 1984
U.S.C.C.A.N. 2734, 2739 (emphasis supplied). The Senate report on
the Senate bill which initiated the legislative process is even
35
more specific and expressive as to the purposes of the 1984 LHWCA
Amendments. See S. Rep. No. 98-81 (1983).
From the language used by Congress in the 1984 LHWCA
Amendments, and from the explanations provided by Congress in
legislative history regarding the need for and purpose of the 1984
LHWCA Amendments, several congressional intentions become
abundantly clear. First, Congress sought to correct, overrule, or
reverse situations in which "courts and agencies have found
coverage which [is] not warranted."*************** Second, Congress
attempted to define situations in which the "nexus to maritime
navigation and commerce" was insufficient to justify the imposition
of the federal compensation scheme.*************** Third, Congress
***************
"It is clear from the abundant record developed at
the ove[r]sight hearings that a pressing need exists to revise
portions of the act. The courts and agencies have found coverage
to exist in situations which are not warranted." S. Rep. No. 98-81
at 20. "[T]he decade of experience under the 1972 Amendments has
vividly demonstrated that the effort to eliminate benefit disparity
and to promote systemic uniformity has exacted a price, too. The
rules of coverage, in the words of one authority, have been a
‘doubly prolific generator of litigation.’" Id. at 24-25 (quoting
4 A. Larson, Workmen’s Compensation § 89.27(b), at 16-180 (1983)).
***************
In this vein, the Senate report reflects the
following judgments about situations in which the connection
between employment and traditional maritime duties are too
attenuated to support LHWCA coverage:
Additionally, the committee would like to
clarify that certain establishments, and their
employees, such as clubs, camps, restaurants,
museums, retail outlets and marinas are exempt from
coverage regardless of their location.
36
recognized that "appropriate state compensation laws" can often
provide coverage to the employees involved "more aptly."***************
The committee received numerous complaints
from these employers and their insurance carriers
that indicate a general confusion as to whether or
not the Longshore Act applies. These businesses
are operated on or over a navigable water and
insurance carriers, fearing a claim under the act,
often require Longshore riders on their workers
compensation insurance policies.
The committee believes that these employers
lack the necessary nexus to maritime employment and
commerce and therefore are properly exempted from
the jurisdiction of the act.
S. Rep. No. 98-81 at 29.
***************
The report states, in pertinent part:
[T]he lower courts as well as the Benefits
Review Board in the past have often been divided on
the proper criteria for determining such issues as
"maritime employment" and "adjoining area." (See,
e.g., discussion in 4 A. Larson, Workmen’s
Compensation § 89.42 at pp. 52-53 (Supp. 1981)).
. . . Uncertainty of coverage fosters
continued litigation, with attendant expense and
delay that is a burden to employers, their
insurance carriers, and claimants.
. . . .
. . . Rather, the consensus among the
committee members was to reaffirm the purposes of
the 1972 jurisdictional changes, and in that light,
the committee narrowed its focus to certain fairly
identifiable employers and employees who, although
by circumstance happened to work on or adjacent to
navigable waters, lack a sufficient nexus to
maritime navigation and commerce. The committee’s
attention was directed to specified activities
which were singled out for criticism by numerous
37
Fourth, Congress aimed to protect the principle that workers’
compensation is an employee’s exclusive remedy against the
employer.***************
None of the language added by the 1984 LHWCA Amendments can be
read to provide for an injured worker to receive both state and
LHWCA benefits. Likewise, none of the language added by the 1984
amendments can be read to adopt the concept articulated by the
Supreme Court in Director, OWCP v. Perini North River Associates,
459 U.S. 297, 103 S. Ct. 634 (1983), that "injury on navigable
waters in the course of employment" is all that is needed to
establish "maritime employment" for the purpose of bestowing LHWCA
coverage. To the contrary, the broad, simple, unqualified language
used in the various clauses of § 902(3) necessarily moots
consideration of that factor.
witnesses before the committee. Under this case-
specific approach, the committee has determined
that certain activities do not merit coverage under
the act and that the employees involved are more
aptly covered under appropriate state compensation
laws.
S. Rep. No. 98-81 at 25 (emphasis supplied).
***************
"Judicial interpretations of the act have allowed
for dual recovery under both State workers’ compensation and LHWCA.
This violates the principle of workers’ compensation that it is the
employer’s exclusive remedy. Current law undermines this principle
when an employer faces both Federal and state programs." S. Rep.
No. 98-81 at 30.
38
III. Effect of the 1984 LHWCA Amendments on the Supreme Court’s
Holding in Perini
The principal case which the majority relies on to determine
Bienvenu’s compensation rights is the 1983 decision of the Supreme
Court in Perini. Obviously, Perini related to facts and
circumstances which occurred after adoption of the Longshoremen’s
and Harbor Workers’ Compensation Act Amendments of 1972, Pub. L.
92-576, 86 Stat. 1251, but before the 1984 LHWCA Amendments. There
is nothing in the Perini opinion which even recognizes the pendency
before Congress of what later became the 1984 LHWCA Amendments.
Nevertheless, the majority relies upon Perini to establish two
essential premises. The first of these is that under the law prior
to the 1972 LHWCA Amendments, a worker injured on actual navigable
waters in the course of his employment on those waters
automatically satisfied the status requirement of the LHWCA. The
second premise is that nothing in the 1972 LHWCA Amendments
indicates a congressional intent to withdraw LHWCA coverage from
workmen covered by the Act before 1972. See Majority Op. at 13-14.
The majority then refers to three prior Supreme Court opinions upon
which the Perini Court relied in making these conclusions: Parker
v. Motor Boat Sales, Inc., 314 U.S. 244, 62 S. Ct. 221 (1941);
Davis v. Department of Labor & Industries, 317 U.S. 249, 63 S. Ct.
39
225 (1942); and Calbeck v. Travelers Insurance Co., 370 U.S. 114,
82 S. Ct. 1196 (1962).
The majority identifies Parker as the case "most relevant to
our decision" in this case. But the 1984 LHWCA Amendments adopted
by Congress substantially undercut the rationales of both Perini
and Parker. For instance, if the factual circumstances involved in
Parker (a janitor employed by a retailer of pleasure craft assists
a salesman placing an outboard motor on a boat and accompanies the
salesman on a demonstration run; the boat then capsizes and the
janitor is killed) had occurred after the passage of the 1984 LHWCA
Amendments, the current statutory terms would expressly preclude
LHWCA coverage for the janitor because he was "employed by a . . .
retail outlet," § 902(3)(B), and he was "employed to build, repair,
or dismantle a recreational vessel under 65 feet in length,"
§ 902(3)(F). Since the janitor in Parker was determined to be an
LHWCA employee, but that same janitor would no longer be covered by
the statute, the value of that opinion is substantially
diminished.*************** Likewise, Perini’s blanket holding -- that the
***************
Just a cursory review of footnote 21 in Perini, 459
U.S. at 311, 103 S. Ct. at 644, indicates the following additional
categories where the 1984 LHWCA Amendments would change the status
of the injured employee described in the following pre-1972 cases:
1. Nalco Chem. Corp. v. Shea, 419 F.2d 572 (5th Cir. 1969)
(pilot salesman traveling to offshore platform) would be changed by
§ 902(3)(D) ("individuals employed by suppliers, transporters, or
vendors . . ."); and
40
1972 LHWCA Amendments preserved and supplemented the entirety of
pre-1972 LHWCA coverage -- should have little influence after the
adoption of the 1984 LHWCA Amendments, which obviously do retract
coverage from the pre-1972 boundaries. The modifications
demolished the Perini proposition by unequivocally withdrawing
LHWCA coverage from certain workers, despite the fact that they may
have been injured on actual navigable waters in the course of their
employment.
IV. What effect did the 1984 LHWCA Amendments have on the rule
announced by the Supreme Court in Herb’s Welding?
The casualty involved in the Herb’s Welding case occurred in
July 1975, after passage of the 1972 LHWCA Amendments, but before
passage of the 1984 LHWCA Amendments. The case was argued before
the Supreme Court on October 3, 1984, just five days after the
effective date of the 1984 LHWCA Amendments. Since the accident
occurred before the 1984 LHWCA Amendments were adopted, it is not
surprising that there is no discussion of that statutory
development in the Herb’s Welding opinion. That decision
2. Holcomb v. Robert W. Kirk & Assoc., Inc., 655 F.2d 589
(5th Cir. Unit B Sept. 1981) (watchman injured while working on
vessel); Interlake S.S. Co. v. Nielson, 338 F.2d 879 (6th Cir.
1964) (watchman); and Rex Investigative & Patrol Agency, Inc. v.
Collura, 329 F. Supp. 696 (E.D.N.Y. 1971) (land-based employee sent
temporarily onto vessel to act as watchman), would be changed by
§ 902(3)(A) ("individuals employed exclusively to perform . . .
security . . . work").
41
nevertheless has a significant application in the present
controversy. First and foremost, Herb’s Welding plainly held that
the work activities which the claimant, Gray, performed on a fixed
platform supporting a well producing oil and gas did not qualify
Gray as a "person engaged in maritime employment" under the 1972
LHWCA Amendments. The Supreme Court arrived at this conclusion not
only by considering the nature of Gray’s work activities (which had
nothing to do with the loading, unloading, or repair of any
vessel), but also by reviewing the history of how Congress had
viewed the activities of offshore production of oil and gas. See
Herb’s Welding, 470 U.S. at 419-26, 105 S. Ct. at 1425-28. Relying
on its earlier decision in Rodrique v. Aetna Casualty & Surety Co.,
395 U.S. 352, 89 S. Ct. 1835 (1969), the Court discussed numerous
aspects in which Congress had made clear that the production of oil
and gas from fixed platforms is not a maritime activity.
Specifically, the court stated (1) that activities on drilling
platforms are not even suggestive of traditional maritime affairs;
(2) that in adopting the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act, 43
U.S.C. § 1331 et seq. (hereinafter, Lands Act), Congress had
expressly decided that "maritime law" would not apply to operations
on fixed platforms; (3) that the history of the Lands Act at the
very least forecloses the conclusion that offshore drilling is a
maritime activity and that any task essential thereto is maritime
42
employment for LHWCA purposes; and (4) that Congress must have been
familiar with Rodrique and the Lands Act when it used the term
"maritime employment" in the definition the term "employee" in the
1972 LHWCA Amendments. Herb’s Welding, 470 U.S. at 420-23, 105 S.
Ct. at 1426-27. Furthermore, the Court pointed out that in prior
cases interpreting the 1972 LHWCA Amendments, the Court had said
"the ‘maritime employment’ requirement is ‘an occupational test
that focuses on loading and unloading,’" id. at 423, 105 S. Ct. at
1427 (quoting P.C. Pfeiffer & Co. v. Ford, 444 U.S. 69, 80, 100 S.
Ct. 328, 336 (1979)), and that while "‘maritime employment’ is not
limited to the occupations specifically mentioned" in § 902(3),
"neither can it be read to eliminate any requirement of a
connection with the loading or construction of ships," id.
According to the Court, both P.C. Pfeiffer & Co. and Northeast
Marine Terminal Co. v. Caputo, 432 U.S. 249, 267, 97 S. Ct. 2348,
2359 (1977), "lead us to the conclusion that Gray was not engaged
in maritime employment for purposes of the LHWCA." Herb’s Welding,
470 U.S. at 423, 105 S. Ct. at 1428. In conclusion, the Supreme
Court in Herb’s Welding held: "Because Gray’s employment was not
‘maritime,’ he does not qualify for benefits under the LHWCA. We
need not determine whether he satisfied the Act’s situs
requirement." Id. at 427, 105 S. Ct. at 1429 (emphasis supplied).
43
Herb’s Welding teaches us that the first decision to be made
in determining LHWCA coverage is whether the injured worker
satisfies the status requirement of the definition of "a person
engaged in maritime employment." The changes made by the 1984
LHWCA Amendments to the status definition in § 902(3) do not
directly address the category of workers on a fixed platform for
the production of oil and gas. But Herb’s Welding states that
"there is nothing inherently maritime" about the tasks Gray
performed in that case. Likewise there is "nothing inherently
maritime" about the tasks Bienvenu performed in this case.
V. What was Bienvenu actually doing during 8.3% of his work time?
The majority attaches controlling significance to the fact
that Bienvenu was performing work on board the MISS JACKIE during
8.3% of his work time. They pay very little attention to carefully
describing the nature of the work Bienvenu performed while on board
the MISS JACKIE. Because the nature of the work which Bienvenu
performed while on board the MISS JACKIE is critically important to
a proper determination of the status question in this case, I quote
the following findings of fact made by the administrative law
judge:
In terms of size, the Caillou Island production
field is approximately five miles north and south
and ten to twelve miles east and west. . . .
During the year 1987, the Caillou Island production
44
field had approximately 150 to 175 producing wells.
All of the wells were located inside of the three
mile territorial limit. The majority of the wells
were located in water areas and bays and contained
a small platform constructed around the well heads.
The platforms were constructed of pilings similar
to telephone poles driven into the mud below the
water line and then wood was constructed on top
with metal grading to allow the workers to walk on.
The entire unit was referred to as a cribbing which
was about six feet wide by twelve to fifteen feet
long. The cribbings had no living quarters.
During the period of his work with Texaco, Mr.
Bienvenu never worked off-shore on the outer
continental shelf. All of his work was inside the
three-mile limit.
Mr. Bienvenu was working as a pumper
specialist at the time of his injury. In that job,
he did maintenance of automated equipment in the
production facilities. The equipment included a
variety of measuring gauges consisting primarily of
fluid measuring meters. His responsibility was to
maintain the equipment. He used other meters to
test the equipment and calibrate it. . . . Each
meter had to be calibrated approximately every
three months. Other meters which he maintained
were fixed on platforms and he also was responsible
for maintaining that equipment. Mr. Bienvenu had a
tool box which included all of his hand tools. The
tool box weighed approximately eighty pounds or
more. The box had to be moved from one well to
another as the work sites changed.
. . . Mr. Bienvenu had almost exclusive use
of the Miss Jackie, however, on occasion the boat
was used by others. Mr. Bienvenu would simply tell
the skipper of the Miss Jackie which particular
cribbing he was to be taken to. The Claimant
[Bienvenu] did not navigate the boat, although his
tools were basically maintained on the boat. He
did not perform maintenance work on the boat
itself. However, he did perform work on some of
the well controls on the back part of the boat.
45
Claimant’s job as a pumper specialist required
him to perform the majority of his work on the
platforms. However, some of the work was performed
on the back of the boat which transported him to
the job site. Of the two to three hours that he
was on the Miss Jackie on an average day,
approximately one hour of that time was spent
actually working on equipment on the boat. The
rest of the time was spent on the Miss Jackie
moving from location to location. The remaining
nine hours of the day was spent on a fixed platform
in the island field doing his work as a pumper
specialist.
Bienvenu, No. 92-LHC-2801, slip op. at 4-5, 27 Ben. Rev. Bd. Serv.
(MB) at 550-51 (emphasis supplied).
From these findings it is absolutely clear that the work which
Bienvenu did on the stern of the MISS JACKIE was directly related
to and an essential part of his primary job responsibility, which
was to maintain, repair, and replace as necessary, the gauges and
meters which measured the flow of oil and gas from each fixed
platform. This work activity had absolutely nothing to do with
loading or unloading a vessel, nor with repairing or maintaining
equipment used to load or unload a vessel, nor with repairing or
maintaining the vessel itself, nor with repairing or maintaining
any dock, wharf, or pier used for the loading or unloading of any
vessel. Bienvenu’s work activity on the stern of the boat was not
"inherently maritime" in nature. Given the express holding by the
Supreme Court in Herb’s Welding, the conclusion is inescapable that
46
the work activities which Bienvenu performed on the stern of the
MISS JACKIE were not maritime in nature.
Consequently, the majority errs grievously when it concludes
that, because of the performance of these non-maritime work
activities on the stern of the MISS JACKIE, Bienvenu somehow
transforms himself from a worker engaged in non-maritime employment
(as Herb’s Welding surely holds he was) into a worker entitled to
claim the benefits of a "maritime employment" status simply because
his injury occurred "on navigable waters." This conclusion is even
more incomprehensible in light of the fact that his injury did not
actually occur during the time that he was working on the stern of
the MISS JACKIE maintaining and repairing the equipment removed
from the production platform.
VI. The majority decision is in direct conflict with Green v.
Vermilion and leaves that conflict unresolved.
A further problem presented by the majority’s treatment of
this case is its conflict with the recently decided Green v.
Vermilion Corp., 144 F.3d 332 (5th Cir. 1998), petition for cert.
filed, 67 U.S.L.W. ____ (U.S. Jan. 14, 1999) (No. 98-1128). There
are many factual similarities between this case and Green. Both
Green and Bienvenu were land-based workers whose primary non-
maritime duties took up the major portions of their work time.
Both Green and Bienvenu sustained injuries on vessels which were
47
owned by their respective employers. Both injuries occurred after
the effective date of the 1984 LHWCA Amendments. In both cases,
the vessel involved was a relatively small vessel which needed only
one person to operate it. At the time of injury in both cases, the
vessels were tied up at a dock in an area which it may be "legally
accurate" to define as "navigable waters," but which was not in any
sense a channel of commerce for interstate or foreign shipping.
The waters involved in both cases were entirely within the
territorial waters of the State of Louisiana. Neither Green nor
Bienvenu performed any tasks for the purpose of maintaining or
repairing the vessel in question, nor did either operate or
navigate such vessel while it was in transit.
At the moment of his injury, Green was helping to unload
supplies brought by boat to the duck camp where he worked. This is
an activity upon which the Green panel might have focused for
purposes of finding LHWCA coverage, but did not. At the moment of
his injury, Bienvenu was lifting his personal tool box on or off of
the boat on which he rode between well platforms; this is an
activity which the majority itself excludes from the category of
"meaningful job responsibilities." Majority Op. at 17.
Following their injuries, both Green and Bienvenu received
full medical care and weekly compensation benefits under the
Louisiana Workers’ Compensation Law. Each of them ultimately made
48
claims for LHWCA benefits. Green sued his employer directly in
federal district court, and the district judge denied him any
recovery. Bienvenu filed an administrative claim directly under
the LHWCA, but the administrative law judge held that the LHWCA did
not apply to his injury. Both Green and Bienvenu appealed to our
Court. In Green’s case, a panel of our Court affirmed the district
court’s determination that Green was not entitled to benefits under
LHWCA. See Green, 144 F.3d at 335. In Bienvenu’s case, the panel
concluded that it was bound by precedent to hold that Bienvenu is
entitled to LHWCA benefits because of his transient or fortuitous
presence upon actual navigable waters. See Bienvenu, 124 F.3d at
693. After en banc reconsideration the majority now confirms the
availability of LHWCA benefits, but on different grounds.
These two decisions are hopelessly at odds, and our Court
should put them in the same category so that they produce the same
result. Green concluded that by enacting the 1984 LHWCA
Amendments, Congress expressly determined that Green was not
engaged in "maritime employment" for the purposes of LHWCA coverage
because he was employed by a "club or camp" and covered by state
compensation. See 33 U.S.C. § 902(3)(B). In essence, Congress
legislatively determined that "non-maritime" status may trump the
"situs" aspect of a particular injury. The panel in Green
correctly affirmed the district court’s denial of LHWCA benefits to
49
Green because Congress statutorily eliminated Green’s employment
from those which could be considered to be "maritime employment."
In my view, we should have applied the same analysis to
Bienvenu’s claim. In Herb’s Welding, the Supreme Court held that
a worker on a fixed platform producing oil and gas from territorial
waters of a state is not engaged in maritime employment and
therefore not entitled to LHWCA benefits. See Herb’s Welding, 470
U.S. at 423-26, 105 S. Ct. at 1427-28. The work which Bienvenu
performed on fixed platforms is analogous to the work which Gray
performed on fixed platforms in that case. Why doesn’t Bienvenu’s
non-maritime status trump his situs in this case? Why doesn’t the
Supreme Court’s determination that producing oil and gas from fixed
platforms in state waters is not a "maritime employment" constitute
just as binding a determination of "non-maritime status" as if
Congress had included in § 902(3) another sub-clause saying that
"maritime employment" does not include individuals employed to
build, repair, maintain, operate, or dismantle fixed platforms on
which there are facilities for the exploration, production, or
storage of oil and gas from territorial waters of any state?
The only thing that distinguishes Bienvenu’s claim from Gray’s
is that in Herb’s Welding the worker was injured on a fixed
platform, while Bienvenu was injured on a vessel tied to a fixed
platform. That factual distinction should not be determinative.
50
First, it is important to note that one of the themes underlying
the enactment of the 1972 and 1984 LHWCA Amendments was eliminating
the circumstance of workers walking in and out of coverage, such
that LHWCA applicability depends upon whether a worker’s injury
occurred on the vessel or on the dock. This approach should
likewise be applied to those workers whose status is determined to
be "non-maritime" either by act of Congress or by a decision of the
Supreme Court. Both employers and employees benefit from the
uniformity and predictability of coverage which would be achieved
by eliminating controversies centered on the circumstance of
whether a non-maritime worker’s injury occurred on land or water.
If Bienvenu sustained an injury while actually repairing a
valve on the fixed platform, there is no question that he would not
be entitled to LHWCA benefits and his compensation benefits would
be under Louisiana state workers’ compensation. If Bienvenu spends
the overwhelming majority of his time working on fixed platforms,
his "non-maritime" status should not change when he gets on a boat
to ride to or from his place of work, or to perform some limited
non-maritime task. Bienvenu’s non-maritime status should not
change unless and until the nature of his work assignments change
so that he is engaged for a substantial portion of his work time in
activities which meet the test of "maritime employment."
Additionally, in making factual and legal determinations about
a worker’s maritime or non-maritime status, we should employ the
51
same rationale and methods of analysis that our Court and the
Supreme Court have recognized as being necessary to the task of
distinguishing between the status of "seaman" or "member of the
crew of a vessel" for Jones Act purposes on one hand and
"longshoreman, harbor worker, or other maritime employment" for
LHWCA purposes on the other. It is noteworthy that the clause of
§ 902(3) which determines that a "master or member of the crew of
any vessel" is not a "person engaged in maritime employment" for
LHWCA purposes is clause (G), which follows immediately after
clauses (A) through (F), which were added by the 1984 LHWCA
Amendments. It seems quite logical and appropriate that the law
should be the same for all of these clauses in § 902(3). I turn
now to some brief comments in that regard.
Our Court should be guided by the examples set in three
important Supreme Court cases -- McDermott International, Inc. v.
Wilander, 498 U.S. 337, 111 S. Ct. 807 (1991); Chandris, Inc. v.
Latsis, 515 U.S. 347, 115 S. Ct. 2172 (1995); and Harbor Tug &
Barge Co. v. Papai, 520 U.S. 548, 117 S. Ct. 1535 (1997) -- which
were decided after Perini and Herb’s Welding, and after the
adoption of the 1984 LHWCA Amendments. These cases, taken
together, constitute the best summary of current Supreme Court
precedent on distinguishing a "seaman" from a "longshoreman." Each
case makes a significant contribution to the task of defining the
52
boundary lines between "seaman" or "member of the crew of a vessel"
(seaman status) and "longshoreman, harbor worker, or other maritime
employment worker" (longshoreman status). Both Wilander and Latsis
contain excellent historical reviews of the origination of the
relevant concepts and principles. Each of these historical
summaries also points out the several instances in which the
Supreme Court has changed course in making this delineation, either
as the result of statutory action by Congress or by later
definition of the Supreme Court itself.
These three recent Supreme Court opinions lead to a number of
conclusions which should inform our judgment in this case. First,
regardless of what the law may have been at one time, it is now
clear that the two categories of seaman status and longshore status
are mutually exclusive. Second, we now know that seaman status is
determined primarily by the worker’s connection with a vessel (or
vessels) -- a connection which must be substantial both in duration
and nature. Third, it has been determined that a maritime worker
who spends only a small fraction of his working time on board a
vessel is fundamentally a land-based worker, and therefore he is
not considered to be a member of the vessel’s crew, regardless of
what his duties are. Fourth, our Court has identified an
appropriate rule of thumb for determining whether a worker has
achieved Jones Act seaman status in the ordinary case -- a worker
53
who spends less than 30% of his time in the service of a vessel in
navigation should not qualify as a seaman under the Jones Act.
See, e.g., Barrett v. Chevron, U.S.A., Inc., 781 F.2d 1067, 1076
(5th Cir. 1986) (en banc). The Supreme Court has blessed this
objective test. See Latsis, 515 U.S. at 366-68, 115 S. Ct. at
2189. Finally, we know that if an employee’s regular duties
require him to divide his time between vessel and land, his status
as a crew member is determined "in the context of his entire
employment" with his current employer.
In order to achieve the goals of uniformity and
predictability, when determining LHWCA coverage we should follow
this same pattern, which our Court has pioneered in dividing
workers between seaman or longshoreman status. First of all, we
should hold that the status of a longshoreman and the status of a
non-maritime worker are mutually exclusive. To fit into either
category, we should look at the type and nature of a worker’s
duties over a period of employment. In order to determine that an
employee fits into either category, we should require determination
that his work assignments in that particular category be
substantial in terms of both their duration and nature. We should
use our rule of thumb from seaman status cases and hold that a
worker who spends less than 30% of his time in maritime employment
should not qualify for LHWCA benefits. In connection with workers
54
who must travel over water to get to their work site, the time in
transit over water should be counted as time attributable to the
status of the duties performed at the work site. If a worker is
employed in both maritime and non-maritime tasks, his remedies
should be determined by the controlling status, regardless of where
the injury occurred.
Applying the foregoing concepts to the factual determinations
made by the administrative law judge here in this case, I would
conclude that, because Bienvenu worked nine hours of his regular
twelve-hour workday performing repair work on the fixed platforms
(a task which clearly falls within non-maritime status) and spent
another two hours in transit between his work sites at each
platform, his non-maritime status is controlling. Indeed, his non-
maritime work represents more than 90% of his total employment
time. Consequently, I would affirm the administrative law judge’s
holding that Bienvenu was not entitled to benefits under the LHWCA
because his controlling employment status was not maritime in
nature and he was covered by state workers’ compensation.
Accordingly, Green and Bienvenu would fall into the same category
insofar as LHWCA coverage is concerned.
55
VII. Where did the "transient or fortuitous" straw man and the
"more than a modicum" test come from?
I must express my discomfort with some of the analysis and
reasoning employed in Part III.B of the majority opinion. As an
initial matter, the problem of "transient or fortuitous presence on
a vessel" simply is not featured in the holdings of either Perini
or Herb’s Welding. That concept exists only in dicta, relegated to
footnotes, in which the Supreme Court is speculating about
circumstances not before the Court in either case. Likewise, there
is no language in the LHWCA which can be construed to require any
such determination in the course of determining status. I am truly
amazed at the willingness of the majority to guess the meaning of
"the signals from the Supreme Court in Perini and again in Herb’s
Welding" on the subject of whether the LHWCA covers a worker who is
"simply transiently or fortuitously aboard a vessel." While the
majority’s guess may be correct, it seems inordinately presumptuous
to use that guess as a launching pad for rewriting the law of the
Circuit. Furthermore, I cannot understand the majority’s reference
to "joining to Eleventh Circuit in reaching this conclusion" on the
basis of Brockington v. Certified Electric Inc., 903 F.2d 1523
(11th Cir. 1990). There is absolutely nothing in Brockington which
addresses the concept of a worker’s "transient or fortuitous"
presence aboard a vessel. Rather, I read Brockington as addressing
56
head-on the fundamental question of "status." The Brockington
Court stated:
In order to answer this question, one must
determine whether "employment" is defined by what
he was doing at the moment he was injured, or
whether it is defined by the nature of employment
in which he was generally engaged. This question
was addressed by the Supreme Court in Northeast
Marine Terminal Co. v. Caputo, 432 U.S. 249, 97 S.
Ct. 2348 (1977), where it held that the question of
whether an individual is a maritime employee for
purposes of LHWCA coverage is controlled by
analysis of his "basic" employment, rather than the
employee’s particular work at the moment of the
accident. . . . What matters to a determination of
maritime status is the description of his regular
employment.
902 F.2d at 1528. Applying that concept, the Brockington Court
concluded that an electrician whose duties consisted primarily of
wiring houses and commercial buildings had no connection to
"traditional ‘loading and unloading’ activity" and that the
"‘marine environment’ in which he was injured had absolutely no
connection to the general nature of his employment." Id. If the
majority truly wants to join the Eleventh Circuit in this
rationale, I would gladly concur because Bienvenu’s "regular
employment" as a pumper specialist on fixed production platforms is
clearly recognized by the Supreme Court in Herb’s Welding as being
non-maritime employment.
Second, I find the new rule postulated by the majority to be
enormously convoluted, and I predict that it will generate
57
litigation rather than avoid it. The majority’s critical measure
of the necessary degree of maritime employment to trigger LHWCA
coverage -- "more than a modicum" -- is inherently subjective and
destroys the hope for predictability and uniformity of results in
determining whether an injured worker gets state compensation
benefits or LHWCA benefits.
Finally, I have to disagree with the majority’s attempts to
"clarify our case law on this subject." The majority opinion is
just flat wrong in its description of the holding in Fontenot v.
AWI, Inc., 923 F.2d 1127 (5th Cir. 1991). The holding in that case
is that the claimant was "covered by the LHWCA because he was on
actual navigable waters in the course of his employment at the time
of his injury." Fontenot, 923 F.2d at 1133. The panel in Fontenot
did address, but ultimately left open and did not decide, the
question of whether "the fact that Fontenot spent 30% of his time
working on an oil production vessel and was returning from a job on
such vessel when he injured himself" would satisfy the LHWCA’s
status test. The majority opinion goes on to castigate the panel
in Randall v. Chevron U.S.A., Inc., 13 F.3d 888 (5th Cir. 1994),
for misreading Fontenot. But the panel in Randall read the holding
in Fontenot exactly as it reads. It is the majority in this case
which now wants to impute to Fontenot a holding which was never
made in that case. While I recognize that our en banc Court is not
58
bound by either Fontenot or Randall, I cannot, for the life of me,
see how we can overrule Randall without also overruling the express
holding in Fontenot.
VII. Conclusion
If there is any area of jurisprudence which mandates the
highest level of clarity, simplicity, predictability, and
efficiency, it is the area of workers’ compensation benefits. An
injured worker is entitled to prompt medical care and treatment for
his injuries, some cash payments during convalescence, and ultimate
compensation for permanent injuries. He should not have to guess
where to get these benefits. Likewise, the employer who wants to
provide compensation benefits should be able to accurately predict
which compensation regime is applicable to his employees, and he
should not have to guess, at the risk of greater liability, which
is the right regime. With employers like Texaco who have workers
in many different states and in other countries -- workers who are
engaged in activities on land, sea, and in the air -- the task of
determining the appropriate compensation remedy should turn on
objective rather than subjective factors. The majority opinion
recognizes that its requirement of "more than a modicum of work
time on a vessel" is not susceptible of objective quantification,
and that the new doctrine will require employers and claimants to
59
endure the caldron of case-by-case development. I think that
relegating the participants in workers’ compensation schemes to a
protracted common-law evolution of principles governing which of
two compensation regimes applies in a given case is a
misinterpretation of both congressional intent and the Supreme
Court’s interpretation of the Longshore and Harbor Workers’
Compensation Act. In addition, it is plainly in conflict with the
policy favoring expeditious but limited compensation to injured
workers, that underlies all programs of workers’ compensation,
whether at the federal or state level. I therefore respectfully
DISSENT.
g:\docs\96-60625.dis 60