Durkin v. Waldron

130 F. Supp. 501, 1955 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 3386
CourtDistrict Court, W.D. Louisiana
DecidedMarch 31, 1955
DocketCiv. A. No. 3759
StatusPublished
Cited by6 cases

This text of 130 F. Supp. 501 (Durkin v. Waldron) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, W.D. Louisiana primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Durkin v. Waldron, 130 F. Supp. 501, 1955 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 3386 (W.D. La. 1955).

Opinion

HUNTER, District Judge.

The proceeding here is brought by the Secretary of Labor in his official capacity under Section 16(e) of the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938, 29 U.S.C.A. § 201 et seq. to recover wages due three named employees (J. C. Porter, E. H. Kinney, and C. W. Gorman), in accordance with their written requests.

The facts may be summarized as follows:

Defendant Waldron, during the period material hereto (June 3, 1950 to March 3, 1951) was engaged in the production of oil from wells owned and operated by him in the so-called Tullos Oil Field. The corporate defendant was engaged in producing oil from wells owned by others (not involved here) under a “farm-out” contract. In addition, a certain amount of clean-out, or maintenance work, was performed by the corporation for operators of other wells in the area.

The corporate defendant was organized in 1934. One hundred shares of stock were authorized. Of the fifty shares actually issued, Waldron owned forty-eight. The remaining two were issued, one to his lawyer, and the other to a friend, with nothing being paid therefor, and both were endorsed in blank and delivered to Waldron. He had sole control over the corporate activities. A single superintendent, his son-in-law, looks after both his properties and the corporate activities. A single crew, of which the employees here were members, did all of the work, both for Waldron and his corporation. They performed all necessary work on Waldron’s wells, and those operated by his corporation as necessity required. Waldron had sole authority (generally exercised through his superintendent) over the crew’s activities, wages and hours. When the employees were employed it was the intention of Waldron to require them to work on any wells needing servicing, regardless of whether they were his personal property, or the property of the corporation. The corporation had no assets other than its farm-out contracts. The equipment used by the corporation Waldron regarded as his own. Time was kept for the employees by the superintendent and carried in a single pay roll ledger, and was charged in part to the corporation, and part to Waldron. No evidence was offered as to the accuracy of. the division, except that the time [504]*504within a particular day was never divided. For example, although four days might be charged to Waldron and two to the corporation, there are no instances where, within a single day, some hours were charged to Waldron and the remainder to his corporation, although it was evident that such instances occurred.

The oil produced was sold at the well head to the Placid Oil Company. (Defendants had no connection whatsoever with the oil after it was delivered to the Placid Oil Company.) It was co-mingled with similar grades of oil obtained from others and was sold and delivered by Placid to the Magnolia Petroleum Company at Lake Charles, Louisiana, which shipped it in interstate commerce. Mr. Waldron had been in the oil business for many years, and although he had no control over the oil after he sold it, and no personal knowledge of its disposition, he knew that Louisiana was a major oil producing state, and that large quantities of the oil produced left the state, either as crude or refined products. There is no question but that Waldron knew when he sold the goods so produced that the same was intended to be shipped, delivered, or eventually sold in interstate commerce.

Suit on their behalf was requested by the three employees, all oil field workers. In their request, they intended to ask the plaintiff to recover the wages due them from their employer, Waldron Oil Company of Tullos, Louisiana, for hours worked by them in excess of forty hours per week.

Various defenses have been interposed by defendants. In the interest of convenience and clarity, we shall deal with these defenses separately.

Applicability of the Act

This defense is based on the assumption that because the oil produced by defendants was sold at the well head to Placid, which company was not engaged in interstate commerce, and because defendants had no connection whatsoever with the oil after it was delivered to said company, that therefore defendants were not engaged in “interstate commerce” or in the “production of goods for commerce” so as to bring such employer and employees under the provisions of the Act.

This defense lacks validity in the light of the facts here and of the uniform jurisprudence. It is without question that the work of pumpers and roustabouts and other maintenance employees in obtaining oil from the ground constitutes “production” under Section 3(j) of the Act, 29 U.S.C.A. § 203(j), which reads as follows:

“ ‘Produced’ means produced, manufactured, mined, handled, or in any other manner worked on in any State; and for the purposes of this Act an employee shall be deemed to have been engaged in the production of goods if such employee was employed in producing, manufacturing, mining, handling, ■transporting, or in any other manner working on such goods, or in any closely related process or occupation directly essential to the production thereof, in any State.”

It is equally clear that such production is production for interstate commerce. The fact that the oil goes out.of the employer’s control and is thereafter shipped in commerce by the purchaser either as crude oil or as a refined product has no bearing on the applicability of the Act to the producer’s employees. It was pointed out in United States v. Darby, 312 U.S. 100, 657, 61 S.Ct. 451, 85 L.Ed. 609, the Act applies to employees producing goods where the employer intends or expects that according to the normal course of his business all or some part will be selected for shipment to out-of-state customers.

In Warren-Bradshaw Drilling Co. v. Hall, 5 Cir., 124 F.2d 42, the applicability of the Act to employees drilling a well was the issue under consideration. The employer did not even actually drill into the producing horizon, but only near thereto when the well was to be completed by another contractor and by oth[505]*505er drilling techniques. The employer was only a contractor with no interest in the lease or in the oil, if any, which would be produced. The record reflected that oil that was produced from the well after completion was sold at the well to pipelines, some being with petroleum companies operating on a national scale, where it was commingled, as here, with uoil produced by others. It was further proven that some of these pipelines shipped crude oil out of the state and that a large percentage of the crude sold to refineries within the state was thereafter shipped to extra-state destinations as refined petroleum products.

The Court of Appeals, without discussion, concluded the proof was abundant that the oil was intended to move and did move in interstate commerce.

The Supreme Court, 317 U.S. 88, 63 S.Ct. 125,127, 87 L.Ed. 83, affirmed. The Darby case was cited and reaffirmed. The Court said:

“The Act extends at least to the employer who expects goods to move in interstate commerce. * * * Assuming that such expectation, or a reasonable basis therefor, was necessary on petitioner’s part before the application of the Act to petitioner, it is here present.

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130 F. Supp. 501, 1955 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 3386, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/durkin-v-waldron-lawd-1955.