{"id":112,"date":"2026-05-29T14:16:30","date_gmt":"2026-05-29T14:16:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/americanservicereview.com\/?p=112"},"modified":"2026-05-29T14:16:30","modified_gmt":"2026-05-29T14:16:30","slug":"justices-validate-arbitration-exemption-for-last-mile-drivers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/americanservicereview.com\/?p=112","title":{"rendered":"Justices validate arbitration exemption for \u201clast-mile\u201d drivers"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

Yesterday\u2019s in Flowers Foods v. Brock<\/em> held that an exemption from the Federal Arbitration Act for interstate <\/em>transportation workers extends to \u201clast-mile\u201d drivers who don\u2019t themselves cross state lines, even though the goods they are delivering are on an interstate journey. That holding protects them from the FAA\u2019s requirement that they litigate disputes with their employers in arbitration as opposed to a court.<\/p>\n

Read more The Supreme Court\u2019s common sense problem<\/a><\/p>\n

Justice Neil Gorsuch\u2019s opinion for a unanimous court is as succinct as you would expect from the one-sided discussion at oral argument. He starts by pointing out that the court recently has considered the interstate transportation exception from the FAA \u201cno fewer than three times,\u201d and that it has \u201crejected efforts to cabin its reach\u201d on each occasion. After summarizing the previous holdings he bluntly states: \u201cMake this case the fourth.\u201d The \u201csole theory\u201d that the employer presents, he emphasizes, is that to qualify for the interstate transportation exception \u201ca worker must either cross state lines or interact with a vehicle that does (say, by loading or unloading the goods it carries).\u201d<\/p>\n

Gorsuch basically makes two points. First, as you might expect, he suggests we \u201c[s]tart with the statutory text,\u201d which protects \u201cworkers engaged in \u2026 interstate commerce.\u201d Because \u201cengage,\u201d when the statute was written (as now) means \u201cto take part in\u201d or to be \u201cinvolved\u201d with, \u201c[n]othing \u2026 requires an individual to cross state lines or interact with a vehicle that does.\u201d Although interstate commerce may require \u201ctransporting products \u2018between points in one state and points in another state[,]\u2019 \u2026 a person can \u2018take part\u2019 \u2026 or be \u2018involved\u2019 in that continuous journey without leaving a State or touching vehicles that do.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gorsuch offers a hypothetical (modeled on the highly successful products of the employer Flowers Foods) of a contract by a company in one state to purchase a truckload of Butterscotch Krimpets from a company that is based in and makes the Krimpets in another state. He posits the idea that the seller<\/p>\n

hires three drivers to make the delivery. Driver 1 takes the Krimpets from [the] bakery right up to the border \u2026. Driver 2 then picks up the Krimpets, drives ten feet across the border, puts the Krimpets down again, and heads off. Finally, Driver 3 picks up the Krimpets and delivers them to [the buyer]. Who was engaged in interstate commerce?<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Under the rule the employer offers, only Driver 2. But for Gorsuch \u201cthat cannot be right. Each of the drivers played a direct, active, and necessary part in ensuring the Krimpets got from a point in [the state of the bakery] to a point in [the state of the buyer] as the contract required.\u201d<\/p>\n

Read more Jury duty for a justice<\/a><\/p>\n

Gorsuch\u2019s second point is that this kind of multi-step transportation arrangement \u201cis hardly a hypothetical at all,\u201d as the court considered it in at least four cases in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Those cases all determined that particular transactions involved \u201cinterstate commerce\u201d for purposes of the commerce clause of the Constitution, which grants Congress the power to regulate interstate commerce. For example, the earliest of the cases involved \u201ca steamer transporting goods on Grand River operated \u2018entirely within the limits of\u2019 \u2026 Michigan.\u201d Because the steamer \u201cwas employed in transporting goods destined for other states,\u201d Gorsuch explains, the court held that it \u201cwas engaged in commerce between the states.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gorsuch acknowledges that various facts of the employee\u2019s operations might support a conclusion that this particular transaction did not involve interstate commerce, but he stops short of considering their relevance, explaining that the employer \u201cdoes not ask us to decide their legal significance,\u201d because the employer \u201cventures it all upon one cast, asking us to adopt a bright-line rule that an individual can never qualify for [the] exemption unless he crosses state lines or interacts with vehicles that do.\u201d For Gorsuch, \u201cwhatever other limits [the statute] may or may not contain, we do not see how the statutory text can support that one.\u201d<\/p>\n

On the issues before the court, I doubt this case will make a lot of waves, as it upheld the judgment of the lower court. At most, I would say, it will give lower courts caution in construing the exemption so narrowly. Also, Gorsuch\u2019s pointed reference to four consecutive cases upholding the claims of employees to the exemption probably will not go unnoticed.<\/p>\n

Read more Justice Barrett targeted in \u201cswatting\u201d incident<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Yesterday\u2019s in Flowers Foods v. Brock held that an exemption from the Federal Arbitration Act for interstate transportation workers extends to \u201clast-mile\u201d drivers who don\u2019t themselves cross state lines, even though the goods they are delivering are on an interstate journey. That holding protects them from the FAA\u2019s requirement that they litigate disputes with their […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":47,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-112","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-court-news"],"yoast_head":"\nJustices validate arbitration exemption for \u201clast-mile\u201d drivers - American Service Review<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/americanservicereview.com\/?p=112\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Justices validate arbitration exemption for \u201clast-mile\u201d drivers - American Service Review\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Yesterday\u2019s in Flowers Foods v. 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