UNITED STATES SUPREME COURT DECISIONS ON-LINE

Employees engaged in the construction of the Algiers Lock and Canal, in Orleans Parish, Louisiana, which will form part of the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway (extending from Florida to the Mexican border), and which was designed as an alternate route to an inadequate existing lock and canal, are "engaged in commerce" within the meaning of § 7 of the Fair Labor Standards Act; and the 40-hour week and overtime provisions of the Act are applicable to them. Pp. 349 U. S. 428-430.

(a) Raymond v. Chicago, M. St.P. R. Co., 243 U. S. 43, distinguished. Pp. 349 U. S. 429-430.

(b) Whether an employee is "engaged in commerce" within the meaning of § 7 of the Fair Labor Standards Act is determined by practical considerations, not by technical conceptions. P. 349 U. S. 429.

(c) The test of whether an employee is "engaged in commerce" within the meaning of the Act is whether the work is so directly and vitally related to the functioning of an instrumentality or facility of interstate commerce as to be, in practical effect, a part of it, rather than isolated, local activity. P. 349 U. S. 429.

(d) The work of improving existing facilities of interstate commerce, involved here, is activity "in commerce" within the meaning of the Act. P. 349 U. S. 430.

214 F.2d 132 reversed. clubjuris

Page 349 U. S. 428