Subject: McDERMOTT INTERNATIONAL, INC. v. WILANDER, Syllabus



    NOTE: Where it is feasible, a syllabus (headnote) will be released, as
    is being done in connection with this case, at the time the opinion is
    issued.  The syllabus constitutes no part of the opinion of the Court
    but has been prepared by the Reporter of Decisions for the convenience
    of the reader.  See United States v. Detroit Lumber Co., 200 U.9S. 321,
    337.
SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES


Syllabus



AMcDERMOTT INTERNATIONAL, INC. v. WILANDER

Bcertiorari to the united states court of appeals for the fifth circuit

CNo.989-1474.  Argued December 3, 1990--Decided February 19, 1991

DRespondent Wilander, a paint foreman injured at work while assigned to a
"paint boat" chartered by petitioner McDermott International, sued
McDermott under the Jones Act.  The Act provides a cause of action in
negligence for "any seaman" injured "in the course of his employment," but
does not define "seaman."  McDermott moved for summary judgment, alleging
that, as a matter of law, Wilander was not a "seaman."  The District Court
denied the motion, and the jury entered an award for Wilander, finding,
inter alia, that the performance of his duties contributed to his vessel's
function or to the accomplishment of its mission and therefore satisfied
the Fifth Circuit's test for seaman status.  The Fifth Circuit affirmed,
refusing to abandon its test in favor of the Seventh Circuit's more
stringent standard, which, in effect, requires that a "seaman" aid in the
navigation of the vessel.

EHeld: One need not aid in the navigation of a vessel in order to qualify
as a "seaman" under the Jones Act.  Pp.93-19.

    F(a) In the absence of contrary indication, it may be assumed that the
    Jones Act's failure to define "seaman" indicates a congressional intent
    that the word have its established meaning under general maritime law
    at the time of the Act's passage.  Pp.93-5.

    (b) At the time of its passage in 1920, the Jones Act established no
    requirement that a seaman aid in navigation.  Although certain early
    cases had imposed such a requirement, a review of later cases
    demonstrates that, by 1920, general maritime law had abandoned that
    requirement in favor of a rule requiring only that a seaman be employed
    on board a vessel in furtherance of its purpose.  Pp.95-8.

    (c) The Longshore and Harbor Workers' Compensation Act (LHWCA)--which
    was enacted in 1927 and provides recovery for injury to a broad range
    of land-based maritime workers, but explicitly excludes from its
    coverage "a master or member of a crew of any vessel"--does not change
    the rule that a seaman need not aid in navigation.  That Act and the
    Jones Act are mutually exclusive, such that a "seaman" under the Jones
    Act is the same as a "master or member of a crew of any vessel."
    Swanson v. Marra Brothers, Inc., 328 U.9S. 1, 7.  Although the LHWCA
    exception thus refines the Jones Act term "seaman," restricting it to
    sea-based maritime employees, it does not indicate that members of a
    crew are required to navigate.  Pp.99-10.

    (d) The conflict addressed here has as its source this Court's
    inconsistent use of an aid in navigation requirement in LHWCA and Jones
    Act cases.  That requirement slipped into the Court's case law in South
    Chicago Coal & Dock Co. v. Bassett, 309 U.9S. 251, 260, an LHWCA case
    decided before the Court recognized in Swanson, supra, that the two
    Acts are mutually exclusive.  Although the Court subsequently ruled in
    another pre-Swanson LHWCA case, Norton v. Warner Co., 321 U.9S. 565,
    that the Bassett aid in navigation test was not to be read
    restrictively and that navigation under the test embraces duties of a
    "member of a crew" that are essential to the operation and welfare of
    his vessel, a series of post-Swanson Jones Act cases either asserted an
    aid in navigation requirement or relied on Bassett even though they
    afforded seaman status to claimants working on board vessels whose jobs
    had no connection to navigation, see, e.9g., Butler v. Whiteman, 356
    U.9S. 271.  Such cases have engendered confusion and have led the lower
    courts to a myriad of standards and lack of uniformity in administering
    the elements of seaman status.  Pp.910-15.

    (e) The time has come to jettison the aid in navigation language.  The
    better rule--the rule that best explains the Court's case law, and is
    consistent with the pre-Jones Act interpretation of "seaman" and
    Congress' land-based/sea-based distinction in the two Acts--is to
    define "master or member of a crew" under the LHWCA, and therefore
    "seaman" under the Jones Act, not in terms of the employee's particular
    job, but solely in terms of the employee's connection to a vessel in
    navigation.  A necessary element of the connection is that a seaman
    perform the work of a vessel, i.9e., that the employee's duties
    contribute to the function of the vessel or to the accomplishment of
    its mission.  Pp.915-17.

    (f) The question of who is a "seaman" under the Jones Act is better
    characterized as a mixed question of law and fact than as a pure
    question of fact for the jury.  It is for the court to define the
    proper legal standard and for the jury to find the facts and apply that
    standard.  The narrow question presented here--whether Wilander should
    be precluded from seaman status because he did not perform
    transportation-related functions on board the vessel--is a question of
    law that must be answered in the negative.  Pp.917-19.

G887 F. 2d 88, affirmed.

HO'Connor, J., delivered the opinion for a unanimous Court.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------




Subject: 89-1474--OPINION, McDERMOTT INTERNATIONAL, INC. v. WILANDER

NOTICE: This opinion is subject to formal revision before publication in
the preliminary print of the United States Reports.  Readers are requested
to notify the Reporter of Decisions, Supreme Court of the United States,
Washington, D. C. 20543, of any typographical or other formal errors, in
order that corrections may be made before the preliminary print goes to
press.
SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES


No. 89-1474



AMcDERMOTT INTERNATIONAL, INC., PETITIONER v. JON C. WILANDER

Bon writ of certiorari to the united states court ofappeals for the fifth
circuit

C[February 19, 1991]



A Justice O'Connor delivered the opinion of the Court.

B The question in this case is whether one must aid in the navigation of a
vessel in order to qualify as a "seaman" under the Jones Act, 46 U.9S.9C.
App. 9688.
CI
D Jon Wilander worked for McDermott International as a paint foreman.  His
duties consisted primarily of supervising the sandblasting and painting of
various fixtures and piping located on oil drilling platforms in the
Persian Gulf.  On July 4, 1983, Wilander was inspecting a pipe on one such
platform when a bolt serving as a plug in the pipe blew out under pressure,
striking Wilander in the head.  At the time, Wilander was assigned to the
American-flag vessel M/V Gates Tide, a "paint boat" chartered to McDermott
that contained equipment used in sandblasting and painting the platforms.
    Wilander sued McDermott in the United States District Court for the
Western District of Louisiana, seeking recovery under the Jones Act for
McDermott's negligence related to the accident.  McDermott moved for
summary judgment, alleging that, as a matter of law, Wilander was not a
"seaman" under the Jones Act, and therefore not entitled to recovery.  The
District Court denied the motion.  App. 19.  In a bifurcated trial, the
jury first determined Wilander's status as a seaman.  By special
interrogatory, the jury found that Wilander was either permanently assigned
to, or performed a substantial amount of work aboard, the Gates Tide, and
that the performance of his duties contributed to the function of the Gates
Tide or to the accomplishment of its mission, thereby satisfying the test
for seaman status established in Offshore Co. v. Robison, 266 F. 2d 769
(CA5 1959).  App. to Pet. for Cert. 16-17.  The District Court denied
McDermott's motion for judgment based on the jury findings.  Id., at
10-16.
    The case then proceeded to trial on the issues of liability and
damages.  The jury found that McDermott's negligence was the primary cause
of Wilander's injuries, but that Wilander had been 25% contributorily
negligent.  The jury awarded Wilander $337,500.  The District Court denied
McDermott's motion for judgment notwithstanding the verdict, id., at 19-21,
and both parties appealed.
    The United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit affirmed the
determination of seaman status, finding sufficient evidence to support the
jury's finding under the Robison test.  887 F. 2d 88, 90 (1989).  McDermott
asked the court to reject the Robison requirement that a seaman
"contribut[e] to the function of the vessel or to the accomplishment of its
mission," Robison, supra, at 779, in favor of the more stringent
requirement of Johnson v. John F. Beasley Construction Co., 742 F. 2d 1054
(CA7 1984).  In that case, the Court of Appeals for the Seventh
Circuit--relying on cases from this Court requiring that a seaman aid in
the navigation of a vessel--held that seaman status under the Jones Act may
be conferred only on employees who make "a significant contribution to the
maintenance, operation, or welfare of the transportation function of the
vessel."  Id., at 1063 (emphasis added).
    The Fifth Circuit here concluded that Wilander would not meet the
requirements of the Johnson test, but reaffirmed the rule in Robison and
held that Wilander was a "seaman" under the Jones Act.  887 F. 2d, at
90-91.  We granted certiorari, 496 U.9S. Z (1990), to resolve the conflict
between the Robison and Johnson tests on the issue of the transporta
tion/navigation function requirement, and now affirm.
CII


A
D In 1903, in The Osceola, 189 U.9S. 158, this Court summarized the state
of seamen's remedies under general maritime law.  Writing for the Court,
Justice Brown reviewed the leading English and American authorities and
declared the law settled on several propositions:

E "1. That the vessel and her owners are liable, in case a seaman falls
sick, or is wounded, in the service of the ship, to the extent of his
maintenance and cure, and to his wages, at least so long as the voyage is
continued.
    "2. That the vessel and her owner are, both by English and American
law, liable to an indemnity for injuries received by seamen in consequence
of the unseaworthi ness of the ship .9.9.9.
    "3. That all the members of the crew .9.9. are, as between themselves,
fellow servants, and hence seamen cannot recover for injuries sustained
through the negligence of another member of the crew beyond the expense of
their maintenance and cure.
    "4. That the seaman is not allowed to recover an indemnity for the
negligence of the master, or any member of the crew .9.9.9."  Id., at 175.
F

The Osceola affirmed a seaman's general maritime right to maintenance and
cure, wages, and to recover for unsea worthiness, but excluded seamen from
the general maritime negligence remedy.
    Congress twice attempted to overrule The Osceola and create a
negligence action for seamen.  The Merchant Marine Act of 1915, 38 Stat.
1164, dealt with proposition 3 of The Osceola, the fellow servant doctrine.
Section 20 of the 1915 Act provided: "That in any suit to recover damages
for any injury sustained on board vessel or in its service seamen having
command shall not be held to be fellow-servants with those under their
authority."  38 Stat. 1185.  The change was ineffective.  Petitioner in
Chelentis v. Luckenbach S.S. Co., 247 U.9S. 372 (1918), a fireman on board
the steamship J.9L. Luckenbach, attempted to recover from the ship's owner
for injuries resulting from the alleged negligence of a superior officer.
The Court explained that the 1915 Act was "irrelevant."  Id., at 384.  The
Act successfully established that the superior officer was not Chelentis'
fellow servant, but Congress had overlooked The Osceola's fourth
proposition.  The superior officer was no longer a fellow servant, but he
was still a member of the crew.  Under proposition four, there was no
recovery for negligence.  247 U.9S., at 384.
    Congress tried a different tack in 1920.  It passed the Jones Act,
which provides a cause of action in negligence for "any seaman" injured "in
the course of his employment."  46 U.9S.9C. App. 9688.  The Act thereby
removes the bar to negligence articulated in The Osceola.
    The Jones Act does not define "seaman."  Neither does The Osceola; it
simply uses the term as had other admiralty courts.  We assume that the
Jones Act uses "seaman" in the same way.  For one thing, the Jones Act
provides what The Osceola precludes.  "The only purpose of the Jones Act
was to remove the bar created by The Osceola, so that seamen would have the
same rights to recover for negligence as other tort victims."  G. Gilmore &
C. Black, The Law of Admiralty 328-329 (2d ed. 1975).  See also Warner v.
Goltra, 293 U.9S. 155, 159 (1934).  The Jones Act, responding directly to
The Osceola, adopts without further elaboration the term used in The
Osceola.  Moreover, "seaman" is a maritime term of art.  In the absence of
contrary indication, we assume that when a statute uses such a term,
Congress intended it to have its established meaning.  See Morissette v.
United States, 342 U.9S. 246, 263 (1952); Gilbert v. United States, 370
U.9S. 650, 658 (1962).  Our first task, therefore, is to determine who was
a seaman under the general maritime law when Congress passed the Jones
Act.

CB
D Since the first Judiciary Act, federal courts have determined who is
eligible for various seamen's benefits under general maritime law.  Prior
to the Jones Act, these benefits included the tort remedies outlined in The
Osceola and a lien against the ship for wages.  See generally Gilmore &
Black, supra, at 35-36, 281; The John G. Stevens, 170 U.9S. 113, 119
(1898); The Osceola, supra, at 175.  Certain early cases limited seaman
status to those who aided in the navigation of the ship.  The narrow rule
was that a seaman--sometimes referred to as a mariner--must actually
navigate: "[T]he persons engaged on board of her must have been possessed
of some skill in navigation.  They must have been able to `hand, reef and
steer,' the ordinary test of seamanship."  The Canton, 5 F. Cas. 29, 30
(No.92,388) (D Mass. 1858).  See also Gurney v. Crockett, 11 F. Cas. 123,
124 (No.95,874) (SDNY 1849).
    Notwithstanding the aid in navigation doctrine, federal courts
throughout the last century consistently awarded seamen's benefits to those
whose work on board ship did not direct the vessel.  Firemen, engineers,
carpenters, and cooks all were considered seamen.  See, e.9g., Wilson v.
The Ohio, 30 F. Cas. 149 (No.917,825) (ED Pa. 1834) (firemen); Allen v.
Hallet, 1 F. Cas. 472 (No.9223) (SDNY 1849) (cook); Sage man v. The
Brandywine, 21 F. Cas. 149 (No.912,216) (D Mich. 1852) (female cook); The
Sultana, 23 F. Cas. 379 (No.913,602) (D Mich. 1857) (clerk).  See generally
M. Norris, The Law of Seamen 92.3 (4th ed. 1985); Engerrand & Bale, Seaman
Status Reconsidered, 24 S. Tex. L. J. 431, 432-433 (1983).
    Some courts attempted to classify these seamen under a broad conception
of aid in navigation that included those who aided in navigation indirectly
by supporting those responsible for moving the vessel: "[T]he services
rendered must be necessary, or, at least, contribute to the preservation of
the vessel, or of those whose labour and skill are employed to navigate
her."  Trainor v. The Superior, 24 F. Cas. 130, 131 (No.914,136) (ED Pa.
1834).  This fiction worked for cooks and carpenters--who fed those who
navigated and kept the ship in repair--but what of a cooper whose job it
was to make barrels to aid in whaling?  As early as 1832, Justice Story,
sitting on circuit, held that "[a] `cooper' is a seaman in contemplation of
law, although he has peculiar duties on board of the ship."  United States
v. Thompson, 28 F. Cas. 102 (No.916,492) (CCD Mass.).  Justice Story made
no reference to navigation in declaring it established that: "A cook and
steward are seamen in the sense of the maritime law, although they have
peculiar duties assigned them.  So a pilot, a surgeon, a ship-carpenter,
and a boatswain, are deemed seamen, entitled to sue in the admiralty."
Ibid.
    By the middle of the 19th century, the leading admiralty treatise noted
the wide variety of those eligible for seamen's benefits: "Masters, mates,
sailors, surveyors, carpenters, coopers, stewards, cooks, cabin boys,
kitchen boys, engineers, pilots, firemen, deck hands, waiters,--women as
well as men,--are mariners."  E. Benedict, The American Admiralty 9278,
p.9158 (1850).  Benedict concluded that American admiralty courts did not
require that seamen have a connection to navigation.  "The term mariner
includes all persons employed on board ships and vessels during the voyage
to assist in their navigation and preservation, or to promote the purposes
of the voyage."  Ibid (emphasis added).  Moreover, Benedict explained, this
was the better rule; admiralty courts throughout the world had long
recognized that seamen's benefits were properly extended to all those who
worked on board vessels in furtherance of the myriad purposes for which
ships set to sea:

E "It is universally conceded that the general principles of law must be
applied to new kinds of property, as they spring into existence in the
progress of society, according to their nature and incidents, and the
common sense of the community.  In the early periods of maritime commerce,
when the oar was the great agent of propulsion, vessels were entirely
unlike those of modern times--and each nation and period has had its
peculiar agents of commerce and navigation adapted to its own wants and its
own waters, and the names and descriptions of ships and vessels are without
number.  Under the class of mariners in the armed ship are embraced the
officers and privates of a little army.  In the whale ship, the sealing
vessel--the codfishing and herring fishing vessel--the lumber vessel--the
freighting vessel--the passenger vessel--there are other functions besides
these of mere navigation, and they are performed by men who know nothing of
seamanship--and in the great invention of modern times, the steamboat, an
entirely new set of operatives, are employed, yet at all times and in all
countries, all the persons who have been necessarily or properly employed
in a vessel as co-labourers to the great purpose of the voyage, have, by
the law, been clothed with the legal rights of mariners--no matter what
might be their sex, character, station or profession."  Id., 9241,
pp.9133-134.
F

    By the late 19th and early 20th centuries, federal courts abandoned the
navigation test altogether, including in the class of seamen those who
worked on board and maintained allegiance to the ship, but who performed
more specialized functions having no relation to navigation.  The crucial
element in these cases was something akin to Benedict's "great purpose of
the voyage."  Thus, in holding that a fisherman, a chambermaid, and a
waiter were all entitled to seamen's benefits, then-Judge Brown, later the
author of The Osceola, eschewed reference to navigation: "[A]ll hands
employed upon a vessel, except the master, are entitled to a [seaman's lien
for wages] if their services are in furtherance of the main object of the
enterprise in which she is engaged."  The Minna, 11 F. 759, 760 (ED Mich.
1882).  Judge Learned Hand rejected a navigation test explicitly in
awarding seamen's benefits to a bartender: "As I can see in principle no
reason why there should be an artificial limitation of rights to those
engaged in the navigation of the ship, to the exclusion of others who
equally further the purposes of her voyage, .9.9. I shall decide that the
libelant has a lien for his wages as bartender."  The J.9S. Warden, 175 F.
314, 315 (SDNY 1910).  In Miller v. The Maggie P., 32 F. 300, 301 (ED Mo.
1887), the court explained that the rule that maritime employment must be
tied to navigation had been "pronounced to be inadmissible and indecisive
by later decisions."  See also The Ocean Spray, 18 F. Cas. 558, 560-561
(No.910,412) (D Ore. 1876) (sealers and interpreters; citing Benedict,
supra); The Carrier Dove, 97 F. 111, 112 (CA1 1899) (fisherman); United
States v. Atlantic Transport Co., 188 F. 42 (CA2 1911) (horseman); The
Virginia Belle, 204 F. 692, 693-694 (ED Va. 1913) (engineer who assisted in
fishing); The Baron Napier, 249 F. 126 (CA4 1918) (muleteer).  See
generally Norris, The Law of Seamen 92.3; Engerrand & Bale, 24 S. Tex. L.
J., at 434-435, and nn.929-30.  An 1883 treatise declared, "[a]ll persons
employed on a vessel to assist in the main purpose of the voyage are
mariners, and included under the name of seamen."  M. Cohen, Admiralty
239.
    We believe it settled at the time of The Osceola and the passage of the
Jones Act that general maritime law did not require that a seaman aid in
navigation.  It was only necessary that a person be employed on board a
vessel in furtherance of its purpose.  We conclude therefore that, at the
time of its passage, the Jones Act established no requirement that a seaman
aid in navigation.  Our voyage is not over, however.

NC
D As had the lower federal courts before the Jones Act, this Court
continued to construe "seaman" broadly after the Jones Act.  In
International Stevedoring Co. v. Haverty, 272 U.9S. 50 (1926), the Court
held that a stevedore is a "seaman" covered under the Act when engaged in
maritime employment.  Haverty was a longshore worker injured while stowing
freight in the hold of a docked vessel.  The Court recognized that "as the
word is commonly used, stevedores are not `seamen.'9"  Id., at 52.  "But
words are flexible. .9.9. We cannot believe that Congress willingly would
have allowed the protection to men engaged upon the same maritime duties to
vary with the accident of their being employed by a stevedore rather than
by the ship."  Ibid.
    Congress would, and did, however.  Within six months of the decision in
Haverty, Congress passed the Longshore and Harbor Workers' Compensation Act
(LHWCA), 44 Stat. (part 2) 1424, as amended, 33 U.9S.9C. 9901-950.  The Act
provides recovery for injury to a broad range of land-based maritime
workers, but explicitly excludes from its coverage "a master or member of a
crew of any vessel."  33 U.9S.9C. 9902(3)(G).  This Court recognized the
distinction, albeit belatedly, in Swanson v. Marra Brothers, Inc., 328
U.9S. 1 (1946), concluding that the Jones Act and the LHWCA are mutually
exclusive.  The LHWCA provides relief for landbased maritime workers, and
the Jones Act is restricted to "a master or member of a crew of any
vessel": "We must take it that the effect of these provisions of the
[LHWCA] is to confine the benefits of the Jones Act to the members of the
crew of a vessel plying in navigable waters and to substitute for the right
of recovery recognized by the Haverty case only such rights to compensation
as are given by the [LHWCA]."  Id., at 7.  "[M]aster or member of a crew"
is a refinement of the term "seaman" in the Jones Act; it excludes from
LHWCA coverage those properly covered under the Jones Act.  Thus, it is odd
but true that the key requirement for Jones Act coverage now appears in
another statute.
    With the passage of the LHWCA, Congress established a clear distinction
between land-based and sea-based maritime workers.  The latter, who owe
their allegiance to a vessel and not solely to a land-based employer, are
seamen.  Ironically, on the same day that the Court decided Swanson it
handed down Seas Shipping Co. v. Sieracki, 328 U.9S. 85 (1946).  With
reasoning remarkably similar to that in Haverty, the Court extended to a
stevedore the traditional seamen's remedy of unseaworthiness in those cases
where the stevedore "is doing a seaman's work and incurring a seaman's
hazards."  Id., at 99.  It took Congress a bit longer to react this time.
In 1972, Congress amended the LHWCA to bar longshore and harbor workers
from recovery for breach of the duty of seaworthiness.  See 86 Stat. 1263,
33 U.9S.9C. 9905(b); Miles v. Apex Marine Corp., 498 U.9S. Z, Z (1990).
Whether under the Jones Act or general maritime law, seamen do not include
land-based workers.
    The LHWCA does not change the rule that a seaman need not aid in
navigation.  "Member of a crew" and "seaman" are closely related terms.
Indeed, the two were often used interchangeably in general maritime cases.
See, e.9g., The Osceola, 189 U.9S., at 175; The Buena Ventura, 243 F. 797,
799 (SDNY 1916).  There is nothing in these cases, or the LHWCA, to
indicate that members of a crew are required to navigate.  The "member of a
crew" exception in the LHWCA overrules Haverty; "master or member of a
crew" restates who a "seaman" under the Jones Act is supposed to be: a
sea-based maritime employee.

CIII
D The source of the conflict we resolve today is this Court's inconsistent
use of an aid in navigation requirement.  The inconsistency arose during
the 19 years that passed between the enactment of the LHWCA in 1927 and the
decision in Swanson in 1946--19 years during which the Court did not
recognize the mutual exclusivity of the LHWCA and the Jones Act.  Thus,
Jamison v. Encarnacion, 281 U.9S. 635, 639 (1930), and Uravic v. F. Jarka
Co., 282 U.9S. 234, 238 (1931), decided after passage of the LHWCA but
before Swanson, reiterated the Haverty rule that stevedores are covered
under the Jones Act.  In Warner v. Goltra, 293 U.9S. 155 (1934), the Court
held that the master of a vessel is a "seaman" under the Act.  In so
holding, the Court relied on the salutary principle that statutory language
"must be read in the light of the mischief to be corrected and the end to
be attained."  Id., at 158.  As the Jones Act is a remedial statute, there
is no reason that the master of a vessel who suffers a maritime injury
should be any less protected than a crew member.  Id., at 162.  All of this
was unnecessary, of course.  Had the Court recognized, as it did
subsequently in Swanson, that the LHWCA further defines Jones Act coverage,
the answer was to be found in the plain language of "master or member of a
crew of any vessel."
    Warner is important for our purposes because it is the Court's first
look at the term "seaman" in the Jones Act as it applies to sea-based
employees.  The Court adopted a definition of "seaman" consistent with that
of the lower federal courts in the later pre-Jones Act cases: "[A] seaman
is a mariner of any degree, who lives his life upon the sea.  It is enough
that what he does affects `the operation and welfare of the ship when she
is upon a voyage.'  The Buena Ventura, 243 Fed. 797, 799, where a wireless
operator was brought within the term."  Warner, supra, at 157.  There is no
reference to navigation.  The Court quoted The Buena Ventura again,
specifically on the point of the expanded definition of "seaman": "The word
`seaman' undoubtedly once meant a person who could `hand, reef and steer,'
a mariner in the true sense of the word.  But as the necessities of ships
increased, so the word `seaman' enlarged its meaning."  The Buena Ventura,
supra, at 799, quoted in Warner, supra, at 157, n.91.  Warner plainly
rejected an aid in navigation requirement under the Jones Act.
    The confusion began with South Chicago Coal & Dock Co. v. Bassett, 309
U.9S. 251 (1940).  Decedent was drowned while working as a deckhand on
board a lighter used to fuel steamboats and other marine equipment.  His
primary duty was to move coal from the boat to other vessels being fueled.
Petitioner maintained that decedent's widow was not entitled to recovery
under the LHWCA because decedent was a "member of the crew" of the lighter.
In holding that decedent's widow was entitled to LHWCA coverage, the Court
explained that the "member of a crew" exception was meant to exclude only
"those employees on the vessel who are naturally and primarily on board to
aid in her navigation."  Id., at 260.  Without defining further precisely
what aiding in navigation entailed, the Court seemed to be harkening back
to an earlier, discarded notion of seaman status.
    But the Court was not defining "seaman" under the Jones Act; it was
construing "member of a crew" under the LHWCA.  Bassett was decided before
Swanson, at a time when the Court viewed "seaman" as a broader term than
"member of a crew."  The Bassett Court stated explicitly that it did not
equate "member of a crew" under the LHWCA with "seaman" under the Jones
Act: "[The LHWCA], as we have seen, was to provide compensation for a class
of employees at work on a vessel in navigable waters who, although they
might be classed as seamen (International Stevedoring co. v. Haverty, [272
U.9S. 50 (1926)]), were still regarded as distinct from members of a
`crew.'9"  Bassett, supra, at 260.  Bassett did not impose an aid in
navigation requirement for seaman status under the Jones Act.
    The Court emphasized this point a year later in a onesentence summary
reversal order in Cantey v. McLain Line, Inc., 312 U.9S. 667 (1941).
Cantey was a Jones Act case.  In ruling that claimant was not entitled to
Jones Act relief, the District Court found the facts of the case
indistinguishable from those of Diomede v. Lowe, 87 F. 2d 296 (CA2), cert.
denied, 301 U.9S. 682 (1937).  Cantey v. McClain Line, Inc., 32 F. Supp.
1023 (SDNY), aff'd, 114 F. 2d 1017 (CA2 1940).  Diomede had held that a
maritime worker was entitled to LHWCA coverage because he was not a "member
of a crew."  Diomede, supra, at 298.  The District Court in Cantey
concluded that because, following Diomede, claimant was not a "member of a
crew" under the LHWCA, he was not a "seaman" under the Jones Act.  Cantey,
supra, at 1023.  The court was six years too early in recognizing the
mutual exclusivity of the Jones Act and the LHWCA, and this Court
consequently reversed.  One of the cases cited in Bassett for the
proposition that a "member of a crew" under the LHWCA must aid in
navigation is Diomede.  See Bassett, supra, at 260.
    All of this should have made it clear that the aid in navigation test
had no necessary connection to the Jones Act.  But it did not.  In Norton
v. Warner Co., 321 U.9S. 565 (1944), another pre-Swanson case, the Court
once again addressed the "member of a crew" exception to the LHWCA.
Decedent lived on board a barge with no motive power and confined to waters
within a 30 mile radius of Philadelphia.  His duties included taking
general care of the barge.  The Court held that decedent was a "member of a
crew."
    The Court's concerns were very different in Norton than they had been
in Bassett.  Certain maritime unions, appearing as amici curiae, emphasized
that the liability of an employer under the LHWCA is exclusive.  This means
that those covered under the LHWCA because not "members of a crew" are not
entitled to the superior remedies available to seamen under the Jones Act
and general maritime law.  See Norton, supra, at 570-571.  Cognizant of its
obligation not to narrow unduly the class for whom Congress provided
recovery under the Jones Act, the Court explained that the Bas sett aid in
navigation test was not to be read restrictively:

E"We said in the Bassett case that the term `crew' embraced those `who are
naturally and primarily on board' the vessel `to aid in her navigation.'
Id., p.9260.  But navigation is not limited to `putting over the helm.'  It
also embraces duties essential for other purposes of the vessel.  Certainly
members of the crew are not confined to those who can `hand, reef and
steer.'  Judge Hough pointed out in The Buena Ventura, 243 F. 797, 799,
that `every one is entitled to the privilege of a seaman who, like seamen,
at all times contributes to the labors about the operation and welfare of
the ship when she is upon a voyage.'  And see The Minna, 11 F. 759; Disbrow
v. Walsh Bros., 36 F. 607, 608 (bargeman).  We think that `crew' must have
at least as broad a meaning under the Act."  Norton, supra, at 571-572.
F

    The Court here expressed a view very close to the Swan son holding that
"member of a crew" under the LHWCA is the same as "seaman" under the Jones
Act.  Norton adopted a conception of "member of a crew" consistent with the
established view of "seaman" in pre-Jones Act cases, and consistent with
the definition of "seaman" the Court announced in Warner.  It is a
conception far broader than that announced in Bassett, despite Norton's
ostensible interpretation of that case.
    With Norton, we again reversed course, steering back toward the Warner
and the pre-Jones Act definition of "seaman."  Unfortunately, the opinion
carried with it the outmoded aid in navigation language.  Of course, Norton
was a pre-Swanson, pure LHWCA case.
    Our Jones Act cases of the late 1950s were not.  In a series of brief
decisions, the Court afforded seaman status to claimants working on board
vessels whose jobs had not even an indirect connection to the movement of
the vessel.  Despite their results, these cases either assert an aid in
navigation requirement or rely on Bassett.  See Gianfala v. Texas Co., 350
U.9S. 879 (1955) (summary reversal order) (citing Bas sett; seaman status
for a driller on board a submersible drilling barge); Senko v. LaCrosse
Dredging Corp., 352 U.9S. 370, 374 (1957) (handyman on dredge anchored to
shore met the aid in navigation test); Grimes v. Raymond Concrete Pile Co.,
356 U.9S. 252, 253 (1958) (per curiam) (citing Bassett; pile driver on
submersible radar installation); Butler v. Whiteman, 356 U.9S. 271 (1958)
(per curiam) (citing Bassett; handyman on tug).  These decisions, to the
extent that they do not make seaman status contingent upon the seaman's job
on board the vessel, are consistent with the Warner and preJones Act
definition of "seaman."  And they do not conflict with the pre-Swanson
LHWCA cases, Bassett and Norton, because those cases do not concern the
Jones Act.  These late 1950s Jones Act cases are befuddling, however, at
least in part because they tie "seaman" under the Jones Act to "member of a
crew" under the LHWCA, while ostensibly retaining the Bassett aid in
navigation requirement.
    Following Butler, we accepted no more of these cases, relegating to the
lower courts the task of making some sense of the confusion left in our
wake.  Our wayward case law has led the lower courts to a "myriad of
standards and lack of uniformity in administering the elements of seaman
status."  Engerrand & Bale, 24 S. Tex. L.9J., at 494.  The Seventh Circuit
expressed its frustration well: "Diderot may very well have had the
previous Supreme Court cases in mind when he wrote, `We have made a
labyrinth and got lost in it.  We must find our way out.'9"  Johnson, 742
F. 2d, at 1060.  One of the problems that this Court's Jones Act cases
present to the lower courts is that the sundry jobs performed by the seamen
in the cases of the late 1950s will not lie with any rational conception of
aid in navigation.
CIV
D We think the time has come to jettison the aid in navigation language.
That language, which had long been rejected by admiralty courts under
general maritime law, and by this Court in Warner, a Jones Act case,
slipped back in through an interpretation of the LHWCA at a time when the
LHWCA had nothing to do with the Jones Act.
    We now recognize that the LHWCA is one of a pair of mutually exclusive
remedial statutes that distinguish between land-based and sea-based
maritime employees.  The LHWCA restricted the definition of "seaman" in the
Jones Act only to the extent that "seaman" had been taken to include
land-based employees.  There is no indication in the Jones Act, the LHWCA,
or elsewhere, that Congress has excluded from Jones Act remedies those
traditional seamen who owe allegiance to a vessel at sea, but who do not
aid in navigation.
    In his dissent in Sieracki, Chief Justice Stone chastised the Court for
failing to recognize the distinct nature of landbased and sea-based
employment.  Traditional seamen's remedies, he explained, have been
"universally recognized as .9.9. growing out of the status of the seaman
and his peculiar relationship to the vessel, and as a feature of the
maritime law compensating or offsetting the special hazards and
disadvantages to which they who go down to sea in ships are subjected."
328 U.9S., at 104.  It is this distinction that Congress recognized in the
LHWCA and the Jones Act.  See id., at 106; Swanson v. Marra Brothers, Inc.,
328 U.9S. 1 (1946).  It also explains why all those with that "peculiar
relationship to the vessel" are covered under the Jones Act, regardless of
the particular job they perform.
    We believe the better rule is to define "master or member of a crew"
under the LHWCA, and therefore "seaman" under the Jones Act, solely in
terms of the employee's connection to a vessel in navigation.  This rule
best explains our case law, and is consistent with the pre-Jones Act
interpretation of "seaman" and Congress' land-based/sea-based distinction.
All who work at sea in the service of a ship face those particular perils
to which the protection of maritime law, statutory as well as decisional,
is directed.  See generally Robertson, A New Approach to Determining Seaman
Status, 64 Texas L. Rev. 79 (1985).  It is not the employee's particular
job that is determinative, but the employee's connection to a vessel.
    Shortly after Butler, our last decision in this area, the Court of
Appeals for the Fifth Circuit attempted to decipher this Court's seaman
status cases.  See Offshore Co. v. Robi son, 266 F. 2d 769 (CA5 1959).  The
Fifth Circuit correctly determined that, regardless of its language, this
Court was no longer requiring that seamen aid in navigation.  Id., at 776.
As part of its test for seaman status, Robison requires that a seaman's
duties "contribut[e] to the function of the vessel or to the accomplishment
of its mission."  Id., at 779.
    The key to seaman status is employment-related connection to a vessel
in navigation.  We are not called upon here to define this connection in
all details, but we hold that a necessary element of the connection is that
a seaman perform the work of a vessel.  See Maryland Casualty Co. v.
Lawson, 94 F. 2d 190, 192 (CA5 1938) ("There is implied a definite and
permanent connection with the vessel, an obligation to forward her
enterprise"), cited approvingly in Norton, 321 U.9S., at 573.  In this
regard, we believe the requirement that an employee's duties must
"contribut[e] to the function of the vessel or to the accomplishment of its
mission" captures well an important requirement of seaman status.  It is
not necessary that a seaman aid in navigation or contribute to the
transportation of the vessel, but a seaman must be doing the ship's work.

NV
D Jon Wilander was injured while assigned to the Gates Tide as a paint
foreman.  He did not aid in the navigation or transportation of the vessel.
The jury found, however, that Wilander contributed to the more general
function or mission of the Gates Tide, and subsequently found that he was a
"seaman" under the Jones Act.  McDermott argues that the question should
not have been given to the jury.  The company contends that, as a matter of
law, Wilander is not entitled to Jones Act protection because he did not
aid in navigation by furthering the transportation of the Gates Tide.
    We have said that seaman status under the Jones Act is a question of
fact for the jury.  In Bassett, an LHWCA case, the Court held that Congress
had given to the deputy commissioner, an administrative officer, the
authority to determine who is a "member of a crew" under the LHWCA.  309
U.9S., at 257-258.  If there is evidence to support the deputy
commissioner's finding, it is conclusive.  Ibid.  In Senko, we applied the
same rule to findings by the jury in Jones Act cases.  352 U.9S., at 374.
"[A] jury's decision is final if it has a reasonable basis."  Ibid.  We are
not asked here to reconsider this rule, but we note that the question of
who is a "member of crew," and therefore who is a "seaman," is better
characterized as a mixed question of law and fact.  When the underlying
facts are established, and the rule of law is un disputed, the issue is
whether the facts meet the statutory standard.  See Pullman-Standard v.
Swint, 456 U.9S. 273, 289, n.919 (1982) (defining a mixed question).
    It is for the court to define the statutory standard.  "Member of a
crew" and "seaman" are statutory terms; their interpretation is a question
of law.  The jury finds the facts and, in these cases, applies the legal
standard, but the court must not abdicate its duty to determine if there is
a reasonable basis to support the jury's conclusion.  If reasonable
persons, applying the proper legal standard, could differ as to whether the
employee was a "member of a crew," it is a question for the jury.  See
Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.9S. 242, 250-251 (1986).  In many
cases, this will be true.  The inquiry into seaman status is of necessity
fact-specific; it will depend on the nature of the vessel, and the
employee's precise relation to it.  See Desper v. Starved Rock Ferry Co.,
342 U.9S. 187, 190 (1952) ("The many cases turning upon the question
whether an individual was a "seaman" demonstrate that the matter depends
largely on the facts of the particular case and the activity in which he
was engaged at the time of injury").  Nonetheless, summary judgment or a
directed verdict is mandated where the facts and the law will reasonably
support only one conclusion.  Anderson, supra, at 248, 250-251.
    The question presented here is narrow.  We are not asked to determine
if the jury could reasonably have found that Wilander had a sufficient
connection to the Gates Tide to be a "seaman" under the Jones Act.  We are
not even asked whether the jury reasonably found that Wilander advanced the
function or mission of the Gates Tide.  We are asked only if Wilander
should be precluded from seaman status because he did not perform
transportation-related functions on board the Gates Tide.  Our answer is
no.  Accordingly, the judgment of the Court of Appeals is

Affirmed.


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