engaged in commerce
Definitions from Case Law · United States Supreme Court
Definitions from Case Law
From 319 U.S. 491 - McLeod v. Threlkeld · 1943Most cited · 802 citing opinions
Fair Labor Standards Act · construing 29 U.S.C. § 201 · Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938
The test under this present act, to determine whether an employee is engaged in commerce, is not whether the employee's activities affect or indirectly relate to interstate commerce but whether they are actually in or so closely related to the movement of the commerce as to be a part of it.
How the Supreme Court has restated “engaged in commerce”
Each Supreme Court definition of “engaged in commerce,” sized by how often later courts cited it. “Change” is measured by wording overlap with earlier definitions — a rough signal, not a semantic judgment.
How often courts cite the cases defining “engaged in commerce”
Court decisions citing the 4 opinions that defined “engaged in commerce” — 2,891 in all, by decade. Counts are citations to the defining cases as a whole, not verified uses of the term. The dip in the most recent years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the latest years.
All 4 definitions, chronological · 1943–1959
Those persons who are engaged in maintaining and repairing such facilities should be considered as 'engaged in commerce' because without their services these instrumentalities would not be open to the passage of goods and persons across state lines.
FLSA · construing 29 U.S.C. § 201 · Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938
The test 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.
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