412
Opinion of O'Connor, J.
thresher who travels from farm to farm performing wheat threshing chores for small farmers on a contract basis. The Court reasons that Holly Farms' employees are unlike the fictional wheat thresher, however, in that they are employed by Holly Farms, rather than by the independent growers themselves. See ante, at 402, n. 8 ("If the chicken catching crews were employed by the independent growers, rather than by Holly Farms' processing operation, those crews would more closely resemble the wheat threshers contemplated by the framers of § 3(f)").
The Court and the Board emphasize formal contractual arrangements to the virtual exclusion of practical realities. The fact that Holly Farms supplies the services of the chicken catchers and forklift operators seems entirely beside the point; the work performed by these employees is precisely the same whether they are hired by Holly Farms or by the independent growers. And the notion that Congress intended the status of the chicken catchers and forklift operators to turn on such a readily manipulable criterion strains credibility. If the live-haul crew's status depends only upon who "hires" them to perform the work, Holly Farms can simply charge the independent growers with raising and catching, caging, and cooping the chickens, and require the independent growers to hire Holly Farms' own live-haul workers to perform those tasks.
The Court's quotation from Imco Poultry, Div. of Int'l Multifoods Corp., 202 N. L. R. B. 259 (1973), reveals precisely where the Board and the Court have gone astray: The Board takes the position that live-haul workers " 'cannot be performing practices incident to, or in conjunction with, [their employer's] farming operations.' " Ante, at 405 (quoting Imco Poultry, supra, at 260). But the statute does not require that work be performed "incident to or in conjunction with" one's employer's farming operations, but only incident to or in conjunction with "such" farming operations— the antecedent for which term is plainly the first clause of
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