Cite as: 520 U. S. 548 (1997)
Stevens, J., dissenting
The majority tries to justify this conclusion with the argument that a rule acknowledging an employee's status as a seaman based on the work he does for a number of employers who hire out of the same hiring hall would create uncertainties for employers. Ante, at 558. The Court's concern is that an employer might not realize that an employee he had selected to chip paint on a docked boat had spent most of the past year as a deckhand on a neighboring vessel. This fear is exaggerated, since an employer who hires its workers out of a union hiring hall should be presumed to be familiar with the general character of their work. Moreover, surely the unfairness created by the majority's rule outweighs this concern.
Of course, in order to hold a particular employer liable, an employment relationship must have existed between the worker and the particular vessel owner at the time of the injury. Chandris teaches us, however, that the specific activity being performed at the time of the injury is not sufficient to establish the employee's status under the Jones Act. Rather, we must determine whether an employee has seaman status by looking at his work history. The character of that history in the market from which a vessel owner obtains all of its crews seems to me just as relevant as the assignments to the particular operator for whom work was being performed when the injury occurred.
Accordingly, I would affirm the judgment of the Court of Appeals.2
2 On the question the Court does not reach, I think the Court of Appeals correctly interpreted our opinion in Southwest Marine, Inc. v. Gizoni, 502 U. S. 81 (1991). See also G. Gilmore & C. Black, Law of Admiralty 435 (2d ed. 1975).
563
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