128
Stevens, J., dissenting
That amendment is what the Court construes today. History amply supports the proposition that it was an uncontroversial provision that merely confirmed the fact that no one interested in the enactment of the FAA ever intended or expected that § 2 would apply to employment contracts. It is particularly ironic, therefore, that the amendment has provided the Court with its sole justification for refusing to give the text of § 2 a natural reading. Playing ostrich to the substantial history behind the amendment, see ante, at 119 ("[W]e need not assess the legislative history of the exclusion provision"), the Court reasons in a vacuum that "[i]f all contracts of employment are beyond the scope of the Act under the § 2 coverage provision, the separate exemption" in § 1 "would be pointless," ante, at 113. But contrary to the Court's suggestion, it is not "pointless" to adopt a clarifying amendment in order to eliminate opposition to a bill. Moreover, the majority's reasoning is squarely contradicted by the Court's approach in Bernhardt v. Polygraphic Co. of America, 350 U. S. 198, 200, 201, n. 3 (1956), where the Court concluded that an employment contract did not "evidence 'a transaction involving commerce' within the meaning of § 2 of the Act," and therefore did not "reach the further question whether in any event petitioner would be included in 'any other class of workers' within the exceptions of § 1 of the Act."
The irony of the Court's reading of § 2 to include contracts of employment is compounded by its cramped interpretation of the exclusion inserted into § 1. As proposed and enacted, the exclusion fully responded to the concerns of the Seamen's Union and other labor organizations that § 2 might encom-herein contained shall apply to contracts of employment of seamen, railroad employes or any other class of workers engaged in foreign or interstate commerce.' This exempted labor from the provisions of the law, although its sponsors denied there was any intention to include labor disputes." Proceedings of the Forty-fifth Annual Convention of the American Federation of Labor 52 (1925).
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