The Portal to Portal Act of 1947 (29 USC §§251-262) was an

Act of Congress An Act of Congress is a statute enacted by the United States Congress. Acts may apply only to individual entities (called private laws), or to the general public ( public laws). For a bill to become an act, the text must pass through both house ...

United States labor law United States labor law sets the rights and duties for employees, labor unions, and employers in the United States. Labor law's basic aim is to remedy the " inequality of bargaining power" between employees and employers, especially employers "org ...

, passed to limit the remedies available in the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 (FLSA). Along with the Taft-Hartley Act of 1947, which decreased the rights of employees and labor unions in the

National Labor Relations Act of 1935 The National Labor Relations Act of 1935, also known as the Wagner Act, is a foundational statute of United States labor law that guarantees the right of private sector employees to organize into trade unions, engage in collective bargaining, and ...

, the Portal to Portal Act of 1947 was passed by a Republican Congress to limit rights in enforcing the

minimum wage in the United States In the United States, the minimum wage is set by U.S. labor law and a range of state and local laws. The first federal minimum wage was instituted in the National Industrial Recovery Act of 1933, signed into law by President Franklin D. Ro ...

*§251(a) as a preamble statement of policy, reads that the FLSA has been "interpreted judicially in disregard of long-established customs, practices, and contracts between employers and employees, thereby creating wholly unexpected liabilities" *§252(c) working time is defined to be time that is compensable under (a) contract, collective agreement or custom or (b) when it was compensable. *§254, limits employer liability for time spent in "preliminary and postliminary" activity. It places a two-year limitations on claims to enforce the FLSA, Walsh-Healey or Davis-Bacon Act, but allows three years for wilful violations (this was introduced in 1966). *§259, creates a defense if the employer underpaid workers "in good faith in conformity and in reliance on any written administrative regulation, order, ruling, approval or interpretation" of the Secretary of Labor. *§260, the defense operates against a liquidated damages claim, rather than unpaid wages claim if the employer proves "he had reasonable grounds for believing that his act or omission was not a violation."

Notes

{{reflist United States labor law

Contents

See also

Notes