## Facts

- The United States indicted a Georgia lumber manufacturer and its owner for violating the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 (FLSA).
- The indictment alleged the defendants shipped lumber in interstate commerce that was produced by employees paid below the federal minimum wage and employed beyond the statutory maximum hours.
- The indictment also alleged failure to keep wage-and-hour records required by the FLSA.
- The federal district court sustained a demurrer, quashed the indictment, and held the FLSA unconstitutional as exceeding Congress’s Commerce Clause power and intruding on state authority under the Tenth Amendment.
- The United States appealed directly to the Supreme Court.

## Issues

1. Whether Congress may prohibit interstate shipment of goods produced by employees paid below federal minimum wages or employed beyond federal maximum hours.
2. Whether Congress may regulate wages and hours of employees engaged in producing goods “for interstate commerce,” including production occurring within a single state.
3. Whether Congress may require covered employers to keep wage-and-hour records as an incident to enforcing the FLSA.
4. Whether the FLSA’s wage-hour and recordkeeping provisions violate the Fifth or Tenth Amendments.

## Decision

- The Supreme Court unanimously reversed the judgment quashing the indictment.
- The Court held the FLSA’s prohibitions on interstate shipment of nonconforming goods and its wage-hour standards for production “for interstate commerce” were within Congress’s Commerce Clause power.
- The Court upheld the recordkeeping requirements as a permissible enforcement mechanism.
- The Court rejected Fifth Amendment due process objections and held the Tenth Amendment did not bar regulation within an enumerated federal power.
- The Court overruled *Hammer v. Dagenhart* and limited earlier restrictive Commerce Clause reasoning associated with *Carter v. Carter Coal Co.*

## Legal Principles

- Congress may regulate interstate commerce by prohibiting the interstate shipment of goods, including goods produced under labor conditions Congress deems harmful to interstate commerce.
- Congress may regulate intrastate activities, including production and employment conditions, when those activities are part of, or substantially related to, an interstate commercial system Congress is regulating.
- Courts do not invalidate a commerce regulation based on Congress’s policy objectives if the regulation is a bona fide regulation of interstate commerce and not otherwise prohibited by the Constitution.
- The Tenth Amendment does not independently restrict the exercise of an enumerated federal power; when Congress acts within the Commerce Clause, state-reserved powers do not negate that authority.
- Recordkeeping duties reasonably related to enforcing valid federal commerce regulations are constitutional.
- *Hammer v. Dagenhart*’s formal distinction between “production” and “commerce” cannot bar Congress from excluding from interstate commerce goods produced under prohibited labor conditions.

## Conclusion

The Court upheld the FLSA as a constitutional exercise of the Commerce Clause, sustaining federal minimum wage, maximum hour, overtime-related, and recordkeeping requirements for goods produced for interstate commerce, and confirming Congress’s authority to bar interstate shipment of goods made under substandard labor conditions.


United States v. Darby, 312 U.S. 100 (1941)