Sandra Day O'Connor

“ The key to seaman status is employment-related connection to a vessel in navigation. We are not called upon here to define this connection in all details, but we hold that a necessary element of the connection is that a seaman perform the work of a vessel. ”

“ By the middle of the 19th century, the leading admiralty treatise noted the wide variety of those eligible for seamen's benefits: "Masters, mates, sailors, surveyors, carpenters, coopers, stewards, cooks, cabin boys, kitchen boys, engineers, pilots, firemen, deck hands, waiters,-women as well as men,-are mariners." ”

“ The crucial element in these cases was something akin to Benedict's "great purpose of the voyage." Thus, in holding that a fisherman, a chambermaid, and a waiter were all entitled to seamen's benefits, then-Judge Brown, later the author of The Osceola, eschewed reference to navigation: " [A] ll hands employed upon a vessel, except the master, are entitled to a [seaman's lien for wages] if their services are in furtherance of the main object of the enterprise in which she is engaged." ”

“ The superior officer was no longer a fellow servant, but he was still a member of the crew. Under proposition 4, there was no recovery for negligence. 247 U.S., at 384, 38 S.Ct., at 504.
Congress tried a different tack in 1920. It passed the Jones Act, which provides a cause of action in negligence for "any seaman" injured "in the course of his employment." 46 U.S.C.App. § 688. The Act thereby removes the bar to negligence articulated in The Osceola.
The Jones Act does not define "seaman." Neither does The Osceola; it simply uses the term as had other admiralty courts. ”

“ Prior to the Jones Act, these benefits included the tort remedies outlined in The Osceola and a lien against the ship for wages. See generally Gilmore & Black, supra, at 35-36, 281; The John G. Stevens, 170 U.S. 113, 119, 18 S.Ct. 544, 546, 42 L.Ed. 969 (1898) ; The Osceola, supra, 189 U.S. at 175, 23 S.Ct., at 487. Certain early cases limited seaman status to those who aided in the navigation of the ship. The narrow rule was that a seaman-sometimes referred to as a mariner-must actually navigate: " [T] he persons engaged on board of her must have been possessed of some skill in navigation. ”

“ McDermott asked the court to reject the Robison requirement that a seaman "contribut [e] to the function of the vessel or to the accomplishment of its mission," Robison, supra, at 779, in favor of the more stringent requirement of Johnson v. John F. Beasley Construction Co., 742 F.2d 1054 (CA7 1984) . ”

“ Of course, Norton was a pre-Swanson, pure LHWCA case.
Our Jones Act cases of the late 1950's were not. In a series of brief decisions, the Court afforded seaman status to claimants working on board vessels whose jobs had not even an indirect connection to the movement of the vessel. Despite their results, these cases either assert an aid in navigation requirement or rely on Bassett. See Gianfala v. Texas Co., 350 U.S. 879, 76 S.Ct. 141, 100 L.Ed. 775 (1955) (summary reversal order) (citing Bassett; seaman status for a driller on board a submersible drilling barge) ; Senko v. ”