DOUGLAS, J., concurring.

345 U.S. the shadow which government will cast over literature that does not follow the dominant party line. If the lady from Toledo can be required to disclose what she read yesterday and what she will read tomorrow, fear will take the place of freedom in the libraries, book stores, and homes of the land. Through the harassment of hearings, investigations, reports, and subpoenas government will hold a club over speech and over the press. Congress could not do this by law. The power of investigation is also limited. Inquiry into personal and private affairs is precluded. See Kilbourn v. Thompson, 103 U. S. 168, 190; McGrain v. Daugherty, 273 U. S. 135, 173-174; Sinclair v. United States, 279 U. S. 263, 292. And so is any matter in respect to which no valid legislation could be had. Kilbourn v. Thompson, supra, pp. 194-195; McGrain v. Daugherty, supra, p. 171. Since Congress could not by law require of respondent what the House demanded, it may not take the first step in an inquiry ending in fine or imprisonment.

Cf. Barsky v. United States, 83 U. S. App. D. C. 127, 167 F. 2d 241, certiorari denied, 334 U. S. 843, rehearing denied, 339 U. S. 971, and Marshall v. United States, 85 U. S. App. D. C. 184, 176 F. 2d 473, certiorari denied, 339 U. S. 933, rehearing denied, 339 U. S. 959.

Syllabus.

UNEXCELLED CHEMICAL CORP. v.
UNITED STATES.

CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT.

No. 293. Argued January 9, 1953. Decided March 9, 1953.

1. An action brought by the United States under the Walsh-Healey Act to recover liquidated damages from a government contractor who knowingly employed child labor in violation of the Act is subject to the two-year statute of limitations contained in § 6 of the Portal-to-Portal Act of 1947. Pp. 60-64.

2. Within the meaning of § 6 of the Portal-to-Portal Act, the cause of action in this case "accrued" when the minors were employed, not when it had been administratively determined that the contractor was liable to the United States for liquidated damages. Pp. 65-66.

3. That the power of the United States to safeguard the public interest may be prejudiced does not justify a construction of the statute at war with its clear and unambiguous words. P. 66. 4. For the purpose of § 6 of the Portal-to-Portal Act, an action is commenced on the date when the complaint in the lawsuit is filed, not when the administrative proceedings under the Walsh-Healey Act are initiated. P. 66.

196 F. 2d 264, reversed.

An action brought against petitioner by the United States under the Walsh-Healey Act was dismissed by the District Court as barred by limitations. 99 F. Supp. 155. The Court of Appeals reversed. 196 F. 2d 264. This Court granted certiorari. 344 U. S. 862. Reversed, p. 66.

George Morris Fay argued the cause for petitioner. With him on the brief were John P. Burke and Edward L. Carey for petitioner.

James R. Browning argued the cause for the United States. With him on the brief were Solicitor General Cummings, Assistant Attorney General Baldridge, Paul A. Sweeney and Benjamin Forman.

Clemens Pottery Co., supra, were summarized in § 1 (a) of the Portal-to-Portal Act. None of these referred to the liquidated damage provisions of the Walsh-Healey Act. None in fact referred to its child labor provisions.

1"SECTION 1. (a) The Congress hereby finds that the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938, as amended, has been interpreted judicially in disregard of long-established customs, practices, and contracts between employers and employees, thereby creating wholly unexpected liabilities, immense in amount and retroactive in operation, upon employers with the results that, if said Act as so interpreted or claims arising under such interpretations were permitted to stand, (1) the payment of such liabilities would bring about financial ruin of many employers and seriously impair the capital resources of many others, thereby resulting in the reduction of industrial operations, halting of expansion and development, curtailing employment, and the earning power of employees; (2) the credit of many employers would be seriously impaired; (3) there would be created both an extended and continuous uncertainty on the part of industry, both employer and employee, as to the financial condition of productive establishments and a gross inequality of competitive conditions between employers and between industries; (4) employees would receive windfall payments, including liquidated damages, of sums for activities performed by them without any expectation of reward beyond that included in their agreed rates of pay; (5) there would occur the promotion of increasing demands for payment to employees for engaging in activities no compensation for which had been contemplated by either the employer or employee at the time they were engaged in; (6) voluntary collective bargaining would be interfered with and industrial disputes between employees and employers and between employees and employees would be created; (7) the courts of the country would be burdened with excessive and needless litigation and champertous practices would be encouraged; (8) the Public Treasury would be deprived of large sums of revenues and public finances would be seriously deranged by claims against the Public Treasury for refunds of taxes already paid; (9) the cost to the Government of goods and services heretofore and hereafter purchased by its various departments and agencies would be unreasonably increased and the Public Treasury would be seriously affected by consequent increased cost of war contracts; and (10) serious and adverse effects upon the revenues of Federal, State, and local governments would occur."

59

Opinion of the Court.

That is the start of the argument made by respondent and adopted by the Court of Appeals to the effect that Congress in the Portal-to-Portal Act had no intention to legislate with respect to the child labor provisions of the Walsh-Healey Act but had in mind only possible suits which employees might bring for unpaid minimum wages and overtime.

We do not stop to lay out the entire legislative history of the Portal-to-Portal Act. For the words Congress used in § 6 are too precise for extended argument. Three causes of action are covered-claims for "unpaid minimum wages," claims for "unpaid overtime compensation," and claims for "liquidated damages" under three Acts, including the Walsh-Healey Act. The only "liquidated damages" collectible under the Walsh-Healey Act are collectible by the United States. That marks a difference between that Act and the Fair Labor Standards Act. For, under the latter, employees may bring suits for double the amount of unpaid wages, plus costs and attorneys' fees. 29 U. S. C. § 216 (b). That is doubtless why § 1 (a) of the Portal-to-Portal Act, after summarizing the great burden on employers of the pending employee claims, states that "all of the results which have arisen or may arise under the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 . . . may (except as to liability for liquidated damages) arise with respect to the Walsh-Healey" Act and that "it is, therefore, in the national public interest . . . that this Act shall apply to the Walsh-Healey Act "That statement does no more than emphasize the difference of the problem of liquidated damages under the two Acts. The fact remains that the Portal-to-Portal Act treats claims for "liquidated damages" under, the Walsh-Healey Act precisely the same as it does claims for "liquidated damages" under the Fair Labor Standards Act, even though the former are enforced exclusively by the Government, the latter by the employees. Perhaps that does not make

States. The fact that due deference to the administrative process should make a court hold its hand until the administrative proceedings before the Secretary of Labor have been completed (Far East Conference v. United States, 342 U. S. 570; Thompson v. Texas Mexican R. Co., 328 U. S. 134; General American Tank Corp. v. El Dorado Terminal Co., 308 U. S. 422; United States v. Morgan, 307 U. S. 183) is a matter of judicial administration and of no relevancy here. The statutory liability accrued when the minors were employed. It was from that date that the period of limitations began to run.

This construction, it is said, will prejudice the power of the United States to safeguard the public interest. But if there is prejudice it is the result of the Portal-toPortal Act which Congress, having made, can refashion.

There is the final argument that the action was, in any event, commenced when the administrative proceedings were initiated. Section 7 of the Portal-to-Portal Act provides that "an action is commenced for the purposes of section 6. . . on the date when the complaint is filed." It is argued that the issuance of a formal complaint in the administrative proceedings (the customary procedure in Walsh-Healey cases) is the commencement of an action in the statutory sense. Congress, however, when it wrote. § 7, was addressing itself to lawsuits in the conventional sense. Commencement of in action by the filing of a complaint has too familiar a history and the purpose of §§ 6 and 7 was too obvious for us to assume that Congress did not mean to use the words in their ordinary Reversed.

sense.

Section 2 provides in pertinent part: "Any sums of money due to the United States of America by reason of any violation of any of the representations and stipulations of said contract set forth in section 1 hereof may be withheld from any amounts due on any such contracts or may be recovered in suits brought in the name of the United States of America by the Attorney General thereof."