[Congressional Record Volume 153, Number 42 (Monday, March 12, 2007)]
[Senate]
[Pages S3010-S3011]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

      By Mr. ISAKSON:
  S. 846. A bill to amend the Longshore and Harbor Workers' 
Compensation Act to improve the compensation system, and for other 
purposes; to the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions.
  Mr. ISAKSON. Mr. President, today, I introduce the Longshore and 
Harbor

[[Page S3011]]

Workers' Compensation Act Amendments of 2007. The Longshore Act 
provides medical, physical rehabilitation and lost wage replacement 
benefits to thousands of workers nationwide for work-related injuries, 
illnesses and deaths. The Act is long overdue for attention from 
Congress, and I am eager to engage with my colleagues from both sides 
as to how we can improve the system for our workers, their employers, 
taxpayers and our economy as a whole.
  We all can agree that the workers covered under this program play a 
key role in our national security and in our vital international trade. 
Longshore and harbor workers labor on the piers of Portland, ME, in the 
dead of winter, just as they toil in the hot Southern sun in Savannah, 
GA. Their work is undoubtedly difficult and often dangerous. It is 
impossible to underestimate the extent to which Americans rely on the 
myriad of products these workers move in and out of our nations' ports. 
Every year, over 15 billion tons of freight moves through our ports, 
with a total value of $9 trillion.
  These workers deserve a fair and effective workers' compensation 
program. Since 1927, longshore and harbor workers have had a unique 
program all their own. Congress enacted the Act in response to Southern 
Pacific Company v. Jensen, a ruling by the Supreme Court in 1917. The 
Court held that the Maritime Clause in the Constitution forbids states 
from covering shore-based maritime workers who may become injured while 
working on vessels anchored in navigable waters. Now, nearly 90 years 
later, not only are private stevedoring companies covered by the Act, 
but so are virtually all maritime construction folks, builders and 
repairers of U.S. Naval and Coast Guard vessels, Federal contractors 
with overseas employees, oil rig workers, and even civilian employees 
at the Post Exchanges on U.S. military bases.
  As many of us have learned if we ever spent time in our State 
legislatures, States nationwide regularly amend their programs to 
incorporate the most modern and best workers' compensation practices. 
However, unlike these responsible state legislatures, Congress has not 
addressed the Longshore Act in over two decades.
  Since the last amendments to the Act, States from California to Rhode 
Island have found numerous methods of improving their workers' 
compensation programs, saving taxpayers' dollars, and eliminating 
waste, fraud and abuse, while always ensuring that workers have 
appropriate medical care. We must bring these State-level innovations 
in workers' compensation to the Longshore Act system.
  Technology, events, and even Congressional interventions have 
continued to dramatically change our nations' seaports and shipyards. 
Indeed, since 2002, per Congress's instruction, U.S. Customs has begun 
locating so-called ``VACIS machines'' at U.S. terminals. These machines 
are truck-mounted gamma ray imaging systems that produce radiographic 
images of the contents of containers and other cargo to determine the 
possible presence of many types of contraband. Eventually, EVERY port 
in the country will have the machines on sight. Will maritime workers 
be exposed to radiation? If so, will they file claims against their 
employers when the machines are owned and operated by the Federal 
Government?
  The bill I introduce today will foster a sound and fair workers' 
compensation system for maritime workers with a clear, exclusive remedy 
for their workplace injuries and illnesses. It will guarantee fairness 
for workers, and in the event of death, their survivors. It will make 
our ports and shipbuilders more competitive. It will ensure fair 
compensability, in that it will hold employers responsible for only 
that which is caused by employment under the Longshore Act system. It 
will fix, once and for all, the so-called ``Special Fund,'' an archaic 
and problematic vestige of early 20th Century public policy.
  In May 2006, I chaired a hearing of the Subcommittee on Employment 
and Workplace Safety, at which we heard about many different problems 
with the implementation of this 80-year-old Act. I have incorporated 
suggestions from both sides in crafting the bill I introduce today.
  Since I began dealing with this issue last year, I have talked with 
more and more workers, port operators, and administrators from the Port 
of Savannah in my home State of Georgia. Savannah is the Nation's 
eleventh busiest waterborne freight gateway for international trade. 
Every year, over $20 billion of international freight move through it 
and its neighboring port of Brunswick. The folks I talk to at Savannah 
and Brunswick tell me that they can't emphasize enough the importance 
of revising the Longshore Act to make it more efficient.
  I hope we can move on this bill, for the sake of taxpayers, for 
workers in Savannah and Brunswick and at ports and ship building 
facilities nationwide, and for the international commerce that is vital 
to our Nation's economy and way of life.

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