The Oxford comma is no longer just the subject of heated debates among grammar nerds. It turns out that the serial comma — its absence, to be exact — could also cost a Maine company millions of dollars in a class-action lawsuit involving overtime pay.
In a 29-page court decision released March 13 by the 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, the lack of the Oxford comma could lead Portland-based Oakhurst Dairy to lose a cool $10 million to its truck drivers.
Case Background
Back in 2014, three truck drivers sued the company and sought over four years’ worth of overtime pay they had been denied, the Boston Globe reported. According to Maine law, workers should be paid 1.5 times their rate for every work hour rendered beyond 40 hours — but with certain exemptions.
The state law notes that overtime rules do not apply to “[t]he canning, processing, preserving, freezing, drying, marketing, storing, packing for shipment or distribution" of meat and fish produce, agricultural goods, and perishable goods.
The question: do the rules intend to exempt "packing for" the shipping or distribution of the three goods categories?
While delivery drivers distribute the food items, they do not pack the items themselves, so the interpretation of the sentence proved crucial to the ruling in the lawsuit. A comma after the word “shipment” might have clarified that the law does not cover distribution.
Missing Oxford Comma Wins The Day
The court of appeals, reversing a lower court’s decision, agreed with the drivers’ claim, saying that the serial comma’s absence led to sufficient uncertainty and thus ruling to the complainants’ favor.
“That comma would have sunk our ship,” said David G. Webbert, an attorney representing the drivers.
The truck drivers earned up to $52,000 a year without overtime and worked 12 extra hours each week on average, said Webbert. The suit was filed by the three, but around 75 will share the money.
The Maine Legislative Drafting Manual, which the language in the law was anchored on, explicitly instructs users to not use the serial comma. It cautioned them to use commas “thoughtfully and sparingly.”
Raging Debate
The Oxford comma is used before conjunctions such as “and” and “or” in a series of three or more items. While its staunch supporters push for its use in the name of clarity, critics feel the serial comma is superfluous, and sentences can do without it.
The debate rages on in book and academic publishing circles. While the Associated Press comes out against the comma in general, the Chicago Manual of Style as well as the Oxford University Press style keep using it to “resolve ambiguity.”
The New York Times stylebook generally recommends against serial commas unless when necessary for clarity, but one editor’s definition of clarity may differ from another’s, which has resulted in one person adding the Oxford coma to a sentence only to have the next one omit it.
But this isn’t the first time in legal history where a comma made the difference. The Oxford comma figured, for instance, in a $1 million battle between Canadian firms back in 2006 as well as in an 1872 tariff law.
If there’s one thing that U.S. appeals judge David J. Barron is sure of, it’s this: “For want of a comma, we have this case.”
