Simpson v. Director, Office of Workers' Compensation Programs

COFFIN, Chief Judge.

This case requires us to determine whether the Supreme Court’s decision in Calbeck v. Travelers Insurance Co., 370 U.S. 114, 82 S.Ct. 1196, 8 L.Ed.2d 368 (1962), which clarified the jurisdictional scope of the Longshoremen’s and Harbor Workers’ Compensation Act of 1927, should be applied to workers’ injuries that antedated the decision.

*82I. Background

On November 21, 1941, Donald Simpson was working as a welder on board a vessel under construction on a marine railway at the Bath Iron Works shipyard. He fell approximately fifty feet from the deck of the vessel, landing on his…