What does federal labor law have in common with civil forfeiture law? As I write at Reason:

Under a provision of the 1938 Fair Labor Standards Act, the U.S. Department of Labor can seek what is known as a “hot goods” order, freezing the physical output of an employer that it suspects of having violated wage and hour law, all without having to prove its case at a trial.

Until lately the procedure was little known to the general public, but the Obama administration, amid its general all‐​fronts offensive to expand wage and hour law and intensify its enforcement, has begun using it against farmers in a series of actions. Applied to agriculture, a “hot goods” order is even more than usually coercive, because both sides know the crop will rot if not brought to market soon. Moreover, as in many forfeiture cases, the freezing of a target’s most valuable asset may mean that it cannot afford legal help to appeal or otherwise challenge what has happened — all of which gives the federal government the leverage to get what it wants in resulting negotiations without having to test the strength of its case at trial.


Now, however, a federal judge has slapped down the administration hard in a Pacific Northwest case that farm groups had described as “extortion.” In a humiliating defeat, the Department of Labor has agreed to drop charges against two Oregon blueberry growers and refund the moneys extracted from them. It’s a case that should rally attention to the need to roll back the Department’s powers in this area.


My whole Reason piece is here.