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Full-Text Articles in Law
The Audacity Of Protecting Racist Speech Under The National Labor Relations Act, Michael Z. Green
The Audacity Of Protecting Racist Speech Under The National Labor Relations Act, Michael Z. Green
Faculty Scholarship
This Article, written for a symposium hosted by the University of Chicago Legal Forum on the Disruptive Workplace, analyzes the most recent failures of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to determine a thoughtful and balanced approach in addressing racist speech. Imagine two employees in the private sector workplace are discussing the possibility of selecting a union to represent their interests regarding wages and working conditions. During this conversation, a black employee notes the importance of using their collective voices to improve working conditions and compares the activity of selecting a union with the Black Lives Matter protests aimed at …
A New Board Policy On Deferral To Arbitration: Acknowledging And Delimiting Union Waiver Of Employee Statutory Rights, Michael C. Harper
A New Board Policy On Deferral To Arbitration: Acknowledging And Delimiting Union Waiver Of Employee Statutory Rights, Michael C. Harper
Faculty Scholarship
This article considers the extent to which the National Labor Relations Board should defer in its protection of statutory rights to the private arbitration process under collective bargaining. The article explains and criticizes the theory of implied union waiver advanced by the District of Columbia Circuit Court of Appeals under the leadership of Judge Harry Edwards. It posits a reformulation of Board deferral doctrine for waivable substantive rights. The article also consider the relevance of the Supreme Court’s 2009 decision in 14 Penn Plaza, LLC v. Pyett to Board deferral to arbitration in cases involving § 7 rights that are …
Gathering Moss: The Nrla's Resistance To Legislative Change , James J. Brudney
Gathering Moss: The Nrla's Resistance To Legislative Change , James J. Brudney
Faculty Scholarship
Why has the NLRA been so resistant to legislative change for more than 60 years? How was Congress able to enact two major labor relations laws within a 12-year period (1935 and 1947) but then unable to approve proposed reforms in the years since 1947? In an effort to answer these questions, the article closely examines contemporaneous newspaper accounts from the 1935 and 1947 legislative “successes” as well as from two more recent congressional “failures” in 1978 and 1992. The article’s examination proceeds based on an analytic framework borrowed from political scientist John Kingdon that posits a recurring interplay among …
Law, Lawyers, And Labor: The United Farm Workers' Legal Strategy In The 1960s And 1970s And The Role Of Law In Union Organizing Today , Jennifer Gordon
Law, Lawyers, And Labor: The United Farm Workers' Legal Strategy In The 1960s And 1970s And The Role Of Law In Union Organizing Today , Jennifer Gordon
Faculty Scholarship
What does law offer labor? It depends. The specifics of the law in question are critical, as are the make-up and funding of the agency that is charged with implementing it and the economic strength, political clout, and strategic creativity of the unions and employers that it governs. Today's discussions of the NLRA from the union perspective are tinged with desperation about what law does for and to organizing-a desperation that is born of labor's sense that it has lost too many important battles before the NLRB and the courts over the interpretation of the NLRA. In despair, however, workers …
Isolated And Politicized: The Nlrb's Uncertain Future The National Labor Relations Board In Comparative Context: Introduction, James J. Brudney
Isolated And Politicized: The Nlrb's Uncertain Future The National Labor Relations Board In Comparative Context: Introduction, James J. Brudney
Faculty Scholarship
The National Labor Relations Board has managed to remain unusually detached or isolated in its decision-making even as it has come to operate in an openly partisan manner. There is a certain paradoxical quality to the coexistence of these two descriptors for Board conduct: isolation in agency performance ordinarily suggests a neutral separation from the political process whereas politicization implies a close connection to the elected branches. The explanation for this odd pairing involves a number of factors: some reflect political realities beyond the agency's ability to control, others relate to the structure of the NLRA, and still others are …
Neutrality Agreements And Card Check Recognition: Prospects For Changing Paradigms , James J. Brudney
Neutrality Agreements And Card Check Recognition: Prospects For Changing Paradigms , James J. Brudney
Faculty Scholarship
The rise of neutrality agreements is a major development in labor-management relations in this country. The union movement's new approach to organizing displaces elections supervised by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) with negotiated agreements that provide for employers to remain neutral during an upcoming union campaign and (in most instances) for employees to decide if they wish to be represented through signing authorization cards rather than through a secret ballot election. Professor Brudney demonstrates the substantial role now being played by this contractually based approach to union organizing. He also explains why so many employers have agreed to neutrality …
Reconciling Differences: The Theory And Law Of Mediating Labor Grievances, Deborah A. Schmedemann
Reconciling Differences: The Theory And Law Of Mediating Labor Grievances, Deborah A. Schmedemann
Faculty Scholarship
While grievance arbitration is the most common method of resolution of disputes arising under collective bargaining agreements, the author proposes that there is also a place for grievance mediation. The author compares mediation to arbitration and negotiation, and describes the strengths and weaknesses of mediation. She explains how mediation clauses in labor agreements could be enforced under section 301 of the LMRA, to protect rights created by those agreements, and proposes that mediation clauses be a basis for injunctions against strikes during the term of an agreement in certain situations. However, the author suggests that courts and the National Labor …