Labor and Employment Law Commons^™

Overcoming Our Global Disability In The Workforce: Mediating The Dream, Elayne E. Greenberg

Faculty Publications

The unparalleled global support for the 2008 United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities ("CRPD") highlights the global schism between the public extolling of human rights for individuals with disabilities and the private castigating of such individuals in their daily lives and in the workforce. The CRPD explicitly mandates that work is a right accorded to individuals with disabilities, and global employers are now being challenged to implement that right. Yet, in order to ensure meaningful, universal compliance with its directives, the CRPD imposes affirmative duties on Supporting States to develop a customized, workable plan that effectively …

A Negotiation Approach To Mandatory Arbitration Contracts, Miriam A. Cherry

Faculty Publications

(Excerpt)

In Rosenberg v. Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner & Smith, Inc. the First Circuit addressed whether a pre-dispute mandatory arbitration contract covered employment claims under Title VII and the Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA) and was thus enforceable. The court held that while these types of arbitration contracts are theoretically enforceable, this particular contract was not. The First Circuit determined that the 1991 Civil Rights Act and the Older Worker's Benefit Protection Act did not preclude the enforcement of mandatory arbitration contracts, and that there was an insufficient showing of arbitral bias to prevent the contract's enforcement. The court, …

Not-So-Arbitrary Arbitration: Using Title Vii Disparate Impact Analysis To Invalidate Employment Contracts That Discriminate, Miriam A. Cherry

Faculty Publications

(Excerpt)

On May 20, 1996, three women filed a sexual harassment and discrimination lawsuit against the Wall Street investment firm Smith Barney. Later joined by twenty additional women, the plaintiffs alleged that Smith Barney failed to hire and promote women, created a hostile work environment, and discriminated on the basis of pregnancy and marital status. The lawsuit quickly gained widespread publicity, most notably for its accusation that the former manager of the Garden City, New York, branch had established a fraternity-like "boom-boom room" in the office basement where female employees were either excluded or harassed if allowed to enter. On …