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Full-Text Articles in Law
State Legislative Update, M. Katherine Kerbs, Katherine E. Mcmurtrey, Courtney Lauer, Theresa Mullineaux
State Legislative Update, M. Katherine Kerbs, Katherine E. Mcmurtrey, Courtney Lauer, Theresa Mullineaux
Journal of Dispute Resolution
Mediation is a non-binding type of dispute resolution. Mediation is a process where a neutral, third party with no authoritative decision-making power assists parties in a dispute to voluntarily reach a mutually acceptable agreement. The legal community has encouraged alternative dispute resolution, including mediation. With mediation as the primary alternative dispute resolution type in the federal district courts, it is now even more important that legislation surrounding mediation and confidentiality is created. In fact, over half of the ninety-four federal court districts now offer, and in most instances, require mediation.
Correcting A Flaw In The Arbitration Fairness Act, Imre Stephen Szalai
Correcting A Flaw In The Arbitration Fairness Act, Imre Stephen Szalai
Journal of Dispute Resolution
The proposed Arbitration Fairness Act of 2013 will ban courts from enforcing arbitration agreements in the employment and consumer contexts. This law will protect America's employees and consumers by keeping the courthouse door open to critical civil rights, employment, and consumer protection litigation. However, the proposed Arbitration Fairness Act suffers from a subtle flaw: it is uncertain whether the law will apply to the states. This flaw, which arises from one of the greatest constitutional errors the Supreme Court has ever made, must be corrected in order to provide the broadest protection to millions of American employees and consumers, and …
Labor-Relations Privilege: How Far Can We Tip The Scales To Hide The Truth, The, Joanna L. Byrne
Labor-Relations Privilege: How Far Can We Tip The Scales To Hide The Truth, The, Joanna L. Byrne
Journal of Dispute Resolution
In order to understand the precise effect the Peterson holding will have on labor-relations law and privilege creation, it is important to first understand how privileges have been created in the past, both traditionally and divergently. Next, it is important to apply the historical context of privilege creation to understand the critical thinking that determines when and how a new privilege should apply. Further, it is important to compare and contrast labor-relations privileges with other privileges in order to create proper limits and application of the labor-relations privilege. Applying this analytical framework to the facts, holding, and reasoning of the …
Missouri Courts Side With Employees Against The Eighth Circuit: Continued Employment Does Not Constitute Acceptance And Consideration For Mandatory Arbitration Agreements: Frye V. Speedway Chevrolet Cadillac, Laura Browne
Journal of Dispute Resolution
The question of whether continued employment constitutes acceptance and consideration for an employment contract, particularly applied to mandatory arbitration clauses, has split the authorities who decide on cases arising out of Missouri. The United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit, while purporting to apply Missouri law in cases arising out of Missouri, holds that an employee who continues to work for his or her employer after an arbitration program has been implemented is bound by it by the virtue of his or her continued employment. Missouri courts, however, disagree with this interpretation of Missouri law and held in …
Mediation In Employment And Creeping Legalism: Implications For Dispute Systems Design, Lisa Blomgren Bingham, Susan Summers Raines, Timothy Hedeen, Lisa Marie Napoli
Mediation In Employment And Creeping Legalism: Implications For Dispute Systems Design, Lisa Blomgren Bingham, Susan Summers Raines, Timothy Hedeen, Lisa Marie Napoli
Journal of Dispute Resolution
This article will explore the question of creeping legalism in mediation of statutory disputes arising out of employment. First, it will briefly review the issue of creeping legalism in arbitration. Second, it will introduce dispute systems design (DSD). Third, it will review the analogous debate on legalism in mediation in three design contexts: evaluative mediation of employment disputes in the court-connected setting, grievance mediation embedded in the collective bargaining agreement, and transformative mediation of employment disputes in the United States Postal Service's (USPS's) REDRESS program. Most employees do not face a choice among mediation models; instead, they choose among adjudicative …
Fallout From 14 Penn Plaza V. Pyett: Fractured Arbitration Systems In The Unionized Workplace, Ann C. Hodges
Fallout From 14 Penn Plaza V. Pyett: Fractured Arbitration Systems In The Unionized Workplace, Ann C. Hodges
Journal of Dispute Resolution
First, the article will review the history of arbitration of statutory employment claims, including the Pyett decision. Second, the article will look at the history and causes of legalism in arbitration. Then the article will consider the probable responses of employers and unions to Pyett. While predictions are necessarily speculative, it is likely that some unionized employers will seek to require employees to arbitrate statutory claims, perhaps in higher percentages than in the nonunion workplace. While unions may, and perhaps should, resist, many future collective bargaining agreements (CBAs) may contain such provisions. The article then discusses the alternative dispute resolution …
Evolving Schizophrenic Nature Of Labor Arbitration, The, Martin H. Malin
Evolving Schizophrenic Nature Of Labor Arbitration, The, Martin H. Malin
Journal of Dispute Resolution
Commentators have rightly criticized Pyett for its complete disregard of decades of established precedent. In this article, however, I situate the Pyett decision in the context of an ongoing evolution in labor arbitration as that institution has tried to accommodate the intrusion of public law claims into a private system of workplace self-governance. I suggest that labor arbitration has developed a kind of schizophrenic existence, preserving its role as a substitute for strikes and other workplace strife in a private system of self-governance while accommodating an additional role as a substitute for litigation of public law claims. Nevertheless, I find …
Elevator Company Goes Down: Mandatory Arbitration Provisions As Applied To Pending Civil Rights Claims In The Employment Context, Miranda Fleschert
Elevator Company Goes Down: Mandatory Arbitration Provisions As Applied To Pending Civil Rights Claims In The Employment Context, Miranda Fleschert
Journal of Dispute Resolution
In Goldsmith v. Bagby Elevator Company, the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals carved a distinction in the employment context between mandatory predispute arbitration agreements and compulsory arbitration agreements as applied to pending claims of discrimination. In doing so, the court warns employers that any effort to terminate an employee's rights with respect to a pending Equal Employment Opportunity Commission ("EEOC") claim by instituting a mandatory arbitration provision will be seen as impermissibly retaliatory. Amid the backdrop of a case in which supervisors routinely called black employees "monkeys," "slaves," and "niggers," the court makes a well-meaning attempt at preserving employees' statutorily …
Knowing And Voluntary Standard: Is The Sixth Circuit's Test Enough To Level The Playing Field In Mandatory Employment Arbitration, The, Christina Semmer
Knowing And Voluntary Standard: Is The Sixth Circuit's Test Enough To Level The Playing Field In Mandatory Employment Arbitration, The, Christina Semmer
Journal of Dispute Resolution
Most courts require that for an individual to waive her Seventh Amendment right to trial by jury, she must knowingly and voluntarily waive that right. This heightened requirement for waiver exists because the United States Supreme Court has found that "[tlhe trial by jury is justly dear to the American people... and every encroachment upon it has been watched with great jealousy." Seemingly this standard should apply to mandatory employment arbitration agreements, as shifting the venue from the courts to the arbitral tribunal implicitly means waiving the right to trial by jury. However, because the Federal Arbitration Act ("FAA") requires …
Last Chance Agreements: How Many Chances Is An Employee Entitled To, Kathleen Birkhofer
Last Chance Agreements: How Many Chances Is An Employee Entitled To, Kathleen Birkhofer
Journal of Dispute Resolution
Over the years, a large number of cases involving labor issues have gone to arbitration. Of these labor cases, a distinct sub-category are those governed by the Railway Labor Act (RLA). In labor cases, including those governed by the RLA, the Supreme Court has repeatedly reaffirmed the strong federal policy in favor of arbitration. Furthermore, courts have consistently held that great deference must be shown toward the arbitrator when reviewing an arbitration award. However, there are still issues that arise as to just how much deference should be afforded to an arbitrator's decision and when a court can overturn an …
Use Of Mediation In Employment Discrimination Cases, The, Matt A. Mayer
Use Of Mediation In Employment Discrimination Cases, The, Matt A. Mayer
Journal of Dispute Resolution
This Article will address the issues noted above. Part II discusses the realities for employers and employees created by the increased filing of employment discrimination claims. Part III encapsulates the procedural movement of a claim through the EEOC. Part IV summarizes the mediation process and notes why mediation is one of the methods used to deal with these claims. Part V highlights the pros and cons associated with the mediation of employment discrimination claims. Part VI discusses the inherent tensions between the goals of mediation and the goals of the anti-discrimination laws, as well as the inherent tensions that naturally …
Employment Protection And Domestic Violence: Addressing Abuse In The Labor Grievance Process, Jennifer Atterbury
Employment Protection And Domestic Violence: Addressing Abuse In The Labor Grievance Process, Jennifer Atterbury
Journal of Dispute Resolution
The effects of domestic violence are not limited to the home environment. Its effects are felt in employment when abused employees are absent from work and when violent incidents erupt in the workplace. For example, a bruised employee might be too injured and embarrassed to attend work, or an estranged spouse might stalk and harass a victim on the job. Another issue arises in that employers often discipline victims of domestic violence for absenteeism and incidents of violence that occur in the workplace. Discipline of union members is governed by collective bargaining agreements and subject to the labor grievance process. …
Wrongful Discharge: Litigation Or Arbitration, Terry A. Bethel
Wrongful Discharge: Litigation Or Arbitration, Terry A. Bethel
Journal of Dispute Resolution
Throughout the country, courts are scrambling to fill the void left by the rapid disappearance of the employment-at-will doctrine. As recently as twenty years ago, most courts accepted without question the adage that employers were free to terminate employees for a good reason, a bad reason, or no reason at alL1 If motivated to explain this rule, the most frequent defense was that employees enjoyed comparable freedom. They, too, could abandon the relationship for whatever reason they desired.
Transforming At-Will Employment Disputes Into Wrongful Discharge Claims: Fertile Ground For Adr, Mary A. Bedikian
Transforming At-Will Employment Disputes Into Wrongful Discharge Claims: Fertile Ground For Adr, Mary A. Bedikian
Journal of Dispute Resolution
This Article begins by reviewing the historical evolution of the at-will rule and examining the common law wrongful dismissal theories. Next, it describes the recent trend of arbitrating wrongful discharge disputes, a trend which the author suggests provides a practical, sound forum for the resolution of employment claims.' 3 Finally, since arbitration is in derogation of the common law, this Article discusses the constitutional and pragmatic barriers to full-scale reform and use of arbitration. The author concludes that fragmentation of interests, political motivations, and the reluctance of the United States Supreme Court to confront an indispensable provision of the Federal …
Demise Of The Faa's Contract Of Employment Exception - Gilmer V. Interstate/Johnson Lane Corp., The, Michael G. Holcomb
Demise Of The Faa's Contract Of Employment Exception - Gilmer V. Interstate/Johnson Lane Corp., The, Michael G. Holcomb
Journal of Dispute Resolution
The recent trend in the federal courts is to expand the scope of the Federal Arbitration Act2 (FAA) to include statutory claims. 3 Gilmer v. Interstate/Johnson Lane Corp. illustrates this trend by compelling claims under the Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 19674 (ADEA) to arbitration pursuant to an arbitration clause in an employment contract' But does this trend neglect the rights of the individual employee vis-a-vis his employer and does it undermine the purpose of the "contract of employment" exception in the FAA?' This Note will examine the Gilmer case and its adherence to the current trend of expanding …