Deflategate, Collective Bargaining, and Arbitration

Lisa Gelernter (SUNY-Buffalo, and a Bills fan) writes to share her take on the Second Circuit’s decision upholding the four-game suspension of Tom Brady of the Patriots for the deflate-gate scandal. [Side note: all the NFL's footballs are manufactured right here in Ada, Ohio -- come visit the factory, and ONU Law School, some time!]

I've cut-and-pasted Lisa's comments here:

 

The [Second Circuit] overturned the district court’s vacatur of what the parties (including the union) all characterized as an arbitrator’s award.  The “arbitrator” in the case was NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell, who under the clear language of the collective bargaining agreement, was allowed to appoint himself as the hearing officer reviewing his decision to suspend Brady.

The Second Circuit’s opinion was totally consistent with the Supreme Court’s doctrine on the limited judicial review available for arbitration awards.  The twist in this case is that the arbitrator was not a neutral party – Goodell was reviewing his own decision.  The Second Circuit said that since the CBA specifically provided for this unusual review process, the court had to adhere to what the parties had agreed to.  Although that seems right in the collective bargaining context when both parties are on somewhat equal footing in terms of bargaining power, hopefully that reasoning will not be carried over into consumer and employment arbitrations where the individual consumer or employee may not realize that he or she is “agreeing” to a partial arbitrator.  After all, the Supreme Court has said that the reason that the FAA allows for enforcement of arbitration agreements is to allow for an alternative to litigation in court, which presumes some minimal level of procedural fairness and neutrality.

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