Document ID: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-caDC-93-01388/USCOURTS-caDC-93-01388-0/pdf.json

Parties Involved:
Federal Labor Relations Authority
Respondent
National Treasury Employees Union
Intervenor
United States Department of the Treasury
Petitioner

Document Text:

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United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT

Argued October 12, 1994 Decided December 30, 1994

No. 93-1388

UNITED STATES DEPARTMENT OF THE TREASURY,

UNITED STATES CUSTOMS SERVICE,

PETITIONER

v.

FEDERAL LABOR RELATIONS AUTHORITY,

RESPONDENT

NATIONAL TREASURY EMPLOYEES UNION,

INTERVENOR

Petition for Review of an Order of the

Federal Labor Relations Authority

Marc P. Richman, Attorney, Department of Justice, argued the cause

for petitioner. With him on the briefs were Frank W. Hunger,

Assistant Attorney General, and William G. Kanter, Attorney,

Department of Justice.

William E. Persina, Attorney, Federal Labor Relations Authority,

argued the cause for respondent. With him on the brief was David

M. Smith, Solicitor, Federal Labor Relations Authority. Arthur A.

Horowitz and Pamela P. Johnson, Attorneys, entered appearances for

respondent.

Elaine D. Kaplan, Deputy General Counsel, National Treasury

Employees Union, argued the cause for intervenor. With her on the

brief was Gregory O'Duden, General Counsel, National Treasury

Employees Union. Barbara A. Atkin, Attorney, entered an appearance

for intervenor.

Before: EDWARDS, Chief Judge, SILBERMAN and RANDOLPH, Circuit

Judges.

Opinion for the Court filed by Circuit Judge SILBERMAN.

SILBERMAN, Circuit Judge: The government appeals the Federal

Labor Relations Authority's affirmance of an arbitrator's award

that held a regulation issued by the Customs Service in violation

of a statute regulating coastwise trade. The Authority challenges

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our jurisdiction to review its order. We hold instead that the

arbitrator and the FLRA exceeded their own jurisdiction.

I.

At the time this case arose, § 1448(a) of the federal customs

laws required ships originating from "a foreign port or place" to

make "formal entry" with United States customs officials before

unloading any goods or passengers at a United States port. 19

U.S.C. § 1448(a) (1988) (superseded). Formal entry entails the

presentation of the ship's manifest and other documentation at the

port customshouse and was required of such vessels at all U.S.

ports of call. Id. Since ships often arrive when customshouses

are closed and formal entry impossible, Congress also provided for

"preliminary entry" to enable unloading prior to formal entry. A

ship's captain could make preliminary entry "by making oath or

affirmation to the truth of the statements contained in the

vessel's manifest and delivering the manifest to the customs

officer who boards such vessel." Id. When preliminary entry was

requested, the Customs Service would arrange to have customs

personnel available to meet an incoming vessel and receive the

manifest, after which cargo could be unloaded to approved

warehouses or container yards pending formal entry. See id. The

costs of this special attention were borne by the shipper. See 19

U.S.C. § 261 (1988) (repealed 1993).

In 1990, the Customs Service adopted the Coastwise Advanced

Preliminary Entry (CAPE) program for its operations in the

Southeastern United States. The program streamlined preliminary

entry for so-called "coastwise vessels"those ships originating

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1In United States Customs Serv. v. FLRA, 854 F.2d 1414 (D.C.

Cir. 1988), we decided that the Customs Service could not be

required to negotiate over implementation of an "experimental"

preliminary entry program along roughly similar lines for its

Pacific Region operations. We held that the NTEU's

counter-proposal would "directly interfere" with the Service's

"reserved authority" and therefore was not subject to required

bargaining. Id. at 1418-20. 

from a foreign port that have already made a formal entry with U.S.

customs. Technological innovations such as the capacity to

transmit manifests electronically in advance of arriving vessels

had made unnecessary the actual physical transfer of manifests to

waiting customs officials. Accordingly, the CAPE program

effectively eliminated boarding as a routine aspect of preliminary

entry.

An expected consequence of the change in policyand one highly

disagreeable to the National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU), which

represents the customs employees affected by the CAPE programwas

a diminution in the amount of lucrative overtime work assigned to

customs agents, who were no longer needed to meet arriving vessels

at odd hours of the day or night. Although not required to do so,

the Service offered to negotiate over "appropriate arrangements"

for employees adversely affected by the new program.1 The union

rejected this proposal, however, and instead filed a grievance

under the collective bargaining agreement.

Under the Federal Service Labor-Management Relations Statute

(FSLMRS or Statute), 5 U.S.C. § 7121 (1988), collective bargaining

agreements between federal agencies and unions representing their

employees must "provide procedures for the settlement of

grievances." The Statute defines "grievances" to comprise any

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complaint concerning

(i) the effect or interpretation, or a claim of breach,

of a collective bargaining agreement; or

(ii) any claimed violation, misinterpretation, or

misapplication of any law, rule, or regulation affecting

conditions of employment....

Id. § 7103(a)(9)(C). Parties are not required to adopt a grievance

procedure coextensive with the Statute's provision, see id. §

7121(a)(2) (the parties' contract "may exclude any matter from the

application of the grievance procedures"), but the collective

bargaining agreement between the Customs Service and the NTEU

defines "grievance" in language identical to that of §

7103(a)(9)(C).

The union's grievance alleged that the Service's decision not

to require actual boarding as a component of preliminary entry

under the CAPE program violated § 1448(a) as well as its primary

implementing regulations. The union argued that since the customs

law requires delivery of "the manifest to the customs officer who

boards such vessel," 19 U.S.C. § 1448(a) (emphasis added), the

Customs Service could not legally dispense with boarding.

Initially, the arbitrator dismissed the union's complaint.

"The statutory and regulatory provisions upon which the union

relies," he decided, "do not fall within the contractual category"

of grievance. Although the CAPE program could be thought to

"affect conditions of employment," the arbitrator reasoned that

"every law-related action of the Agency has some impact on its

employees" (emphasis added), and therefore a mere effect was an

"insufficient nexus" to establish an arbitrable grievance. He

thought that whether a particular "law, rule, or regulation"

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2Section 7122(a) provides:

Either party to arbitration under this chapter may file

with the Authority an exception to any arbitrator's

award pursuant to the arbitration.... If upon review

the Authority finds that the award is deficient

(1) because it is contrary to any law, rule, or

regulation; or

(2) on other grounds similar to those applied by

federal courts in private sector labor-management

relations;

the Authority may take such action and make such

recommendations concerning the award as it considers

necessary, consistent with applicable laws, rules, and

regulations. 

3Section 7106 is captioned "Management Rights." In relevant

part, subsection (a) states:

provided a cognizable basis for grievances should be answered by

drawing upon a "zone of interest" analysisi.e., by determining

whether the law was intended to benefit the employees on whose

behalf the grievance was brought. Persuaded that § 1448(a) was not

enacted with the interests of Customs officers in mind, he

concluded that the dispute was not arbitrable.

The union appealed his decision to the FLRA, which has

authority to review arbitration awards under 5 U.S.C. § 7122.2 The

Authority determined that the arbitrator had too narrowly construed

the term "grievance" as used in the Statute. United States Dep't

of Treasury, United States Customs Serv. v. NTEU (Customs I ), 43

F.L.R.A. No. 72, at 4-5 (1992). The Authority reasoned that "law"

as used in § 7103(a)(9)(C)(ii) had the same scope as the term

"applicable law" under § 7106(a), the section of the Statute that

sets forth the management prerogatives of covered federal

agencies.3 Id. at 4. Under that latter section, an agency acting

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[N]othing in this chapter shall affect the authority of

any management official of any agency

(1) to determine the mission, budget,

organization, number of employees, and internal

security practices of the agency; and

(2) in accordance with applicable laws

(A) to hire, assign, direct, layoff, and

retain employees in the agency, or to

suspend, remove, reduce in grade or pay, or

take other disciplinary action against such

employees;

(B) to assign work, to make determinations

with respect to contracting out, and to

determine the personnel by which agency

operations shall be conducted;

(C) with respect to filling positions, to

make selections for appointments from

(i) among properly ranked and certified

candidates for promotion; or

(ii) any other appropriate source; and

(D) to take whatever actions may be necessary

to carry out the agency mission during

emergencies.

5 U.S.C. § 7106(a). 

"in accordance with applicable laws" is guaranteed authority,

notwithstanding any provision of the FSLMRS, to make all major

personnel decisions. Since the Authority had previously

interpreted "applicable law" to "include[ ] provisions of the U.S.

Code, the U.S. Constitution, controlling judicial decisions, and

Presidential Executive Orders," so long as they "relate to the

conditions of employment of unit employees," National Treasury

Employees Union & U.S. Dep't of Treasury, Bureau of Pub. Debt, 42

F.L.R.A. 1333, 1337, 1338 (1991) (Bureau Pub. Debt ), it read "law"

under § 7103(a)(9)(C)(ii) to have the same broad meaning. Nor was

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4Although the overtime pay that the customs officers would

have received but for the CAPE program would have been charged to

the shippers, see 19 U.S.C. § 261, the Customs Service was

saddled with paying the back pay damages. 

the term limited to "statutes that prescribe employee rights and

benefits." Customs I, 43 F.L.R.A. No. 72, at 4 (quoting Bureau

Pub. Debt, 42 F.L.R.A. at 1338). In short, there are no

definitional constraints on the available grounds for grievances

under § 7103(a)(9)(C)(ii) other than that the law in question

"affect" conditions of employment in some way in a particular

circumstance.

The Authority remanded the case to the arbitrator, and, after

being so instructed concerning the Statute's meaning, he determined

that since the collective bargaining agreement defined a grievance

in the same terms as did the Statute, the union had put forward an

arbitrable dispute by alleging a violation of § 1448(a). On the

merits, the arbitrator held that the CAPE program was inconsistent

with § 1448(a) (and the Customs Service's own regulations) by

virtue of having dispensed with boarding as an element of

preliminary entry. To redress the violation, the arbitrator

awarded back pay to the relevant customs officials in the amount

that they would have earned but for the CAPE program; he also

ordered the Customs Service "to comply with all applicable laws,

rules and regulations in the future."4

This time the Service appealed to the FLRA, arguing that §

1448(a) was not grievable under the FSLMRS and, alternatively, that

the CAPE program did not violate that section of the customs laws.

Without any deference to the Customs Service's interpretation of a

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law that Congress entrusted to the Service to enforce, compare

Chevron U.S.A. Inc. v. Natural Resources Defense Council, Inc., 467

U.S. 837 (1984) (federal appellate courts owe deference to

agencies' interpretations of the statutes they are charged with

administering when the statutes are silent or ambiguous with

respect to the issues in question), the FLRA held that § 1448(a)

plainly contemplated physical boarding as an aspect of preliminary

entry. The Authority also dismissed the Service's argument that

the arbitrator's award transgressed its management prerogatives

under § 7106(a) of the Statute. United States Dep't of Treasury,

United States Customs Serv. v. NTEU, 46 F.L.R.A. No. 137, 1439,

1443 (1993).

The Customs Service's request for rehearing was denied; it

then petitioned for review of the Authority's decision. Congress

has since amended § 1448(a) so as expressly to provide for

preliminary entry through electronic communication. See Pub. L.

No. 103-182, Title VI, § 656, 107 Stat. 2211 (1993). Consequently,

only the back pay portion of the arbitrator's award remains in the

case.

II.

We are faced, then, with the FLRA's construction of a statute

drafted by Congress to govern an aspect of foreign trade, the

importation of ships' cargo into the United States. The petitioner

presents us with a volley of arguments to support its claim that

the Authority improperly compelled the arbitrator, against his

better judgment, to interpret a law never meant to regulate labor

relations or the assignment of work to employeesand then itself

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interpreted the law wrongly. The Authority's primary defense is

jurisdictional. Neither we nor any court, it is argued, has the

power to review the FLRA's decision no matter what "law" the

arbitrator and the Authority applied in the case.

The Authority's argument concerning our lack of subject matter

jurisdiction is based on the express preclusion of judicial review

set forth in § 7123(a) of the Statute:

Any person aggrieved by any final order of the Authority

other than an order under

(1) section 7122 of this title (involving an award

by an arbitrator), unless the order involves an

unfair labor practice ...

* * *

may ... institute an action for judicial review of the

Authority's order....

5 U.S.C. § 7123(a) (emphasis added).

We have recognized that the merits of an arbitrator's award

that implicates only the collective bargaining agreement are, by

virtue of the categorical nature of this provision, absolutely

immune from judicial review. United States Dep't of Justice v.

FLRA, 981 F.2d 1339, 1342 (D.C. Cir. 1993). The Authority's role

in reviewing such awards, by contrast, depends on the nature of the

exception raised by the complaining party. If the arbitrator's

decision is attacked "because it is contrary to any law, rule, or

regulation," the Authority reviews the legal question de novo. 5

U.S.C. § 7122(a)(1). If, on the other hand, the objection is not

one of law, but of contract, the Authority's role is limited to

that of "federal courts in private sector labor-management

relations." Id. § 7122(a)(2). See also United Steelworkers v.

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Enterprise Wheel & Car Corp., 363 U.S. 593, 597 (1960) (district

court must enforce arbitration award if it "draws its essence" from

the parties' agreement). In either event the Authority is the

final stop "unless the order involves an unfair labor practice."

This case does not. We are told, however, that the union has filed

an unfair labor practice charge against the Service for its refusal

to comply with the arbitrator's award. Once the Authority

determinesas it would be expected to do in light of its opinion

affirming the awardthat the Service committed an unfair labor

practice by refusing to comply with the award, the Service could

petition for review of that order. The Customs Service suggests

that at that point we might have jurisdiction to review the

arbitrator's award even if we lack it now. In light of that

prospect, it moved after oral argument to hold the case in abeyance

until the conclusion of the unfair labor practice proceedings.

The Authority contends, however, that to read § 7123(a) of the

Statute to permit judicial review of an arbitrator's award when the

FLRA seeks to enforce it would be to circumvent, indeed nullify,

Congress' deliberate preclusion of judicial review of arbitrators'

awards. Its position has been endorsed by the Ninth Circuit in

United States Marshals Serv. v. FLRA, 778 F.2d 1432, 1435-36 (9th

Cir. 1985), and the Second Circuit in United States Dep't of

Justice v. FLRA, 792 F.2d 25, 27-28 (2d Cir. 1986), and we too

agree with the Authority. It does not appear that either a federal

agency or a public-sector union has any means to enforce an

arbitrator's award other than to file an unfair labor practice

charge. See Columbia Power Trades Council v. United States Dep't

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of Energy, 671 F.2d 325, 329 (9th Cir. 1982) (refusing on these

grounds to issue a writ of mandamus ordering compliance with

arbitration award). In light of our holding that the district

courts lack jurisdiction to review arbitration awards arising under

the FSLMRS, see Griffith v. FLRA, 842 F.2d 487, 491 (D.C. Cir.

1988), it is doubtful that district courts have jurisdiction to

enforce such awardsas they do in the private sector, where limited

review is available. And surely it would have been senseless for

Congress to preclude judicial review of arbitration awards except

when they are sought to be enforced by the only means available.

Limiting judicial review under those conditions would be of no

significance since an unenforceable award is a nullity, which no

one would need or want to be reviewed.

We must bear in mind, moreover, that the typical arbitrator's

award interprets a collective bargaining agreement, and if at the

enforcement stage we gained jurisdiction to review the FLRA's

affirmance of the award, we would be obliged to review even rather

minor applications of such agreementsa result Congress clearly

wished to avoid. See Department of Justice, 981 F.2d at 1342;

Griffith, 842 F.2d at 491.

Of course, the phrase "involves an unfair labor practice" in

§ 7123(a) must have some meaning. We think Congress contemplated

and was concerned about the sort of case that arises quite often in

the private sector when an arbitrator's award is based in part on

the unfair labor practice provisions of the National Labor

Relations Act. See, e.g., Utility Workers Union v. NLRB, No. 93-

1350, slip op. at 11-12 (D.C. Cir. Nov. 18, 1994) (arbitrator's

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5For an FLRA review of an arbitration award to be deemed to

"involve" an unfair labor practice within the meaning of §

7122(a)(2)and therefore to be reviewable under § 7123(a)(1)"a

statutory unfair labor practice must be either an explicit ground

for, or be necessarily implicated by, the Authority's decision." 

United States Dep't of Interior v. FLRA, 26 F.3d 179, 183 (D.C.

Cir. 1994) (quoting Overseas Educ. Ass'n v. FLRA, 824 F.2d 61,

67-68 (D.C. Cir. 1987)). 

decision may be deferred to in resolving unfair labor practice).

In such a case, the FLRA's interpretation of the Act advanced in

the process of reviewing the arbitrator's award would be subject to

judicial review.5

Concluding, as we do, that our jurisdiction would not be

enhanced if this dispute were to come to us as an agency petition

for review of an unfair labor practice determination, we are

obliged to consider carefully whether we have jurisdiction now

because, if not now it would be, as the Authority argues, never.

The Customs Service relies primarily on two rather unpersuasive

arguments to establish our subject matter jurisdiction. The first

is that the broad management rights section of the Statute, §

7106(a), which states that "nothing in this chapter shall affect

the authority of any management official of any agency" to

determine the agency's mission, somehow overrides the

jurisdictional bar if judicial review is necessary to ensure the

Service's right to determine its mission (i.e., if the FLRA has

decided a case against the government). That would mean that if

both a federal agency and a union were dissatisfied with an FLRA

opinion upholding an arbitrator's interpretation of a statute, we

would have jurisdiction over only the issues presented in the

agency's petition. That seems to us to be a labored, even silly,

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6The Leedom exception is premised on the original federal

subject matter jurisdiction of the district courts. See 358 U.S.

at 188-90 (citing Switchmen's Union v. National Mediation Bd.,

320 U.S. 297, 300 (1943)). Even if Leedom did apply to the

FLRA's actions, it would therefore not confer jurisdiction upon

us to hear this case. The Leedom exception obtains in those

cases where direct appellate reviewwhat the Service seeks

hereis presumptively foreclosed. See id. at 187; cf.

Oestereich v. Selective Serv. Sys. Local Bd. No. 11, 393 U.S.

233, 237 (1968). 

construction of the statute. There is not the slightest indication

that Congress intended such an asymmetrical construction of its

limitation on judicial reviewor, indeed, that the substantive

provision of the management rights clause would have any

applicability to the provision precluding judicial review.

According to the Service's arguments, whether we had jurisdiction

would depend on whether the FLRA's adverse decision trammelled core

management rights. We would only have jurisdiction if we had

already concluded that the dispute had to be resolved in

management's favor.

Also wide of the mark is the Service's reliance on Leedom v.

Kyne, 358 U.S. 184 (1958), to circumvent the statutory preclusion.

Leedom stands for the proposition that if an agency openly violates

a clear mandate of a statute even a preclusion of judicial review

(in that case implied) will not bar judicial intervention. See id.

at 188-91. There is no such clear transgression of a substantive

statutory mandate here.6

The key question presented, as we see the case, is the proper

scope of § 7123(a)'s express preclusion of judicial review. Can it

be that the FLRA's interpretation of any "law"including the

Constitution, judicial decisions, or any statuteis immune from

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judicial review? (On the Authority's understanding, it is not even

open to us to ask whether a particular law has any effect

whatsoever on employment conditions; once the Authority is

satisfied that a law falls within the limitation imposed by §

7103(a)(9)(C)(ii) ("any law, rule, or regulation affecting

conditions of employment ") (emphasis added), its determination to

that effect would foreclose our review.) In answering this

questionas the government maintains and the Authority does not

disputewe owe no deference to the Authority's interpretation of

any statutory language that bears on our jurisdiction. See, e.g.,

Ramey v. Bowsher, 9 F.3d 133, 136 n.7 (D.C. Cir. 1993); Chrysler

Corp. v. EPA, 600 F.2d 904, 913 (D.C. Cir. 1979).

Although the Authority did not, either in its brief or at oral

argument, acknowledge the point, we have already rejected the

Authority's positionat least as it relates to collateral

constitutional claims. In Griffith, we observed that the "maxim

that congressional preclusion of judicial review must be "clear and

convincing' applies in a particularly rigorous fashion ... when

constitutional claims are at stake," 842 F.2d at 494, and went on

to hold that Congress had not expressed itself in such a fashion in

the FSLMRS. We thought it clear that Congress expected the FLRA's

review of arbitrators' awards to track closely the federal courts'

limited review of arbitrators' awards in the private sector. Id.

at 491. In the private sector an arbitrator interpreting a

collective bargaining agreement would not be expected to apply

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7In Griffith, an employee complained that the agency had

failed to follow appropriate procedures in denying her a pay

raise; an arbitrator ruled in her favor, but was reversed by the

FLRA. She brought suit in district court in part claiming that

the manner in which the FLRA disposed of her case (by not

remanding to the arbitrator) violated her right to due process. 

See 854 F.2d at 490. 

8An arbitrator is often confronted with contract language

that mirrors a statute, but in that event the arbitrator's

interpretation would not be described as "applying" the federal

law. 

constitutional law.7

Of course, an arbitrator in the private sector would not be

expected to apply a federal statute either.8 The private sector

arbitrator must confine himself to interpreting the agreement; so

long as he does his award is virtually unreviewable. See

Enterprise Wheel & Car, 363 U.S. at 596-97. By contrast, under the

Federal Service Labor-Management Relations Statute arbitrators are

given direct authority to interpret "any law, rule, or regulation

affecting conditions of employment" unless the parties' collective

bargaining agreement specifically limits the scope of grievances.

5 U.S.C. § 7121(a)(2). And in Griffith, which in part involved the

FLRA's modification of an arbitrator's award based on a different

interpretation of the Back Pay Act, we concluded that any further

judicial review of the statutory claim was barred. 842 F.2d at

494. That case, however, concerned the interstices of a federal

statute that undisputedly was designed to deal directly with

employee working conditions. Id. at 494 ("[T]he legal error, if

any, is at most one of failing to capture some marginal nuance of

the Back Pay Act."). Here we are confronted with an arbitrator's

interpretation of a statute governing international trade which

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could hardly be thought to have been crafted with any regard for

Customs Service employees.

It seems clear to us that § 7123(a) (the preclusion of

judicial review of arbitrated disputes) must be read in light of §

7103(a) (the definition of permissible grounds for grievances).

Congress obviously assumed in drafting the former provision that an

arbitrator would never have occasion to interpret a law that did

not affect working conditions. The term "affecting working

conditions," in turn, must have been thought to impose a real

limitation on an arbitrator's authority. The FLRA's construction

of that phrase would, however, deprive it of any limiting

principle. Absolutely any law could under some circumstances have

some adverse consequences on the working conditions of one or more

employees. The Authority's definition thus does not restrict the

category of laws that may be brought to arbitration, but only

suggests that a law may be the subject of a grievance if an

employee is somehow aggrieved by its applicationwhich in essence

reduces the limitation to a standing requirement. We think,

rather, that a "law, rule, or regulation affecting conditions of

employment" can be only interpreted, as it initially was by the

arbitrator in this case, to confine grievances to alleged

violations of a statute or regulation that can be said to have been

issued for the very purpose of affecting the working conditions of

employeesnot one that merely incidentally does so. Once the §

7103(a) language is given that meaning it becomes apparent that a

"grievance" predicated on a claim of violation of a law that is not

directed toward employee working conditions is outside both the

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9If the FLRA were to uphold an arbitrator's determination

that an agency action had violated the Constitution, review would

lie in this court for the purpose of determining whether the FLRA

had exceeded its jurisdiction. On the other hand, a claim that

the arbitration or FLRA procedures were unconstitutional would

have to be brought as a collateral challenge in the district

court, as was the case in Griffith. See 854 F.2d at 494-95; see

also McNary v. Hatian Refugee Ctr., Inc., 498 U.S. 479, 491

(1991); Reno v. Catholic Social Servs., Inc., 113 S. Ct. 2485,

2499 (1993). The appellate and district courts, then, each have

distinct, limited, and exclusive jurisdiction based on the nature

of the claim. See Ayuda, Inc. v. Thornburgh, 948 F.2d 742, 753

(D.C. Cir. 1991); Telecommunications Research & Action Ctr. v.

FCC, 750 F.2d 70, 77-79 (D.C. Cir. 1984). 

10Major administrative boards and commissions (such as, for

example, the Federal Communication Commission, the Federal Trade

Commission, the National Labor Relations Board, the Securities

and Exchange Commission) usually have at least five members at

the rank of executive level 4 and a chairman at level 3. See 5

U.S.C. §§ 5314, 5315 (1988). The Authority's two members are

level 5 officials and its chairman is at level 4. See id. §§

5315, 5316. 

arbitrator's and the FLRA's jurisdiction.9

The very preclusion of judicial review suggests powerfully

that Congress could not have contemplated, let alone intended, that

all or any part of American law would be definitively interpreted

by the FLRA on review of one or a series of cases originally put to

arbitration. To give any administrative tribunal such final

authority to construe any or all statutes or treaties of the United

States would be a staggering delegation, which surely would have

provoked considerable congressional debate. That Congress would

entrust such sweeping authority to a minor three-member commission

with quite restricted expertise is, when one ponders the matter,

utterly inconceivable.10

The Authority was led into its farfetched, if self-serving,

misconstruction of § 7103(a)(9)(C)(ii) (the definition of

grievance) by effectively equating the phrase "law, rule, or

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11Although the IRS case, like the case at bar, involved an

FLRA effort to give an expansive meaning to the phrase "law,

rule, or regulation affecting conditions of employment," the

Court did not consider the scope of the limitation "affecting

conditions of employment" because it held that the management

rights section foreclosed the Authority's determination that the

union's proposed grievance procedure was negotiable. See 494

U.S. at 928-32. 

regulation affecting conditions of employment" with the term

"applicable laws" in the management rights section. The latter

provision, as we have noted, ensures that an agency acting in

"accordance with applicable laws" may make virtually all the most

important decisions respecting personnel matters without regard to

any provision of the entire FSLMRS. As such, the term "applicable

law" might well include laws that compel certain personnel actions

but which are by no means directed to working conditions.

Therefore, an "applicable law" could easily have a much broader

subject matter scope than a "law, rule, or regulation affecting

working conditions." Indeed, the Supreme Court has already

rejected the Authority's equation of "applicable law" in §

7106(a)(2) with "law, rule, or regulation" in § 7103(a)(9)(C)(ii)

in Department of Treasury, IRS v. FLRA, 494 U.S. 922, 931-32

(1990). To be sure, in that case the Court was faced with the

reverse argument. The FLRA had maintained that any "law, rule, or

regulation affecting conditions of employment" was an "applicable

law," and therefore could be relied upon to require management to

negotiate matters touching upon its exclusive prerogatives under §

7106(a). The Court rejected that claim on the obvious ground that

whereas the former phrase included rules and regulations, the

latter did not.11 The Authority argues, however, that although the

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content of "applicable laws" may well be narrower than that of law,

rule, or regulation affecting employment, all components of the

former phrase fit within the latter. We disagree. A government

agency, for example, might well assert that the Constitution itself

dictated the manner in which it "hired or laid off " employees,

and, as in this case, the assignment of work will almost always to

some extent reflect the agency's efforts to give effect to the

statutes Congress has charged it with administeringstatutes not

directed to employee working conditions. This is not to say that

the FLRA does not have authority to reject an agency's

interpretation of a law applicable to certain personnel actions

covered under § 7106(a). Butand it is a big buta dispute between

an agency and the FLRA concerning an interpretation of a law

applicable to the exercise of management prerogatives will almost

always arise in a negotiability case or unfair labor practice

proceeding, and, following the statutory design for such questions,

may ultimately be brought to a federal court of appeals.

Accordingly, there was no reason for Congress to limit "applicable

laws" in § 7106 as it did "law, rule, or regulation" in §

7103(a)(9)(C)(ii) to those that affect (are directed to) working

conditions.

In sum, we conclude that the arbitrator essentially got it

right the first time. A grievance claiming a "violation,

misinterpretation, or misapplication of a law, rule, or regulation"

may be brought under § 7103(a)(9)(C)(ii) (assuming the relevant

agreement tracks the statutory definition) if the particular legal

authority relied upon was fashioned for the purpose of regulating

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the working conditions of employees. Our review is available for

the limited purpose of determining whether the Authority exceeds

its jurisdiction. Having determined that it did so here, we grant

the petition for review.

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