Opinion ID: 200402
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Whether the arbitrators exceeded their authority

Text: 24 JCI argues that the arbitrators were limited to interpreting the Telecommunications Labor Agreement, under which Local 103 brought its grievance. From this, JCI reasons that the arbitrators exceeded their authority by: (1) deciding an issue governed by another agreement (the Jurisdictional Agreement), (2) invalidating the Jurisdictional Agreement, (3) deciding an issue involving a non-party to the arbitration (Local 2222), and (4) reviewing JCI's CBA with and recognition of Local 2222. 25 For almost forty years it has been clear that arbitrators can resolve jurisdictional disputes involving an employer and two local unions, whether the dispute is (1) a controversy as to whether certain work should be performed by workers in one bargaining unit or those in another; or (2) a controversy as to which union should represent the employees doing particular work. Carey v. Westinghouse Elec. Corp., 375 U.S. 261, 263, 84 S.Ct. 401, 11 L.Ed.2d 320 (1964). Carey held that the employer must arbitrate a work assignment jurisdictional dispute on the demand of only one union. Id. at 265-66, 84 S.Ct. 401. Sometimes the second union seeks to intervene in the arbitration, sometimes not, and this case involves no issue of arbitral authority to compel the second union's participation. See Elkouri & Elkouri: How Arbitration Works 350-51 (M.M. Volz & E.P. Goggin eds., 5th ed.1997). Thus, there was nothing wrong in principle with the arbitrators reviewing the agreement with one local although a different local had some interests at stake. Of necessity, Carey means arbitrators may have to review the intersections of different labor agreements in the course of applying one of them. 26 JCI's argument that a problem arises because Local 2222, a non-party, is bound by the agreement is simply wrong. The arbitral order does not purport to be binding on Local 2222 and no relief is ordered as to that Local. It is true that, until and unless JCI withdraws from the Telecommunications Labor Agreement, JCI will have to pay Local 103 for the privilege of using Local 2222 members to do work the Committee found to be within the scope of the Telecommunications Labor Agreement. That may deter JCI from using Local 2222 workers, and Local 2222 may feel its contract is violated and grieve as a result. But that is a problem of the company's own making. 27 The argument that the arbitrators exceeded their authority by considering the Jurisdictional Agreement is also unavailing. JCI did not assert at the arbitration hearing that the Jurisdictional Agreement deprived the arbitrators of jurisdiction; nor did it reserve the issue of the meaning of the Jurisdictional Agreement during the arbitration hearing; nor did it refuse arbitration for any reason, much less on the ground that the arbitrators had no authority over the Jurisdictional Agreement. Once the submission to the arbitrators was made without such a reservation, it was for the arbitrators to determine the scope of their own authority. See Dorado Beach Hotel Corp. v. Unión de Trabajadores de la Industria Gastronómica de P.R. Local 610, 959 F.2d 2, 4-5 (1st Cir.1992) ([W]e normally will defer to an arbitrator's interpretation of the arbitral authority conferred by the CBA and the parties' submissions.). 28 Also, it was JCI which asked the arbitrators to consider the Jurisdictional Agreement when JCI relied on that Agreement in its defense to the grievance. JCI argued that the construction of the Telecommunications Labor Agreement must be undertaken in light of the Jurisdictional Agreement, and having raised the issue itself, JCI cannot complain that the arbitrators reached it. See, e.g., Rock-Tenn Co. v. United Paperworkers Int'l Union, 184 F.3d 330, 334 (4th Cir.1999) ([U]nconditional submission of an issue to arbitration, without any objection to the arbitrator's authority to decide that issue, cedes authority to the arbitrator, or represents consent to arbitration of that issue.) (internal quotations omitted); Franklin Elec. Co. v. Int'l Union, United Auto. Aerospace & Agric. Workers, 886 F.2d 188, 191-92 (8th Cir.1989) (a party cannot argue, after an arbitral award, that the arbitrator lacked authority to decide a jurisdictional or arbitrability issue the party itself submitted); Jones Dairy Farm v. Local No. P-1236, United Food & Commercial Workers Int'l Union, 760 F.2d 173, 175-76 (7th Cir.1985) (if a party voluntarily and unreservedly submits a jurisdictional issue to arbitration, then the party cannot later argue that the arbitrator had no authority to resolve it); see also Nghiem v. NEC Elec., Inc., 25 F.3d 1437, 1440 (9th Cir.1994) ([W]e have long recognized a rule that a party may not submit a claim to arbitration and then challenge the authority of the arbitrator to act after receiving an unfavorable result.) (quotation omitted); Dorado Beach, 959 F.2d at 4 ([A]n arbitrator's authority under the CBA may be supplemented by the parties' submissions.). See generally Moses H. Cone Mem'l Hosp. v. Mercury Constr. Corp., 460 U.S. 1, 24-25, 103 S.Ct. 927, 74 L.Ed.2d 765 (1983) ([A]ny doubts concerning the scope of arbitrable issues should be resolved in favor of arbitration.). 29 Nor is there any merit to the assertion that the manner in which the arbitrators construed the effect of the Jurisdictional Agreement exceeded their authority. An arbitrator's award must be affirmed so long as the arbitrator is even arguably construing or applying the contract. United Paperworkers Int'l Union v. Misco, Inc., 484 U.S. 29, 38, 108 S.Ct. 364, 98 L.Ed.2d 286 (1987). Based upon the evidence before the arbitrators, the Jurisdictional Agreement needed specific signatures to be executed and those signatures were not on the document: neither of the two Locals executed it and there was no evidence that the International President approved the agreement, as the terms of the International's Constitution required. 5 There was no error in the arbitrator's finding that JCI did not proceed on the basis of an executed and binding Jurisdictional Agreement. 6 30 Since a court reviews the merits of the arbitral decision based on the record before the arbitrator under a narrow standard of review, JCI is not free now, under the guise of judicial review of an arbitral award, to conduct discovery and obtain a de novo determination of the meaning and validity of the Jurisdictional Agreement. 7 It long ago waived any such claim through its actions. The district court was quite correct not to permit this effort by JCI to evade the normal rules of review. 8 31