Opinion ID: 2163453
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: The Post-Arbitration Award Spielberg Deferral Doctrine

Text: Federal response to the question of NLRB deferral first arose in a post -arbitral award deferral context. Inasmuch as the doctrine of discretionary pre -arbitral deferral, under consideration here, emanated from that decisional authority and rationale supporting post -award deferral, we will first briefly address the post -award, or Spielberg, deferral doctrine. As indicated in footnote 15, supra, our discussion of the NLRB's Spielberg doctrine is not intended to sanction that rule but is, rather, offered only to elucidate the concept of Collyer pre-arbitral deferral. In Spielberg Mfg Co, 112 NLRB 1080; 36 LRRM 1152 (1955), the parties agreed to submit their employee reinstatement dispute to contractual binding arbitration. The arbitration panel concluded that reinstatement was not required under the terms of the parties' agreement. Upholding that award, the NLRB emphasized that it was not legally bound by the private tribunal's resolution pursuant to § 10(a) of the act, but concluded that it would not upset it where    the proceedings appear to have been fair and regular, all parties had agreed to be bound, and the decision of the arbitration panel is not clearly repugnant to the purposes and policies of the Act. In these circumstances we believe that the desirable objective of encouraging the voluntary settlement of labor disputes will best be served by our recognition of the arbitrators' award. Id., 1082. (Emphasis supplied.) The Spielberg doctrine was elaborated upon and clearly reaffirmed in International Harvester Co, 138 NLRB 923, 925-926; 51 LRRM 1155, 1157 (1962). The Supreme Court added its imprimatur to the post-award deferral doctrine in Carey v Westinghouse Electric Corp, 375 US 261, 271; 84 S Ct 401; 11 L Ed 2d 320 (1964), quoting with approval the following statement from International Harvester Co, supra, 925-926: `There is no question that the Board is not precluded from adjudicating unfair labor practice charges even though they might have been the subject of an arbitration proceeding and award. Section 10(a) of the Act expressly makes this plain, and the courts have uniformly so held. However, it is equally well established that the Board has considerable discretion to respect an arbitration award and decline to exercise its authority over alleged unfair labor practices if to do so will serve the fundamental aims of the Act. `The Act, as has repeatedly been stated, is primarily designed to promote industrial peace and stability by encouraging the practice and procedure of collective bargaining. Experience has demonstrated that collective-bargaining agreements that provide for final and binding arbitration of grievance and disputes arising thereunder, as a substitute for industrial strife, contribute significantly to the attainment of this statutory objective.' (Emphasis supplied.) In Raytheon Co, 140 NLRB 883, 884-886; 52 LRRM 1129 (1963), rev'd on other grounds Raytheon Co v NLRB, 326 F2d 471 (CA 1, 1964), the NLRB supplemented Spielberg by requiring that the unfair labor practice charge cognizable under the parties' agreement have been presented to, as well as considered by, the arbitral tribunal before post-award deferral would be deemed proper. Spielberg otherwise remained undisturbed. [22] Although the Spielberg doctrine has been repeatedly addressed and refined by the Federal authorities, [23] it has survived both judicial and administrative scrutiny for the past approximately 30 years. [24] In short, our research discloses that the NLRB is empowered with discretion to abstain from entertaining an alleged unfair labor practice charge arguably covered by the parties' binding collective bargaining agreement and defer to the arbitral tribunal's award where the charge has been properly decided through private arbitration. The Spielberg doctrine has been fashioned as furthering the purposes of the Federal labor relations scheme despite the contradictory sense of NLRA, § 10(a).