Court Opinion

ID: 9469449
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 02:40:53.421138+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:41:23.709635
License: Public Domain

PREGERSON, Circuit Judge
(dissenting):
I respectfully dissent. Remand to the arbitrator for clarification of his opinion is the proper course to follow here.
The majority first argues that a remand is unnecessary because “[t]he only logical inference which can be drawn” from the language of the arbitrator’s opinion is that the arbitrator found Murphy to have “participated” in the unlawful strike. Maj. Op. at 1283. It then contends that even if it is not clear that the arbitrator drew this conclusion, remand is still inappropriate because the facts admit of no contrary conclusion. Neither of these claims is justified.
I
According to the majority, the arbitrator ordered Murphy reinstated solely because he believed mitigating factors made dismissal an overly harsh penalty, and not because of any doubt as to whether Murphy participated in the strike. Yet the arbitrator’s opinion nowhere states a finding of participation by Murphy. The language that the majority reads as implying such a finding does not, in fact, compel any such conclusion.1 Indeed, the arbitrator’s find*1287ing that Murphy was fired without just cause is evidence that the arbitrator concluded that Murphy had not participated in the strike.2 So is the language in which the arbitrator couched his conclusion: “the Arbitrator is neither constrained nor persuaded to uphold the termination.” This language can most plausibly be interpreted as indicating that the arbitrator believed, not merely that mitigating factors coun-selled against upholding Murphy’s discharge — so that the arbitrator was not “persuaded” to uphold it — but that Murphy had not violated 5 U.S.C. § 7311 by participating in the strike — so that the arbitrator was not “constrained” to uphold the discharge.
At best, therefore, the arbitrator’s opinion is ambiguous on the crucial issue— whether Murphy participated in the strike. That ambiguity calls for a remand to the arbitrator to permit him to clarify his opinion, as both this circuit3 and others4 have recognized. Yet the majority not only refuses to seek such clarification, but chooses precisely that interpretation of the arbitrator’s ambiguous opinion which renders the award unenforceable. That procedure directly contradicts our recognition that “[t]he Supreme Court . . . has consistently required us to favor the arbitrator’s decision when his opinion is subject to several interpretations.” IAM Local 389 v. San Diego Marine Construction Corp., 620 F.2d 736, 739 (9th Cir. 1980).5
A remand would give the arbitrator the opportunity to clear up the confusion generated by the conflicting interpretations to which his opinion is subject. Possibly he would explain that — as the majority believes — he meant to find that Murphy had participated in the illegal strike. In that case, Murphy’s discharge could be upheld; the government would scarcely be significantly prejudiced by the delay. Possibly, however, the arbitrator would explain that in his opinion Murphy did not “participate” in the strike. There would then be no justification for firing Murphy; the order reinstating him would be valid and enforceable, and he would be spared the stigma of discharge and disqualification from federal employment. That, indeed, was what happened in a case squarely on point, United States Postal Service v. National Post Office Mail Handlers Union, Civil No. 79-1967 (D.N.J. April 3, 1980). That case, like the one before us, involved a postal employee, discharged for alleged participation in an illegal strike, whose reinstatement was ordered by an arbitrator. The arbitrator’s opinion contained greater evidence of strike participation than does the opinion in the instant case — in fact, it explicitly labeled the discharged worker a “participant in the strike.” Yet, because the arbitrator had also found the employee’s discharge to be *1288without just cause, the district court perceived an ambiguity in the arbitrator’s opinion and remanded for clarification. The arbitrator explained that he had not meant to find that the worker had “participated” in the strike for purposes of applying 5 U.S.C. § 7311, and the district court then upheld the award ordering reinstatement. I can perceive no reason why the remand procedure adopted by the district court in the New Jersey case is not equally appropriate here.
II
The majority, however, argues that a remand is inappropriate here even if the arbitrator’s opinion is ambiguous. According to the majority, it is so clear that Murphy participated in the strike that a contrary finding on remand would constitute “manifest disregard of the law” by the arbitrator and would thus merit no judicial deference.
The majority’s appeal to the principle that “manifest disregard of the law” invalidates an arbitrator’s decision is surprising. I have found not a single case in which this circuit has ever applied that principle to overturn an arbitration award.6 Indeed, we have indicated that it is difficult even to understand just what “manifest disregard of the law” means. San Martine Compania de Navegacion v. Saguenay Terminals Ltd., 293 F.2d 796, 801 n.4 (9th Cir. 1961). At the very least, it “must be something beyond and different from a mere error in the law or failure on the part of the arbitrator to understand or apply the law,” id. at 801, since “[i]t is a truism that an arbitration award will not be vacated for a mistaken interpretation of law.” Sobel v. Hertz, Warner & Co., 469 F.2d 1211, 1214 (2d Cir. 1972); accord, Raytheon Co. v. Rheem Mfg. Co., 322 F.2d 173, 182 (9th Cir. 1963).7 Since it is so difficult to determine what “manifest disregard” means, and since whatever it is must transcend misinterpretation or misapplication of the law, it is astonishing that the majority can confidently assert that only through “manifest disregard of the law” could the arbitrator conclude that Murphy did not participate in the strike.
In fact, however, the majority does not rest on this assertion. Even if a finding of non-participation would not constitute manifest disregard of the law, we are told, such a finding would still deserve no judicial deference. For — and here at last we have the crux of the majority’s opinion — “[w]e cannot empower the arbitrator to nullify the mandates of Congress simply by stating that an individual did not strike when, as here, his actions, as presented in undisputed facts, constitute a strike.” Maj. Op. at 1285.
The majority’s basic position, then, is not that the arbitrator unambiguously found Murphy to have participated in the strike, nor that a contrary conclusion would require “manifest disregard of the law.” It is, quite simply, that the majority has assumed the role of deciding whether Murphy participated in the strike, and has decided that he did. With all due respect, it is for the arbitrator, not this court, to make that decision. Consequently, I must dissent *1289from the unwarranted and unjust disposition which the majority arrives at in this case-

. Thus, the majority seizes on the arbitrator’s statement that Murphy gave “active, but misconceived, support of the strike.” Yet support for a strike quite obviously does not entail participation in the strike, since even persons who are not employees of the struck concern can support the strike (e.g., by refusing to cross picket lines or donating money to the strikers). The majority also points to the arbitrator’s determination that Murphy “abandoned the strike” after learning it was not authorized by his union. This, too, does not necessarily imply that Murphy initially “participated” in the strike. Had Murphy merely attended a meet*1287ing to discuss a proposed strike, and then decided not to take part in it, one could correctly say that he had “abandoned the strike” but not that he had ever “participated” in it.

. To conclude, despite this evidence, that the arbitrator believed Murphy had participated in the strike is to impute to the arbitrator either an inexplicable failure to realize that, by virtue of 5 U.S.C. § 7311, striking was “just cause” for dismissal, or a conscious desire to flout the law.

. Hanford Atomic Metal Trades Council v. General Electric Co., 353 F.2d 302, 307-08 (9th Cir. 1965).

. Burkart Randall v. Lodge 1076, IAM, 648 F.2d 462, 468 (7th Cir. 1981); Bell Aerospace Co. v. Local 516, UAW, 500 F.2d 921, 924 (2nd Cir. 1974); San Antonio Newspaper Guild Local 25 v. San Antonio Light Division, 481 F.2d 821, 825 (5th Cir. 1973); IBEW Local 369 v. Olin Corp., 471 F.2d 468, 472-73 (6th Cir. 1972); Local 719, American Bakery & Confectionery Workers v. National Biscuit Co., 378 F.2d 918, 926 (3rd Cir. 1967); cf. Locals 2222, 2320-2327, IBEW v. New England Telephone & Telegraph Co., 628 F.2d 644, 647-49 (1st Cir. 1980) (dispute not reached in arbitration proceeding, but encompassed within original submittal, requires remand to original arbitrators).

. The Supreme Court has cautioned that “[a] mere ambiguity in the opinion accompanying an award, which permits the inference that the arbitrator may have exceeded his authority, is not a reason for refusing to enforce the award.” United Steelworkers v. Enterprise Wheel & Car Corp., 363 U.S. 593, 598, 80 S.Ct. 1358, 1361, 4 L.Ed.2d 1424 (1960). See also In re Arbitration Between Aloha Motors, Inc. and ILWU Local 142, 530 F.2d 848, 849 (9th Cir. 1976).

. Significantly, when the majority declares that “a conclusion that Murphy did not strike would constitute manifest disregard for the law,” Maj. Op. at 1284, Slip Op. at 2467, it cites four cases notable chiefly for their irrelevance. Wilko v. Swan, 346 U.S. 427, 74 S.Ct. 182, 98 L.Ed. 168 (1953); Sobel v. Hertz, Warner & Co., 469 F.2d 1211, 1214 (2d Cir. 1972); Trafalgar Shipping Co. v. International Milling Co., 401 F.2d 568 (2d Cir. 1968); San Martine Compania de Navegacion v. Saguenay Terminais Ltd., 293 F.2d 796 (9th Cir. 1961). In none of these cases was an arbitration award set aside for manifest disregard of the law (or for any other reason). Moreover, none of these cases arose in a labor context, in which extreme deference to an arbitrator’s decisions is mandated. See United Steelworkers v. Enterprise Wheel & Car Corp., 363 U.S. 593, 596, 80 S.Ct. 1358, 1360, 4 L.Ed.2d 1424 (1960); Riverboat Casino, Inc. v. Local Joint Executive Board, 578 F.2d 250, 251 (9th Cir. 1978); Holly Sugar Corp. v. Distillery Workers Int'l Union, 412 F.2d 899, 902-03 (9th Cir. 1969).

. At least one court has stated that manifest disregard can be shown only by establishing that the arbitrator understood and correctly stated the law and then proceeded to ignore it. Reynolds Securities, Inc. v. Macquown, 459 F.Supp. 943, 945 (W.D.Pa.1978).