Court Opinion

ID: 9483883
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 09:34:00.320434+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:49:53.306721
License: Public Domain

WOLLMAN, Judge,
dissenting.
There can be no argument with the principles of law set forth in the court’s opinion regarding the scope of arbitration clauses. The only question is whether the parties *417agreed that job performance discharges should not in any manner be subject to arbitration.
Because I believe that the union expressly bargained away the right to arbitrate any and all disputes over discharges based upon a member’s job performance, I respectfully dissent from the court’s opinion.
If it were possible to parse the arbitrable issue — whether poor job performance was the real reason for the discharge — in such a way as to avoid reaching the merits of the discharged employee’s job performance, I might well join the court’s opinion. As I see it, however, once a discharged employee challenges as pretextual KTVI’s proffered reason for discharge, it is inevitable that the arbitrator will have to make findings regarding the quality of the discharged employee’s job performance, the very issue that the parties expressly agreed would not be subject to arbitration. Accordingly, I would hold that this is one of those relatively rare cases in which the parties have clearly agreed to exclude from arbitration a condition and term of employment.
Such a holding would not leave KTVI’s employees without a remedy for, among other things, alleged age-based discharges, for they would have. all of the remedies available under statute and common law. Cf. International Ass’n of Machinists v. Republic Airlines, 829 F.2d 658 (8th Cir.1987).
I would reverse the order compelling arbitration.