Have You Signed Away Your Right to Sue?
More employees are being forced to sign mandatory-arbitration clauses. But is it legal?
Fonza Luke had worked as a nurse for Baptist Health System's Princeton Medical Center in Birmingham, Alabama, for 26 years when the human resources department summoned her to a meeting about a new "dispute resolution program." Nurses, housekeepers, and lab techs crammed into a conference room where hospital administrators presented a form and told them to sign. Signing meant agreeing to submit any future employment-related complaints to an arbitrator hired by the hospital and waiving the right to sue in court. Refusing to sign meant they'd be fired.
Luke had known the arbitration agreement was coming, and she didn't like the idea one bit—"I just think it's unfair to be made to do something like that," she says. So before going to the conference room, she slipped away to a pay phone and called her lawyer. He said, "Don't sign it. You'll be signing your rights away," she recalls. Luke turned in the form without a signature in quiet protest. A few weeks later, the hospital again ordered her to sign, and again she refused. Despite repeated threats, the hospital didn't fire her, at least not then.
Three years later, Luke traveled to Atlanta for a continuing-education class recommended by her coworkers. When she returned, the hospital fired her for "insubordination" because she had been cleared to take just one day off, not two. For 30 years, Luke had been an exemplary employee. Her personnel file was full of praise for her performance; a review three weeks before the firing called her a "role model." Many of the younger, white nurses Luke worked with had taken unapproved leave, she observed, and kept their jobs. So Luke filed a race and age discrimination complaint with the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (eeoc), which conducted a lengthy investigation, upheld her complaint, and recommended that Luke file a civil rights suit in federal court, which she did in 2003.
That's when the surprise came: Baptist Health argued that Luke had given up her right to sue back in 1997 when the hospital presented the arbitration agreement—even though she'd refused to sign. Simply by continuing to show up for work, Baptist's lawyers said, she'd agreed to the terms. Acting contrary to established contract law, which requires both parties to consent to a contract before it becomes binding, a federal judge accepted the hospital's argument. Luke was forced to take her civil rights case before Baptist's hired arbitrator, who dismissed it in short order. She had no right to appeal. She'd lost not only her job but, because she hadn't yet reached retirement age, part of the pension she'd worked toward for most of her adult life. Now Luke works night shifts at two health care facilities to make up her lost salary.
You Can't Sue Us! Some of the companies that use arbitration clauses in contracts with employees or customers
Hooters • Applebee's • kfc • Friendly Ice Cream Corporation • Circuit City • Neiman Marcus • Nordstrom • Hallmark Cards • Merrill Lynch • Citigroup • First usa • Ameriquest • Discover • Blue Cross Blue Shield • Aetna • Kaiser Permanente • AT&T • Ford • Daimler AG • Toyota • Clear Channel • General Electric • Halliburton • Bechtel • Rent-a-Center
Mandatory-arbitration provisions like the one forced upon Luke are not rare. In fact, agreements not to sue are becoming a ubiquitous facet of commercial life, governing everything from employment to used-car sales. On job-related matters alone, the National Employment Lawyers Association (nela) estimates that 30 million Americans, or roughly a fifth of the nonunion workforce, have been forced to sign away the right to bring civil claims before a judge or jury. (The practice had a moment in the spotlight recently when a kbr contractor named Jamie Leigh Jones, who said she'd been raped by coworkers in Iraq, had to take her sexual assault and harassment case to an arbitrator hired by her employer rather than a civil jury after the Justice Department failed to prosecute her alleged attackers.)
The root of the arbitration trend is an obscure 1925 law called the Federal Arbitration Act. At the time of its passage, lawmakers stipulated that it only applied to "merchants" involved in contract disputes. But in 1984, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that Congress had created a "national policy favoring arbitration," thus opening the door to far wider use. The decision prompted a dramatic increase in mandatory binding arbitration, which proponents claimed would help clear overcrowded judicial dockets and cut back on excessive legal expenses.
Since then, judges have used the Supreme Court ruling to legitimize and further expand the use of mandatory arbitration, even though, as Justice Hugo Black once observed, arbitrators can be "wholly unqualified" to oversee complicated cases. Indeed, private arbitrators aren't required to follow the law or established precedent, or even issue written decisions. Many have legal backgrounds, but there is no standard dictating that they be lawyers or credentialed in any way—yet their decisions can't be appealed.
In 1992, the California Supreme Court ruled that an arbitration decision can stand even if it is legally wrong and causes "substantial injustice." In 2006, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 7th Circuit declared that courts shouldn't review arbitrators' decisions even when they are "wacky." Also in 2006, the 11th Circuit appellate court went so far as to suggest that people who try to challenge arbitration awards in court ought to be sanctioned. Says Cliff Palefsky, a San Francisco employment lawyer and cofounder of nela, "Courts have created the fiction that docket clearing is public policy."
Judges have another reason to love arbitration: The growth of private justice has created for them a new and lucrative job market. U.S. district court judges earn $165,200 a year, less than some second-year law firm associates. Private arbitrators can make $10,000 in a day. Some judges now even seek coaching on how best to tailor their résumés for future arbitration jobs. Lucie Barron, the founder of Action Dispute Resolution Services in California, encourages judges to keep lawyers' business cards for use in marketing their arbitration services to the legal community later on. The trend has become so pronounced that in December, a judge in California reportedly refused to accept a move from civil to criminal court because it would impact his ability to get a job as an arbitrator.
National arbitration companies recruit heavily among sitting judges, many of whom have at one time or another been called upon to rule in a challenge to an arbitration clause. In fact, the California Supreme Court justice who wrote the 1992 opinion allowing unjust arbitration decisions to stand now works as a private arbitrator charging $6,500 a day.
With little hope of progress in the courts, consumer advocates and employment lawyers have turned to Congress. They are banking on a bill introduced last July by Senator Russell Feingold (D-Wis.) that would outlaw mandatory-arbitration clauses in consumer and employment contracts. In December, Fonza Luke flew to Washington to testify before the Senate Judiciary Committee. Having once successfully petitioned the pope to intervene when she thought her daughter had been mistreated in Catholic school, Luke held her own on a witness panel dominated by lawyers and law professors. "I did everything I could to keep my right to go to federal court," she told the committee, "but the courthouse doors were closed when I got there."
Sitting down the table from Luke was Mark de Bernardo, an attorney representing employers who dubbed Feingold's measure a "mandatory-litigation bill." De Bernardo argued that doing away with forced arbitration would lead more people to choose court hearings and "impose a death penalty" on alternative dispute resolution in America. Yet to Feingold and others, that's exactly the point—people should be able to choose. As F. Paul Bland Jr., a staff lawyer with Public Justice in Washington, D.C., put it, "It is a pretty grim idea that the only way you could have arbitration is to force people into it."
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How do I become a professional actor? Auditions Movie Acting is a work of the imagination acting jobs
Professional Unions are long overdue, and the dwindling trade unions need reviving. The Corporate States of America need the check and balance (along with a few slaps) of unions.
Arbitration is reliable, fair and cost saving only:
If agreeable between both parties, and
If paid & funded by the Judiciary system, and
If conducted by the legal professionals, and
If arbitrators are randomly selected by a computer automation systems, with no affiliation to any parties and finally
If arbitration decision not admissible to the court
It is time for Professional Unions.
Labor has to have more input into pay,pensions,health care,paid time off.
The supper rich do what ever they want.
The rest of us get EMPLOYMENT at Will.
We have no checks and balance.
We have Rebuplicians and Demolicians.
The only way arbitration could be the least bit fair in employment is if the "arbitrator" was a panel of co-workers. The current arbitrators are corporate henchmen and sick degenerates.
Magna Carta? We don't need no stinking Magna Carta to do business in my country. I'm the dictator here.
GW Bush and the gang
The "Baptist" are always at it! They will not only lie to thier employees but they will also lie to the patients! It is despicable how time and again the "for profit" and "not for profit" are really one in the same! Never agree to "arbitration". If you are asked to sign anything which erquires you to "arbitration" get out fast!
Apparently, for those who think that this is a country of rules and laws, it really doesn't matter whether something is legal or constitutional or not.
This is a major problem.
Thank you MJ for bring this issue to the public.
My husband joined the 24 hour fitness gym yesterday and had to sign an arbitration clause to work out. Every fascet of our lives is now governed by the arbitration companies. We have no rights if we do not sign we can not have a new car, house, cell phone or even go to the gym.I wish more people understood the evils of arbitration. I recommend they google my name and read my testimony before the congressional hearing on the effects of arbitration on the consumer. Most people have not had to go though this dispicable, costly, unfair process. Unfortunalty for us we have twice... with a shoddy builder in Houston. Our neighbors were able to sue and won. We had an arbitration clause so we had to go into foreclosure and even when we no longer owned the house we were forced into arbitration. We are listed in the sub prime debacle but so many of us are there because our builders used these clauses to hide from responsibility.
Thank you again for helping make the consumer aware their rights have been taken. We no longer have seventh amendment rights.
Jordan Fogal
jfogal281@aol.com
If you have a boss, you need a union. The unity of workers gives the strength to the union. Arbitration and mediation is the bosses power push against full justice to the workers. Only the comming into being of the workers state can full and complete power of justice and law support completely the workers side. The bosses state serves the bosses, and therefore the workers suffer the consequences of injustice.
If you don't like mandatory arbitration in your contracts, don't sign. Go elsewhere for the services you want. I this case, consent to the arbitration clause was a condition of employment, read the District Court's decision. Ms. Luke knew that by continuing to work for Baptist Health, she would be bound by the arbitration provision. Baptist Health gave her express notice that she would have to arbitrate if she chose to continue to work for Baptist Health. The fact that she did not sign the arbitration agreement is therefore of no consequence.
You must work for the
You must work for the hospital or some other lying, cheating corporation that chooses to treat its employees like disposable wipes. What she knew was that signing meant signing her rights away. So she didn't sign. How do you twist that into "she agreed to it"? She explicitly did not agree to it.
Actually...
Actually someone can enter into an agreement just by performing some action, particularly in an at-will employment state such as Alabama. I don't agree with the justice of the outcome in this case, but I take issue with this author misinforming readers by stating that the district and circuit courts' decision is contrary to established contract law. E.g.: "You will be fired tomorrow morning unless you agree to this arbitration clause. We extend the offer to continue your employment which you can accept by arriving to work tomorrow." Contrary to the author's statement, that could create a binding contract.
Mott v. Jackson, et al. 55 So. 528 (Ala. 1911)
Hoffman-LaRoche, Inc. v. Campbell, 512 So. 2d 725, 735 (Ala. 1987)
The point should be that while this outcome may agree with contract law, it does not agree with our sense of justice, and that is why employment arbitration clauses should be voided by law except for employeeing executive-types who are in the position to actually bargain or meaningfully consent to arbitration. Al Franken's amendment to the defense budget bill is a step in the right direction.
Will, you are a prime example of what's wrong in this country today!
Will Richardson seems to think that because the court decided that arbitration was a condition required by the employer for the employee to continue working, that this ends the discussion. I suggest that Will and the judge are both wrong. Ms. Luke never agreed to the arbitration provision - she expressly rejected it. The employer allowed her to continue working. For the judge to say that this condition was part of the employment contract is a ridiculous fiction that too many courts have used in too many employment disputes. It's time we started to appoint judges who aren't so wedded to the protection of the powerful and who can recognize injustice when it hits them in the face.
It's not that arbitration is good or bad. It has its benefits as well as its weaknesses. For some it may be all the justice they can afford. The problem is that it is forced upon employees and consumers at a time when there is no dispute and no real attention paid to the issue. To allow hidden, inconspicuous language buried in papers signed at the time of hire to become the controlling "agreement" when the dispute arises is to allow overreaching by employers. I would be embarrassed to have to defend such a practice. Incidentally, it doesn't necessarily reduce litigation. Many lawsuits have been fought over the enforceability of arbitration provisions, and those poor bastards had to fight over the forum for years, sometimes all the way to the Supreme Court, before they ever got around to addressing the merits of the dispute.
Just wondering about the jugges' interpretation in the Baptist case. If signing the arbitration paper was a condition of employment, why did Baptist not fire Ms Luke for refusing to sign. If supplying a Social Security number is a condion of employment, would Baptist then let an illegal imigrant work without supplying the same? Annd if they did and ICE made one of their famous raids, would the Baptist lawyer argue that since the worker continued to show up for work, that was proof enough for them that they had a social security card? Would the moron judge then agree with the worker's argument that since Baptist did not fire them, that that was proof enough that they were legally employed? America, these politician we revere as leaders are mostly hookers bought and paid for by the corporations. The judges they appoint all the way to the ****ng supreme court are all bought and paid for. We will all wake up one day to a police state and wonder how we got there. I'll tell you how, one given away, stolen away, signed away, forced away right at a time. Slowly and stealthly chipping away at your rights as a citizen. And WE THE PEOPLE are letting it happen. The constitution has lost all significance in our lives, our ideals, our sense of justice. The Law is just a clever play of words. The smoothest tongue wins.
I am amazed at this as I had not heard of it before. The Unions have been decimated and non-union workers are becoming like feudal slaves. The Democratic claim they are for the working people but the only working group they even attempt to help are the Unions because of their political donations. The Democratic Party has shifted from the party of the working class to the party of "minorities" and other liberal causes. Yet millions of voters still vote for them because they were pro-worker years ago. Not so any more. The Republican Party, of course, is not pro-worker either which leaves the working class without a political party to represent them. To pay for all their liberal and minority programs the Democrats have to tax the people and since the rich get tax loop holes and the poor have no money; guess who gets taxed" The working class. The working class has been abandoned. Seems like a lot of people haven't figured this out.
Tell you senators to support current legislation to make mandatory arbitration in employment and consumer transactions illegal.
I made an appointment with a gastoenterologist recently. Yesterday I received the new patient forms to be filled out amoung those forms was an arbitration form which says in huge red letters that by signing it, I give up all my rights to take legal action in case of malpractice. I do not want to sign but there are no other gastroenterologists in the area except the eight in this group. None will see me unless I sign their arbitration form. I do not get to pick the arbitrator. I do not know what damage may be done to me by the gastroenterologist so I do not know what I am signing away. I cannot find any good information on the quality of their colonoscopy. Why do I have to trust my life and health to someone who wants me to sign away all my rights and my survivor's rights if he is incompetent? Yet I am 55 years old with a chronic inflammatory bowel problem who is at high risk for colon cancer. I must be scoped as a preventative. What a Catch 22!
I purchased a new Honda from a dealer recently, for cash. When processing the papers with the 'finance' guy I was asked to sign a mandatory arb. agreement, which I did without even asking if it was necessary. That is what I'm asking now - is this a standard part of buying a new car nowadays ?
The deck is stacked against you if you are employed at-will. As disturbing as the Baptist Health System's example is, there are only two responses besides cynicism and 'find another job.' The most powerful response and most dangerous one is join a union. Once a contract is negotiated there is recourse for violations of workers' rights. You certainly have a better chance of resolution in this case of alleged insubordination (a capital offense) with a grievance procedure in place and union enforcement, even if the case went to arbitration through the grievance procecdure. I speak from experience on this one having saved jobs of workers just like Fonza Luke. It is the at-will issue where you will almost always lose. The boss can do what they want as long as they don't violate (or appear to violate) the law. The second response, connected to this one, is political. For those workers unfortunate not to have union protection, the Feingold bill is a beginning but it is only that. It will take a generation to repopulate the courts with judges that are more sympathetic to woirker issues like this one, and that is only if the right people are elected and the stars line up just right.
After 29 years in a union, and only six with full bargaining rights gotta remind ya'all about right to work. Hard to keep your local alive if you got 35 members and 130 people demanding full services required by law . Taft Hartley is huge portion of lack of union growth-check out history of textiles, and auto asssembly.
Alec Baldwin is a genius...in 7 short years the fattest, happiest people on earth are now broke, scorned ,stripped of sovernty and humanity ;they have have sucumb to shock and awe
In other words all my rights have been taken away. Perhaps we can get our new President who ever it is to step in.
The local Casper Star Tribune has been
running articles on the State of
Wyoming's Workman's Comp system. The
joke in the state, is that you don't
want to get hurt in the state.
If it's true as WJR quotes, "Baptist Health gave her express notice that she would have to arbitrate if she chose to continue to work for Baptist Health. The fact that she did not sign the arbitration agreement is therefore of no consequence." Then why did the hospital go to the trouble of collecting signatures if they are not required? This type of thinking should make all contracts invalid.
Libertarian and tyranny are antonyms ma'am. As a journalist I urge you to become more familiar with Libertarianism as you would especially enjoy some of it's ideals.
Criminals are largely the result of poor upbringing. I don't meant non-affluent, i mean the parents aren't doing the greatest job.
Unfortunately, in many black communities, you have the "baby's daddy" scenario, whereby a single mother irks by, raising her child on her own, surrounded by other mothers raising their children alone. Now you have hordes of unsupervised children running the streets and eventually getting into drugs and crime. I have seen this plenty in Albany, NY. Seven to Ten of them, all too young to be out wandering the streets. How long until some mischeif strikes? How long until that escalates? How long until someone gets the bad idea to make it lucrative?
The victims of those crimes are going to be the people closest at hand - those people in those communities.
I truly don't recommend clamping down on any of our freedoms, because there are people making mistakes with their child rearing.
I think instead, we should put more money into education, after school programs, perhaps find some sort of way to subsidize good, quality day care so these children can be in a warm and positive environment. "Staying off the streets" is a term you hear over and over when talking about afterschool programs - and there is a really good reason for that.
Certainly there will always be those bad apples, who had all the opportunities and still grew into a homicidal maniac. For those bad seeds, I want to be able to keep my gun ready and loaded. Perhaps if everyone else followed suit, that bad seed might be able to indulge in a more victimless crime - or get taken out of the gene pool altogether with a .45 caliber slug.
You libs are always kissing the feet of the trial lawyers!
Well, it looks like the fanatics have finally gotten around to privatising the judiciary! Full scale communist totalitarianism (full privatisation of everything, rendering individual human beings into mere products) may not be too far away. It's sad to think about the potential that the United States of Central North America once had, but then again, even severe social breakdown has often been necessary in order for people to learn.
My advice to those living there is either to get radically politically active, and expect to be persecuted (after all you haven't got much to lose, and you might at least inspire others around the world), or to get the hell out, while you still can.
It's stories like this that make glad to live in Australia. Good luck :).
Will, your comment regarding the defendant having some magical form of prior knowledge to such a ludicrous decision is trumped in stupidity only by said decision by the corrupted court that issued it.
Before you know it "contributory negligence" will be back in style again.
The presumptions in favor of arbitration arose out of cases involving unions and employers who had arbitration clauses in their collective bargaining agreements. Arbitration clauses found in an employee handbook or in an employment contract are entirely different animals. Unfortunately, the caselaw does not reflect this.
Arbitration clauses at this point are really only useful for employers to evade class actions. This law needs to be undone.
I AM IN A SITUATION THAT MY EMPLOYER WHICH WAS SURRY COUNTY SHERIFF'S DEPARTMENT FIRED ME FOR DISCRIMINATION BECAUSE WHEN THEY FOUND OUT I HAD DISABILITIES THEY GOT RID OF ME AND THE EEOC HAS FILED IT HAS BEEN SENT TO THE DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE AND I REALLY IN MY HEART BELIEVE THAT SURRY COUNTY SHERIFF'S DEPARTMENT IS GOING TO GET AWAY WITH IT AND FOR THE PAST YEAR I HAVE TRIED TO FIND A LAWYER AND I FIND NOONE WANTS TO BE MY LAWYER ALL THE LAWYER'S SAYS IS WE HAVE A CASE AND THEY NEED $5000.00 TO START OF WITH THE WORK AND WE DON'T HAVE THAT KIND OF MONEY. PLEASE HELP IF YOU CAN. THESE LAWYER'S WE PAY THEM A CONSULTATION FEE OF 100.00 AN HOUR. PLEASE HELP IF YOU CAN?
I AM IN A SITUATION THAT MY EMPLOYER WHICH WAS SURRY COUNTY SHERIFF'S DEPARTMENT FIRED ME FOR DISCRIMINATION BECAUSE WHEN THEY FOUND OUT I HAD DISABILITIES THEY GOT RID OF ME AND THE EEOC HAS FILED IT HAS BEEN SENT TO THE DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE AND I REALLY IN MY HEART BELIEVE THAT SURRY COUNTY SHERIFF'S DEPARTMENT IS GOING TO GET AWAY WITH IT AND FOR THE PAST YEAR I HAVE TRIED TO FIND A LAWYER AND I FIND NOONE WANTS TO BE MY LAWYER ALL THE LAWYER'S SAYS IS WE HAVE A CASE AND THEY NEED $5000.00 TO START OF WITH THE WORK AND WE DON'T HAVE THAT KIND OF MONEY. PLEASE HELP IF YOU CAN. THESE LAWYER'S WE PAY THEM A CONSULTATION FEE OF 100.00 AN HOUR. BEFORE I WAS FIRED THEY TRIED TO FORCE ME SIGN A LETTER OF RESIGNATION AND I REFUSED. PLEASE HELP IF YOU CAN?
Articles on the housing debacle seem to purposely leave out, ignore and not mention some of the main reasons for the "sub prime crisis" . Reasons which led to the lenders' chaos. The banks, the hedge funds and the builders cry out for help like something out of Danes' inferno. All the while taking their bonus checks, of our hard money and stuffing them along side what they have already gleaned from us ...with their thrown up, defective housing. Now since the gravy train has derailed they cry out," help us we wanted more.".Yet the cries and wishes of the middle class go unheard.. It is doubly diabolical that we the tax payer should once again be forced to pay the perpetrators. The government thinks they should help the people who cheated and robbed us of our homes. We hear that consumer confidence is down, and the government seems to be baffled as to the why.. Greed, of course, is at the helm of this perfect storm, prefect for everyone except the once, homeowing tax payer.
The general population has been preyed upon by the greed of shoddy construction, and further destroyed by arbitration clauses which hide the builders role in this housing debacle. I am sickened by the articles on arbitration all written by people who have not endured this diabolical process.
My husband and I have been there. And it is not fair or cheaper, but some times you can get screwed a lot faster, they even have a name for it, it is called," fast track arbitration". As we are dragged behind these closed doors, many of us who are not silenced by gag orders,( carefully termed secrecy agreements) tell of the unbelievable goings on . Most of these so called secrecy agreements conveniently cover up what has occurred inside. Inside, where the rules of law no longer apply, where fraud and perjury are standard fare and the arbitrators turn a blind eye because of...greed. The big builder is their constant meal ticket. We the home owner will never financially recover to be subjected again to this incestuous farce. A farce that is touted as being so good for the consumer they made it mandatory. If in fact this privatization of the justice system is so wonderful why is it mandatory?
Arbitration is a sin against the constitution and the general public. One way to get us out of this crisis is to get the arbitration companies to pony up their unbelievable earnings... after all they tout them selves as non -profit facilitator. Non Profit? We know how much they profited off us.Then check the bank accounts of these lenders and builders and make me feel sorry for them. Sorry they have made only 3 million this year instead of the 25 million the year before. These insidous leaches have made millions off us. The builders and lenders are screaming now because their greed became so insasable they have driven this county into a recession. And once again we the people are screwed.
If you would like more on this crisis please google my name Jordan Fogal an read my testimony for the congressional hearing... on the effects of arbitration on the consumer. You may also go to HADD.com or HOBB.org and remember the home you save most likely will be your own.
My name is Albert Luke III. I am the son of Fonza M Luke. You guys can't even begin to understand what my family went through. It was a very emotional time for my mother. My sisters and I didn't understand why my mother was so emotional, sick, and up and down with her weight during that very dark time. How is that you can work for a company all of those years and not sign a piece of paper which makes you waive your rights to work then get fired. My mother and father have worked hard all of their lives. They have put four children through Catholic Schools which is not cheap at all. My mother now works two jobs to meet they needs of her household. The one job which was taken from her did just that. My mother not only has two jobs but takes on the day to day task of caring for six grandchildren when she gets home from work. Their ages range from 1 to 12. Some of the comments which I have read concerning arbitration are hard to swallow. I myself have signed when I first started with the company that I work for. We know by the article which has been written that my mother was terminated. What I don't understand is how can you not sign Arbitration papers but continue to work. My experience in the past working as a supervisor would say that would be considered insubordination and is grounds for termination at that point. My mother was used and then dismissed. I am very upset at how my mother was treated. All I can say is watch your TV's and read the new papers because the books are about to be re-written for ARBITRATION. It may not happen right now but it will happen.
Sincerely,
Albert Luke III
Wow this is ridiculous...now I've never had any problems with ever having to arbitrate but unlike alot of persons...I actually read my contracts and I started noticing that there was always some MANDATORY ARBITRATION agreement in nearly every thing I sign. How is the country suppose to help maintain its citizens rights when basically you have no rights, no power, no checks and balances....and even if you enter into an agreement before and refuse to sign something you can be FORCED into arbitration....that is hella ridiculous. We need to start an interest group...or lobby to get the rich "representatives" to repeal these acts. I swear this country is going from "more power to the people" to "more power to the big business".... So whats the difference between this and Totalitarianism
Mandatory arbitration is yet another method for big business to end-run a court system it cannot control and wants to dismantle. For one thing, the employer is at least potential repeat business for the arbitration companies, while the individual will only arbitrate one case in his or her lifetime. Accordingly, the arbitration associations cater to their repeat customers and generally treat the individual litigant and his attorney as outsiders. Discovery is, by design, extremely limited, if not forbidden altogether. That once again puts the individual at a vast disadvantage. The companies already have all the information they need to defend themselves, including control over witnesses who are still employed by that company. The individual prosecuting the claim, on the other hand, usually doesn't even know the last name of his supervisor. The employers will always dissemble and talk around interrogatories rather than answering them, so depositions are essential in order to investigate the case properly, but the arbitrators discourage taking depositions. I could go on and on, but the essential point is that big business is not requiring people to sign these arbitration agreements because they're trying to be fair. I think it's scandalous for our federal courts to enforce these things.
AAA Arbitration has violated their own Rule oath ethics. AAA Arbitrator have committed fraud protected by immunity and AAA uses clauses to protect them from any liability. They have had protected by adding laws and clauses just in the last 15 -20 years knowing they can deceptively malitiously corrupt the system with no back lash. They even have laws to scar anyone from fighting back without high risk. The law has protected them by lack of complete no if buts or and of evidence. But they have gone to far in violating and braking many laws and using immunity without responsibility for protection. My case will use there rule oaths ethic plus the laws on the books even the one they use against consumer to show no but if or and what they have knowingly been doing.
Let this be a lesson to those who choose to ignore the benefits of proper union representation. Though some are better than others, unions can still provide legal advice and service to members who are faced with questionable employer demands. There are still no laws which require any employer to keep an unwanted employee, nor should there ever be, but there are laws which prohibit unfair discrimination. Until the onus falls upon the employer, and not the employee, to prove such laws had not been broken, the benefit of strong union representation cannot be denied. I suggest mediation became the boondoggle by which the NLRB, the courts, and employers could simultaneously waste employee grievances, and assure them they need not organize.
I thought access to the courts was a civil right. I thought legally no one can make you waive civil rights.
I hope Russ Feingold's bill becomes law, but it doesn't seem like we should need it.
Baptist Health System's Princeton Medical Center in Birmingham, Alabama, Please accept my warmest congratulations for your despicable behavior. I hope and pray that the whole world will discover your wonderful support for hard working, dedicated employees. May all your current employees strike and refuse to return to work until you have made financial amends to Ms. Luke. Oh, by the way, enjoy the upcoming seasonal broadcasts of a Christmas Carol.
