resolution.”[1]“Congress’s intent in the RLA [was] ‘to keep [carriers’] labor disputes out of the courts.”[2] To facilitate this process, the RLA provides a “mandatory arbitral mechanism to handle disputes ‘growing out of grievances or out of the interpretation or application of agreements concerning rates of pay, rules, or working conditions.’”[3]
Disputes under this regime are generally characterized as either major or minor. “[M]ajor disputes seek to create contractual rights, minor disputes to enforce them,”[4] so disputes about defining the rights guaranteed by a collective bargaining agreement are minor disputes.[5] Minor disputes are preempted by the RLA and must be dealt with first through a carrier’s internal dispute resolution process, and then a System Adjustment Board comprised of workers and management.[6] The Act states that among its purposes are to provide for settlement of “all” disputes about “pay, rules or working conditions,” and “all” disputes growing out of
- ↑ Aircraft Serv., 779 F.3d at 1073 (citing Bhd. of R.R. Trainmen v. Chi. River & Ind. R.R., 353 U.S. 30, 40, 77 (1957) (emphasis added)).
- ↑ Fennessy v. Southwest Airlines, 91 F.3d 1359, 1363 (9th Cir. 1996) (emphasis in original) (quoting Lewy v. Southern Pac. Transp. Co., 799 F.2d 1281, 1289 (9th Cir. 1986)).
- ↑ Norris, 512 U.S. at 248 (quoting 45 U.S.C. § 153, First)
- ↑ See Consol. Rail Corp. v. Ry. Labor Execs. Ass’n., 491 U.S. 301, 302 (1989) (quoting Elgin, Joliet & E. Ry. Co. v. Burley, 325 U.S. 711, 723 (1945)).
- ↑ Norris, 512 U.S. at 255.
- ↑ 45 U.S.C. § 184.
