snapthis
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- Joined
- Dec 23, 2009
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The 9th gets it.
From the outset, USAPA was irreconcilably opposed to the negotiating
position of the West Pilots. Conceived in the minds of the East Pilots, elected and
installed by the East Pilots, and constitutionally committed to a date-of-hire list
that favored the East Pilots, USAPA could never fairly and impartially represent
the West Pilots. The very reason for its existence was to undermine the Nicolau
Award in every manner that ALPA had refused to do. USAPA was, for all intents
and purposes, a representative for the East Pilots. This purpose is nowhere more
evident than in the East Pilots’ and USAPA’s own words. In the East Pilots’
consultations with counsel, they sought to develop a roadmap for creating “a new
bargaining agent [that] can get around the award and make the Nicolau Award
moot.” And although counsel cautioned the East Pilots to take care not to advertise
too broadly that the “sole reason for the new union” was to abrogate the Nicolau
Award, the East Pilots paid little heed. Their new union’s constitution spoke its
founders’ purpose loud and clear. USAPA’s constitution committed it “to
maintain[ing] uniform principles of seniority based on date of hire.” This principle
flatly contradicted the Nicolau Award, but it ensured that the East Pilots, whose
voting strength overpowered the West Pilots by more than two-to-one, would vote
to certify USAPA as the new collective bargaining representative. And upon its
certification, USAPA’s first act was to submit a new seniority list to US Airways,
consistent with the date-of-hire principles it was constitutionally committed to
proselytize.
Although in Addington I we were uncertain about how the East and West
Pilots’ “internal disputes” would eventually “work themselves out,” 606 F.3d at
1181 n.4, USAPA’s subsequent actions have rendered the picture clear. Since
USAPA’s initial act of proposing a revised seniority list in 2008, it has continued
to oppose any efforts to reach a “Single Agreement,” the consummation of which
would automatically trigger the implementation of the Nicolau Award under the
terms of the Transition Agreement. Thus far, USAPA has been fully successful.
Two years after we decided Addington I , when US Airways and American Airlines
announced their merger, there was still no Single Agreement and no Nicolau
Award. USAPA succeeded in keeping separate the seniority lists applicable to the
East and West Pilots until it finally had the opportunity, in the US
Airways–American Airlines merger, to dismantle the Nicolau Award for good. In
short, USAPA’s aim to benefit the East Pilots at the expense of the West Pilots is
no longer in any doubt.
From the outset, USAPA was irreconcilably opposed to the negotiating
position of the West Pilots. Conceived in the minds of the East Pilots, elected and
installed by the East Pilots, and constitutionally committed to a date-of-hire list
that favored the East Pilots, USAPA could never fairly and impartially represent
the West Pilots. The very reason for its existence was to undermine the Nicolau
Award in every manner that ALPA had refused to do. USAPA was, for all intents
and purposes, a representative for the East Pilots. This purpose is nowhere more
evident than in the East Pilots’ and USAPA’s own words. In the East Pilots’
consultations with counsel, they sought to develop a roadmap for creating “a new
bargaining agent [that] can get around the award and make the Nicolau Award
moot.” And although counsel cautioned the East Pilots to take care not to advertise
too broadly that the “sole reason for the new union” was to abrogate the Nicolau
Award, the East Pilots paid little heed. Their new union’s constitution spoke its
founders’ purpose loud and clear. USAPA’s constitution committed it “to
maintain[ing] uniform principles of seniority based on date of hire.” This principle
flatly contradicted the Nicolau Award, but it ensured that the East Pilots, whose
voting strength overpowered the West Pilots by more than two-to-one, would vote
to certify USAPA as the new collective bargaining representative. And upon its
certification, USAPA’s first act was to submit a new seniority list to US Airways,
consistent with the date-of-hire principles it was constitutionally committed to
proselytize.
Although in Addington I we were uncertain about how the East and West
Pilots’ “internal disputes” would eventually “work themselves out,” 606 F.3d at
1181 n.4, USAPA’s subsequent actions have rendered the picture clear. Since
USAPA’s initial act of proposing a revised seniority list in 2008, it has continued
to oppose any efforts to reach a “Single Agreement,” the consummation of which
would automatically trigger the implementation of the Nicolau Award under the
terms of the Transition Agreement. Thus far, USAPA has been fully successful.
Two years after we decided Addington I , when US Airways and American Airlines
announced their merger, there was still no Single Agreement and no Nicolau
Award. USAPA succeeded in keeping separate the seniority lists applicable to the
East and West Pilots until it finally had the opportunity, in the US
Airways–American Airlines merger, to dismantle the Nicolau Award for good. In
short, USAPA’s aim to benefit the East Pilots at the expense of the West Pilots is
no longer in any doubt.
