A National Labor Relations Board hearing officer Wednesday found that Northwestern football players who receive scholarships are university employees and may unionize. The ruling might be groundbreaking, but we are a long way from breaking ground on a union hall adjacent to the Nicolet Football Center.
For one thing, hearing officers, also called administrative law judges, don't have the last word. They have the first word. Anyone who can identify the doink-doink of "Law & Order" has heard the legal cliché that a prosecutor can indict a ham sandwich. What hearing officers do is akin to certifying a class in a class-action lawsuit. Now the game begins.
As my colleague Lester Munson detailed, administrative law judge Peter Sung Ohr believes that former Northwestern quarterback Kain Colter and the sundry current Wildcats who want to unionize have a good case. However, Northwestern already has said it plans to take the case to the entire NLRB.
For another, this decision would set aside a stack of case law in which courts have ruled that student-athletes are not employees. It would be a momentous undertaking for the executive branch (NLRB) to set aside the judicial. If that happens, surely Northwestern will take its case back to the courts, where that case law might have more sway.
And even if the courts reverse the case law and rule that the players may unionize, thus changing the character of intercollegiate athletics, don't you think that the legislative branch (Congress) would join the fun?
So nothing is going to happen for a long time.
But the most interesting law here might be the law of unintended consequences.
Let's say that the NLRB sides with Colter. And let's say they vote to authorize the College Athletes Players Association to represent them.
Look at how Ohr made his decision. He illustrated how they perform services under a contract of hire (scholarship), subject to the other party's control (coaches) and in return for payment ($61,000 per academic year at Northwestern; $76,000 for those players who attend summer school).
Stanford released a statement Wednesday which read: "Stanford student-athletes go through the same admission process as non-student-athletes and must meet the same academic requirements once admitted."
For entire article: http://espn.go.com/college-football...ion-victory-small-battle-collegiate-landscape
For one thing, hearing officers, also called administrative law judges, don't have the last word. They have the first word. Anyone who can identify the doink-doink of "Law & Order" has heard the legal cliché that a prosecutor can indict a ham sandwich. What hearing officers do is akin to certifying a class in a class-action lawsuit. Now the game begins.
As my colleague Lester Munson detailed, administrative law judge Peter Sung Ohr believes that former Northwestern quarterback Kain Colter and the sundry current Wildcats who want to unionize have a good case. However, Northwestern already has said it plans to take the case to the entire NLRB.
For another, this decision would set aside a stack of case law in which courts have ruled that student-athletes are not employees. It would be a momentous undertaking for the executive branch (NLRB) to set aside the judicial. If that happens, surely Northwestern will take its case back to the courts, where that case law might have more sway.
And even if the courts reverse the case law and rule that the players may unionize, thus changing the character of intercollegiate athletics, don't you think that the legislative branch (Congress) would join the fun?
So nothing is going to happen for a long time.
But the most interesting law here might be the law of unintended consequences.
Let's say that the NLRB sides with Colter. And let's say they vote to authorize the College Athletes Players Association to represent them.
Look at how Ohr made his decision. He illustrated how they perform services under a contract of hire (scholarship), subject to the other party's control (coaches) and in return for payment ($61,000 per academic year at Northwestern; $76,000 for those players who attend summer school).
Stanford released a statement Wednesday which read: "Stanford student-athletes go through the same admission process as non-student-athletes and must meet the same academic requirements once admitted."
For entire article: http://espn.go.com/college-football...ion-victory-small-battle-collegiate-landscape
