Cite as: 518 U. S. 231 (1996)
Stevens, J., dissenting
that would be produced in a free market. Nor do those policies support a rule that would allow employers to suppress wages by implementing noncompetitive agreements among themselves on matters that have not previously been the subject of either an agreement with labor or even a demand by labor for inclusion in the bargaining process. That, however, is what is at stake in this litigation.
II
In light of the accommodation that has been struck between antitrust and labor law policy, it would be most ironic to extend an exemption crafted to protect collective action by employees to protect employers acting jointly to deny employees the opportunity to negotiate their salaries individually in a competitive market. Perhaps aware of the irony, the Court chooses to analyze this case as though it represented a typical impasse in an unexceptional multiemployer bargaining process. In so doing, it glosses over three unique features of the case that are critical to the inquiry into whether the policies of the labor laws require extension of the nonstatutory labor exemption to this atypical case.
First, in this market, unlike any other area of labor law implicated in the cases cited by the Court, player salaries are individually negotiated. The practice of individually negotiating player salaries prevailed even prior to collective bargaining.3 The players did not challenge the prevailing
3 As the District Court explained: "The present case does not involve any change in preexisting wage terms of either an active or expired collective bargaining agreement. In fact, creation of the developmental squads added a novel category of players to each NFL club. These players were not treated under the salary terms applicable to regular NFL players. Under the 1982 Collective Bargaining Agreement, the NFL players were expressly given the right to negotiate the salary terms of their contracts. 1982 Collective Bargaining Agreement at Article XXII, Plaintiffs' Exhibits at 1. By contrast, the developmental squad contracts indicates that the prospective developmental squad players had no right to negotiate their own salary terms but instead were to receive a fixed non-negotiable
255
Page: Index Previous 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 NextLast modified: October 4, 2007