## Facts

- Philadelphia Newspapers, Inc. employed an editorial cartoonist who was represented by the Newspaper Guild of Greater Philadelphia, Local 10 under a collective bargaining agreement (CBA).
- The CBA permitted termination only for “good and reasonable cause.”
- The newspaper terminated the cartoonist after he published a cartoon that included his estranged wife’s telephone number.
- The Guild grieved the discharge, and the parties submitted the dispute to arbitration.
- The arbitrator found the newspaper lacked contractual cause to terminate the employee and ordered reinstatement to “his former, or substantially equivalent position.”
- The arbitrator stated that he retained jurisdiction for 60 days to enforce the decision.
- After the award, the newspaper offered the employee an advertising-artist position instead of restoring him to his editorial-cartoonist role.
- The Guild contended the advertising-artist position did not satisfy the award’s “former, or substantially equivalent position” requirement and asked the arbitrator to determine whether the offer complied with the award.
- The newspaper objected that the arbitrator lacked authority to revisit the matter after issuing the initial award.
- The arbitrator issued a follow-up order interpreting the reinstatement remedy and concluding the advertising-artist position did not comply with the original award.
- The newspaper filed suit in federal district court (E.D. Pa.) seeking to vacate the arbitrator’s follow-up order, and the parties filed cross-motions for summary judgment.

## Issues

1. Whether an arbitrator who ordered reinstatement to the employee’s “former, or substantially equivalent position,” and who expressly retained jurisdiction for 60 days to enforce the decision, could issue a post-award order interpreting whether the employer’s offered position complied with the award.
2. Whether the follow-up order was a permissible clarification/enforcement of the original remedy rather than an unauthorized change to the award that would justify vacatur.

## Decision

- The court rejected the newspaper’s request to vacate the arbitrator’s post-award order.
- The court granted summary judgment in favor of the Guild and left the award in place as interpreted by the arbitrator.
- The court concluded that, given the arbitrator’s express retention of jurisdiction, the arbitrator had authority to determine whether the advertising-artist job satisfied the reinstatement remedy, and the follow-up order did not exceed that authority.

## Legal Principles

- Federal courts give strong deference to labor-arbitration awards and will not overturn an award so long as it is tied to the parties’ CBA and the issue submitted to arbitration.
- When an arbitrator expressly retains jurisdiction to enforce or implement an award, the arbitrator may resolve later disputes about compliance with the award’s remedial terms.
- A post-award order is generally valid when it clarifies or applies the original award to a concrete compliance dispute, rather than replacing the original remedy with a different one.
- Whether an employer’s reinstatement offer satisfies language such as “former, or substantially equivalent position” may be treated as a question of implementing the award that the arbitrator can answer when jurisdiction is retained.

## Conclusion

In *Philadelphia Newspapers v. Newspaper Guild of Greater Philadelphia, Local 10*, the court upheld the arbitrator’s authority—based on the arbitrator’s retained jurisdiction—to issue a post-award clarification determining that the newspaper’s offer of an advertising-artist position did not satisfy the reinstatement remedy requiring the employee’s former or a substantially equivalent job, and the court denied vacatur and entered judgment for the Guild.


Philadelphia Newspapers v. Newspaper Guild of Greater Philadelphia, Local 10, 1987 WL 17744 (1987)