Each year, the CCBA sponsors it's premier event for players in the Unit 123 (and some invited guests) to participate the Invitiational Pairs held during the Winterfest Sectional in January.

This event is open to only those players that have met certain criteria found in the conditions of contest.  (Although marked 2008 Invitational Pairs, conditions are identical, but applied to previous year's winners!)

It is the intent of the CCBA to ask its membership to vote on the inclusion of an arbitration policy for its events and member.

NEW ARBITRATION RULES

The ACBL recently adopted a policy of requiring binding arbitration for any disputes between itself and individual members, and the CCBA is following suit.  In the rare event of a dispute serious enough that it would otherwise result in litigation, arbitration is both a more effective and less expensive procedure for resolving the dispute.  Below is an explanation of how arbitration works and why it is preferable for duplicate bridge.

What is Arbitration?

Arbitration is like an informal trial, in a conference room rather than a courthouse, in which both parties present their evidence, call and cross-examine witnesses, and make their arguments to a panel of knowledgeable decision-makers, who run the procedure and act like a judge and jury combined.  Usually the parties are involved in choosing who the arbitrator(s) will be.  There may be any number of arbitrators (the number is established by rule), who run the hearing, may question the witnesses or parties, and after hearing all the evidence, deliberate and make a decision, which may include a penalty or sanction against the losing party.  Arbitration is a voluntary process; by signing an agreement to arbitrate a given category of dispute, the participants gives up their right to go to court to resolve the dispute and instead agrees to be bound to the arbitration process and its outcome.

Arbitration has been established by federal law (9 USC 1 et seq.), and the U.S. court system gives it great deference.  It is very difficult for the disappointed party to go to court to try to overturn the arbitration decision.  The courts will not allow the losing party to re-argue the merits of the case and will instead defer to the arbitrators.  However, the courts would carefully consider a party’s argument that the process was unfair or biased:  that it denied him/her the ability to prove his/her case, that s/he was denied typical due process rights of being able to call witnesses, confront accusers, etc.  If the arbitration hearing has been conducted properly, it is nearly impossible as a practical matter to have a court subsequently reverse the result.

Why Is Arbitration Better?

Hopefully, the arbitration process will never have to be used.  At least in recent history, there has never been a dispute between the CCBA and any of its members that was serious enough to go to court or to require formal dispute resolution.  But there have been several lawsuits against the ACBL by one or more of its members, and there is at least one local unit that is currently in court against a member.

Such lawsuits are ridiculously expensive – for both parties.  Even a simple lawsuit typically costs tens of thousands of dollars to litigate, and there is a lot of truth to the popular wisdom that “only the lawyers win.”  Certainly the CCBA neither has that kind of money, nor is willing to squander it pursuing a dispute that is likely to be tangential at best to the CCBA’s mission of providing quality duplicate bridge experiences for its members.

Particularly under the rules that the CCBA is establishing, the arbitration process would be far less expensive than litigation.  There would be no court costs and no need to hire or pay lawyers to undertake or defend the time-consuming motion practice, discovery, and other court-mandated procedures.  Since the CCBA arbitration rules call for the arbitrators to serve voluntarily, without charging for their time, the cost of resolving a dispute between the CCBA and a member through arbitration would likely be fairly nominal – many magnitudes less expensive than going to court.

The arbitration process is faster than court litigation as well.  An arbitration under the CCBA rules would typically be resolved in a few months, whereas court litigation ordinarily lasts several years.  (For a lawsuit filed in the Circuit Court of Cook County, the average duration before it gets to trial is approximately four years).  No dispute should fester for that long!  Whether a claim is justified or not, it deserves to be adjudicated quickly either to have the problem corrected promptly or else so that the CCBA can get back to focusing on running its tournaments.

But the primary advantage of arbitration is that disputes are resolved more intelligently and by people who understand the game and context of duplicate bridge.  Court cases are decided by twelve randomly chosen jurors who typically don’t want to be there, have no expertise in adjudication, and have probably never heard of duplicate bridge.  Even if both sides agree to waive a jury and let a judge try the case, the judge will know nothing of the game, its history or the rules/ethics of tournament play.  Court decisions that attempt to adjudicate disputes involving duplicate bridge are likely to be misguided at best and outright harmful at worst.  (Consider the almost universal outcry in the bridge community over the Swiss court’s recent reversal of the European Bridge League’s banning of Fantoni and Nunes as an example of a misguided decision by a court that doesn’t understand duplicate bridge).

The CCBA arbitration rules call for the arbitrators to be experienced duplicate bridge players who understand the special context and issues that are likely to be raised in a bridge-related dispute.  Any arbitrator chosen to resolve a particular dispute must be neutral and unbiased.  Although the arbitrators may know some of the parties and/or the witnesses (since the bridge community is small enough that almost everyone knows everyone else), they would be vetted before they are selected to ensure that they have no biases or relationships that might lead them to be anything but fair and impartial.

Nationwide, especially in specialized industries, there has been a significant trend toward increasing use of arbitration and other forms of alternative dispute resolution rather than litigation in court.  Although we hope that it will never have to be used, the CCBA is jumping on that bandwagon as a preventative measure:  to try to ensure that any future disputes, win or lose, don’t prove to be ruinous to the parties.

How Do I Sign Up?

Arbitration only happens if both parties agree to it.  But the agreement doesn’t have to be a formal contract.  Parties can evidence agreement to be bound by arbitration rules by their actions.  And since the CCBA is now mandating binding arbitration for all disputes between the CCBA and any of its members, simply choosing to remain a member of the CCBA or to participate in any CCBA tournaments will constitute an acceptance of the new CCBA arbitration rules.

CCBA members don’t need to do anything special to indicate their assent.  The entry forms at CCBA tournaments will include a provision that states that by filling out the entry, each participant is agreeing to be bound by the arbitration rules.  (The ACBL already does this at its tournaments).  Arbitration has to be mandatory, so there is no way to opt out except by resigning from the CCBA and declining to participate in its tournaments.

Of course, no one should want to opt out.  Requiring arbitration of disputes is good for the CCBA and good for all of its members.  Just one lawsuit could bankrupt the organization and cripple duplicate bridge in the Chicago area for years.  That’s in no one’s interest.  If you have any questions or concerns about the new arbitration rules, please contact a CCBA board member or pose your question to arbitration dot rules at bridgeinchicago dot com.  

This handbook (368.1 KB download) is a guideline as to how we handle the various committee's that have been formed to make the CCBA function.

Last Update - March 28, 2013