This is where us poor, dumb truck drivers would have trouble understanding our rights. It's taken me two months to dig up this info, trying to figure out who had jurisdiction over disputes in these cases. It's not the NRLB, it's not OLMS, or even the DOL. Union constitutions are considered contracts between the union and the members. As such it falls under the jurisdiction of the courts.
Whether it's the state courts' or federal court's jurisdiction is a matter of contention, but the supreme court has consistently ruled that disputes over union constitutions fall under the federal court's jurisdiction. Since they are deemed contracts, contract theory applies. I can just about guarantee that the clausrs that give the general president and executive board final say and the right to make changes when they feel like it would be seen as unenforcable.
The courts have final say over interpretations of contracts, and any clause that gives one party the right to make changes without approval of the other party would be thrown out. According to contract theory, vaguely written clauses will be interpreted in the favor of the party that did not write it. The union wrote the constitution, and article 12 is extremely vaguely written, so....
