Knox v. Service Employees International Union, Local 1000
Diane Knox v. Service Employees International Union | |
---|---|
Holding | |
The case is not moot, the First Amendment does not permit a public-sector union to impose a special assessment without the affirmative consent of a member upon whom it is imposed. | |
Court membership | |
| |
Case opinions | |
Majority | Alito, joined by Roberts, Scalia, Kennedy, Thomas |
Concurrence | Sotomayor (in judgment), joined by Ginsburg |
Dissent | Breyer, joined by Kagan |
Laws applied | |
U.S. Const. amend. I |
Knox v. Service Employees International Union, 567 U.S. 298 (2012), is a
Background
Under
SEIU's Political Fight Back Fund along with an alliance of other public sector unions expended $24 million campaigning against Schwarzenegger's fiscal reform, with the California Teachers Association expending an additional $56 million and going so far as to mortgage its Sacramento headquarters to fund more campaign spending.[9][10] Schwarzenegger likewise spent nearly $8 million of his own fortune campaigning.[11] The tenor was highly divisive, with Schwarzenegger calling his opponents “stooges” and at one point Warren Beatty leading a bus full of public employees to follow the governor and shout down his events.[12]
Proposition 75 and all Governor Schwarzenegger's other fiscal reform agenda initiatives were defeated by wide margins.[5] It had been the most expensive election in California history.[13] As the results came out in Sacramento the president of the California Professional Firefighters union waived a broom over his head while state employees chanted “sweep, sweep, sweep”.[14]
In March 2008 District Court Judge
Plaintiffs then filed their opening brief. Instead of filing a reply brief, SEIU mailed a ten-page booklet to the 28,000 plaintiffs offering terms and conditions for a full refund, even including a $1 bill.[17] SEIU then moved to dismiss the case as moot.
Opinion of the Court
Writing for the Court in a 7-2 ruling,
Alito begins by correlating First Amendment protection of compelled funding with compelled speech and compelled association. He reads precedent as allowing compulsory fees funding private speech only when a compelling state interest requires the comprehensive regulation of a mandatory association and the fees are necessary for the regulatory purpose.[19]
Questioning the necessity of compulsory union fees Alito writes “acceptance of the free-rider argument as a justification for compelling nonmembers to pay a portion of union dues represents something of an anomaly—one that we have found to be justified by the interest in furthering “labor peace.”[20] He finds this anomaly is “a remarkable boon for unions” and that it only came about as a “historical accident”.
Alito is unwilling to extend the anomaly of compelling ordinary union dues to further compelling extraordinary union fees. The SEIU Political Fight Back fee had, then, extracted a forced loan out of the nonmembers, coercing them to fund a political campaign they disagreed with and only offering to return the funds after the campaign had been won.[21] This particularly troubles Alito with regard to Proposition 75 because “the effect of the SEIU’s procedure was to force many nonmembers to subsidize a political effort designed to restrict their own rights”.[22]
Finally, SEIU had argued that its Political Fight Back fee was not political because for a public employees union “lobbying the electorate” is part of contract negotiations.[23] Alito is not persuaded, finding this definition of contract negotiations “would effectively eviscerate the limitation of use of compulsory fees to support unions’ controversial political activities.”[24] The Court therefore holds unions cannot impose extraordinary fees on nonmembers without first receiving nonmembers’ affirmative consent.
Concurrence in Judgment
Because neither the question presented, briefed, or argued disputed the constitutionality of requiring nonmembers to opt out of fees, Sotommayor does not feel the Court has the power to make affirmatively opting into fees a constitutional requirement. Because what is chargeable and nonchargeable to nonmembers is uncertain, Sotomayor feels the “majority’s answer to its unasked constitutional question is not even clear.”[26]
Dissent
Reactions
The editors of the New York Times disliked the outcome, decrying that "the legal approach is indistinguishable from politics."[29] Erwin Chemerinsky called Knox the term's "biggest sleeper case".[30] Chermerinsky would later write that Knox should be read to increase union political power.[31] Michael Dorf disliked Justice Alito's "broadly anti-union rhetoric".[32] Students on the Harvard Law Review called the case "undoubtedly represents a watershed moment in the field of union campaign finance" and welcomed "a restraint on government power to rig the marketplace of ideas".[33]
The court would soon extend First Amendment protections against unions in
See also
- Janus v. AFSCME
- List of United States Supreme Court cases by the Roberts Court
- List of United States Supreme Court cases involving the First Amendment
References
- (2012).
- ^ "The State Worker: U.S. Supreme Court rules against SEIU Local 1000 in fee case". Archived from the original on November 10, 2014. Retrieved November 10, 2014.
- ^ "Supreme Court Union Ruling, Knox v. SEIU, Could Cut Back Labor's Political Speech". HuffPost. June 25, 2012. Archived from the original on November 10, 2014. Retrieved November 10, 2014.
- ^ Chicago School Teachers Union v. Hudson, 475 U.S. 292 (1986).
- ^ a b Richard Hasen, Assessing California's Hybrid Democracy, 97 Cal. L. Rev. 1501 (2009). Archived January 18, 2016, at the Wayback Machine
- ^ "Proposition 75 - Institute of Governmental Studies - UC Berkeley". igs.berkeley.edu. August 2, 2012. Archived from the original on March 4, 2016. Retrieved April 24, 2018.
- ^ "Archived copy" (PDF). Archived (PDF) from the original on March 4, 2016. Retrieved April 14, 2015.
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link) - ^ 9th Cir.2010).
- ^ "Election Overview - FollowTheMoney.org 62". followthemoney.org. Archived from the original on September 24, 2015. Retrieved April 24, 2018.
- City Journal. No. Spring 2010. Manhattan Institute for Policy Research. Archivedfrom the original on April 14, 2015. Retrieved April 14, 2015.
- ^ "Show Me - FollowTheMoney.org". followthemoney.org. Retrieved April 24, 2018.
- ^ Marinucci, Carla (November 6, 2005). "Beatty crashes governor's party". San Francisco Chronicle. Archived from the original on September 24, 2015. Retrieved April 14, 2015.
- ^ Thomas, Bryan (November 10, 2005). "A Weary State is Left Facing Hefty Price Tag". The Daily Californian. Archived from the original on January 18, 2016. Retrieved April 14, 2015.
- ^ Chronicle political writers (November 9, 2005). "Californians say no to Schwarzenegger". San Francisco Chronicle. Archived from the original on March 29, 2015. Retrieved April 14, 2015.
- E.D. Cal.Mar. 28, 2008).
- ^ Ross Runkel, When union fees go up, must a “Hudson notice” go out?, SCOTUSblog (Jan. 5, 2012, 10:01 AM) Archived March 13, 2017, at the Wayback Machine
- ^ "Granted case challenged as "moot" - SCOTUSblog". scotusblog.com. October 25, 2011. Archived from the original on March 13, 2017. Retrieved April 24, 2018.
- ^ Knox, 132 S. Ct. at 2287.
- ^ 132 S. Ct. at 2289.
- ^ 132 S. Ct. at 2290 citing Clyde Summers, Book Review, Sheldon Leader, Freedom of Association: A Study in Labor Law and Political Theory, 16 Comparative Labor L.J. 262, 268 (1995).
- ^ 132 S. Ct. at 2293.
- ^ 132 S. Ct. at 2292.
- ^ 132 S. Ct. at 2294.
- ^ 132 S. Ct. at 2295.
- ^ 132 S. Ct. at 2297.
- ^ 132 S. Ct. at 2299.
- ^ 132 S. Ct. at 2304 (Breyer, J., dissenting, citing Cal. Govt.Code Ann. Sec. 3515.8 (West 2010)).
- ^ 132 S. Ct. at 2306 (Breyer, J., dissenting).
- ^ "Opinion - The Anti-Union Roberts Court". The New York Times. June 22, 2012. Archived from the original on November 22, 2017. Retrieved April 24, 2018.
- ^ "333Casting an Overdue Skeptical Eye: Knox v. SEIU" (PDF). cato.org. Archived (PDF) from the original on August 13, 2017. Retrieved April 24, 2018.
- ^ Catherine L. Fisk & Erwin Chemerinsky, Political Speech and Association Rights after Knox v. Seiu, Local 1000, 98 Cornell L. Rev. 1023 (2013).
- ^ "The Knox v. SEIU Dictum is Truly Radical". dorfonlaw.org. July 17, 2012. Archived from the original on March 29, 2017. Retrieved April 24, 2018.
- ^ Leading Cases, 126 Harv. L. Rev. 186 (2012).
External links
- Text of Knox v. Service Employees International Union, 567 U.S. 310 (2012) is available from: CourtListener Google Scholar Justia Library of Congress Oyez (oral argument audio)
- http://www.scotusblog.com/case-files/cases/knox-v-service-employees-intl-union-local-1000/