Supreme Court conservatives appear ready to overturn mandatory union fees

The union and state claim this is fair because all workers benefit from collective bargaining, so some workers shouldn’t be allowed to be “free riders” by paying no fees. “Every individual should have the right to decide” which organization she supports, said Friedrichs, a third-grade teacher from Anaheim whose case is championed by conservative legal organizations.

The larger issue, though, is that union leaders fear employees will simply choose to stop paying dues for economic reasons, if the law allows that choice. More than half of union-represented workers in the public sector are women. The court did rule that nonmembers can not be charged a fee to cover for a union’s political activity.

“It may limit their revenues somewhat, but they can compensate for that by being less involved in things like politics and tend to their knitting by representing their members in collective bargaining”, Carvin said. The union wouldn’t listen to her and insisted on bargaining for pay raises despite the fact that it would mean good teachers would be laid off and everybody else would get increased class sizes.

The Supreme Court has long held that requiring non-union members to pay the full amount of union dues would violate their right of free expression, forcing them to subsidize a union’s political activities whether they agree with its goals or not. The case that could deal a crippling blow to the millions of unions that represent millions of the nation’s public employees like teachers and police officers. They said Justice Kennedy and Justice Antonin Scalia, two Republican-appointed members of the court, had previously seemed sympathetic to the problem of union free riders but on Monday offered stern critiques of the practice of charging fees. If that’s how the case goes, it would be a huge victory for workers’ rights, the First Amendment, and educational freedom – and probably the most important ruling this term. While dues might cover the cost of some of the union’s political activities, “fair share” fees are restricted to paying for collective bargaining, grievances and other non-political services, the law professor said.

“California understands the First Amendment interests that are involved in this case”, he told the Court. But the court in that case fell shy of overturning Abood, and several justices Monday seemed to test the implications of doing so this time.

Federal employee unions also can not collect such fees. And clearly already-decimated private-sector unions will be the next target.

The dispute pits non-union teachers and the Christian Educators Association International against the California Teachers Association, an influential union with 325,000 members.

Rebecca Friedrichs and nine other California teachers are not all wrong in their critique of the oversized influence and self-interest of teachers unions. The court’s logic at the time was that, if employees were given the choice of whether or not to pay dues to their union, very few would do so – thus harming the union’s ability to collectively bargain. Currently, workers must “opt out” of the political fees by checking a box on a form.

The court’s decision, which should come down by the end of June, could have a transformative effect on the workplace-relations landscape in the United States.