Teacher’s unions are hell bent on keeping the agency fees they collect from government workers whether they want to join the unions or not. “Later this month the U.S. Supreme Court will hear arguments in the case of Janus v. AFSCME, Council 31, in which anti-union ‘right to work’ forces are challenging the right of public employee unions to collect agency fees from non-members that the unions represent,” Hank Reichman writes on the academe blog maintained by the American Association of University Professors (AAUP). “These fees have since 1977 been protected by the Supreme Court’s unanimous decision in Abood v. Detroit Board of Education. The ostensible plaintiff, Mark Janus, backed by the National Right to Work Committee and other anti-union groups, claims that requiring non-members to pay for union representation at all is de facto government-compelled speech and hence a violation of the First Amendment.” Wait until you see the hairpin turns he makes to argue that it isn’t.
“Last month the AAUP joined with the National Education Association to submit an amicus curiae brief in support of the respondents, which urged the Court to reject the challenge, arguing that ‘the government is fully justified in ordering its own workplace affairs through collective bargaining with an exclusive representative. And in order to secure that arrangement, the government is equally justified in authorizing and entering agency fee arrangements that ensure the financial stability of its collective bargaining partner. Such a result is fully consistent with the First Amendment, which grants the government the ‘widest latitude’ in conducting its own internal affairs.’”
See if you can find that in your pocket Constitution.
