February 28th 2021
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Tens of millions of Americans are still out of work and relying on expanded unemployment benefits, but not all jobless workers are receiving those benefits. And the distribution of unemployment benefits, like so much else about American society, is infected with...
In February, the Supreme Court heard oral arguments in Janus v. AFSCME. Today, a slight majority of the Court issued a decision that regrettably impacts far more than just “fair share” fees and the more than 40-year-old precedent established by Abood v. Detroit...
Recognizing the potential folly in engaging with a Trump tweet, I thought it was worth two quick comments on what the President had to say about Janus. Here's the tweet: Supreme Court rules in favor of non-union workers who are now, as an example, able to support a...
Janus, the Court’s case about public sector agency fees that will be decided this term, is a case that could be framed in two ways. On the one hand, Janus is a case about compelled political speech: the government, by imposing agency fees as a condition of...
This term, the Supreme Court will decide Janus, where it will determine the future of agency shop agreements in public sector unions. Despite being a public-sector union case, Justice Ginsburg raised a question on many people’s minds at oral argument: “what happens...
Janus v. AFSCME will soon decide the constitutional fate of fair-share fees for public sector unions. These fees support unions’ collective bargaining work on behalf of employees they are legally required to represent but who are not union members. Most prognosticators expect the Supreme Court to hand the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation (NRTWLDF) a win on its claim that such fees violate the First Amendment rights of non-union workers. Yet, as I develop further below, the history that led to Janus offers three thin rays of hope to the labor movement.
The United States filed an amicus brief last night in Janus v. AFSCME asking the Supreme Court to overrule Abood and to hold that public sector agency fee agreements are unconstitutional. This represents a change in the federal government's position...
In light of the Court's grant of cert. in Janus v. AFSCME, I'm posting my new draft article on the subject. The article, Agency Fees and the First Amendment, 131 Harv. L. Rev. (forthcoming Feb. 2018), makes two related arguments, both of which aim to demonstrate...
The Supreme Court decided yesterday to hear Janus v. AFSCME. The Court seems poised to hold that agency-fee agreements for public sector workers are unconstitutional. Since the order, reports and commentaries have analyzed Janus's threat to public sector workers,...
Last term’s Supreme Court decisions, particularly in the employment area, suggest that the Court was simply marking time while it functioned without a ninth Justice and Presidential politics occupied center stage. But to this observer, the thin and relatively...
Fighting the dangers of tobacco, seeking redress for homeowners during the mortgage crisis, and most recently standing up against the Muslim ban – state attorneys general have long been at the forefront of efforts to protect the well-being of the people of their states. In recent months, progressive state attorneys general have emerged as some of the nation’s foremost champions of civil rights and of humane, sensible policy in the face of declining protection at the federal level. As income inequality grows and too many American workers struggle to get a fair deal in our economy, the role of state attorneys general in enforcing statutes that protect workers’ economic interests has taken on new importance. To build on the energy and expertise of these public servants, under the auspices of the Labor and Worklife Program at Harvard Law School, we recently hosted attorneys from the offices of 11 state attorneys general last week to discuss strategies and best practices for enforcing labor laws
The Supreme Court has been asked to reconsider whether arrangements requiring non-union employees in the public sector to pay fair share or agency fees violate the First Amendment of the Constitution. Yesterday, Mark Janus, an Illinois state employee, petitioned...