Labor movement finally catches a break as Supreme Court deadlocks in Friedrichs case

A right wing attempt to severe­ly weak­en pub­lic sec­tor unions end­ed in fail­ure today when the Supreme Court announced in a one-sen­tence rul­ing that it would not over­turn its 1977 deci­sion allow­ing such unions to charge non-mem­bers agency fees to cov­er the cost of rep­re­sent­ing them in col­lec­tive bar­gain­ing negotiations.

Pre­sum­ably, the remain­ing mem­bers of the court’s right wing bloc (John Roberts, Clarence Thomas, Samuel Ali­to, Antho­ny Kennedy) desired to set a new prece­dent and over­turn the 1977 deci­sion, but were effec­tive­ly stopped by the pro­gres­sive bloc (Ruth Bad­er Gins­burg, Sonia Sotomay­or, Ele­na Kagan, Stephen Breyer).

With Jus­tice Antonin Scalia no longer on the bench, the right wing bloc lacked the five votes it need­ed to decide the case in favor of the Repub­li­can Par­ty and its right wing allies, who des­per­ate­ly want­ed a rul­ing out of the Court that would great­ly weak­en unions like the Nation­al Edu­ca­tion Asso­ci­a­tion (NEA) or AFSCME, which gen­er­al­ly sup­port the Demo­c­ra­t­ic Par­ty and pro­gres­sive causes.

When pub­lic sec­tor unions nego­ti­ate con­tracts, they do so on behalf of entire groups of work­ers, not just those who wish to belong to the union. It is there­fore com­plete­ly appro­pri­ate and rea­son­able that the work­ers who ben­e­fit from those nego­ti­a­tions pay a fair share ser­vice fee to the union.

U.S. Sen­a­tor Pat­ty Mur­ray applaud­ed the out­come, which affirmed a rul­ing by the 9th Cir­cuit Court of Appeals leav­ing intact the cur­rent agency fee system.

“This is good news for work­ers, unions, fam­i­lies, and the econ­o­my,” Mur­ray said. “With the low­er court rul­ing being affirmed by a dead­locked Supreme Court, this lat­est assault on the abil­i­ty of teach­ers, nurs­es, and oth­er pub­lic ser­vants to orga­nize and make their voic­es heard in the work­place has been beat­en back.

“The econ­o­my is only tru­ly strong when it is grow­ing from the mid­dle out, not the top down—and unions are key in mak­ing that hap­pen. When unions are strong, work­ers can fight for high­er wages, more oppor­tu­ni­ties, and greater eco­nom­ic secu­ri­ty for them­selves and their fam­i­lies. Many Repub­li­cans are going to keep work­ing to tilt the scales in favor of the biggest cor­po­ra­tions and the wealth­i­est Amer­i­cans by mak­ing it hard­er for work­ers to band togeth­er and fight to improve and pro­tect their wages and ben­e­fits. But as a nation, we should not turn our backs on empow­er­ing work­ers through col­lec­tive bar­gain­ing and mak­ing sure that work­ers have a strong voice at the table—and this deci­sion today upholds that principle.”

“While a dead­locked Supreme Court hap­pened to result in a pos­i­tive out­come in this case, this is one more reminder that we need a ful­ly func­tion­ing Supreme Court to pro­tect the rights of work­ers, women, and fam­i­lies across the coun­try. Now that the Pres­i­dent has nom­i­nat­ed Judge Mer­rick Gar­land, Sen­ate Repub­li­cans should do their jobs by giv­ing him all due con­sid­er­a­tion, a hear­ing, and a vote.”