Atlanta, Ga. (September 21, 2005) - National Right to Work Foundation attorneys have filed charges on behalf of a telephone worker against his employer, BellSouth Telecommunications, and its union for forcing him to wear a union logo as a job condition. In doing so, company and union officials are directly defying a 2005 U.S. Court of Appeals decision which ruled that their policy is unlawful. In January, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit unanimously overturned a controversial Clinton-era National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) ruling that approved the practice of forcing both union and non-union BellSouth employees to wear union insignia on their work uniforms or be fired from their jobs. After issuing its decision, the Court of Appeals took the rare step of ordering the NLRB to pay attorneys fees because their erroneous decision had not been substantially justified. In defiance of the appellate court’s ruling, Communications Workers of America (CWA) union officials continue to insist, despite the objections of BellSouth employee Gary Mullis, that he wear their logo as a condition of employment. Mullis, who is not a member of the CWA union, was informed in May by BellSouth that he would not be allowed to refrain from wearing the union insignia. Mullis objects to wearing the logo because the union pursues political objectives that do not represent his views. His charges seek the prosecution of the company and union for unfair labor practices. “Workers should not be forced to be walking billboards for union officials who seek to trample their own freedoms,” said Stefan Gleason, Vice President of the National Right to Work Foundation. “The repeated abusive actions of the CWA hierarchy and BellSouth management raise serious questions about their integrity and respect for the law.” The appellate court’s 3-0 decision overturning the unlawful policy concurred with Foundation attorneys’ arguments that provisions of the National Labor Relations Act embodied a “right to refrain from wearing union insignia.” The court rejected union and company lawyers’ claims that the display of the union patch alongside the company logo on the uniform was so integral to the “public image” of BellSouth that the mandate superceded the individual rights of workers. The court noted that there was no evidence that the union patch projected a positive image to customers, and that it could, in fact, signal a negative image to customers who could conclude that strikes and service interruptions were more likely to occur. However, regardless of what image was projected to customers, the court explained that proper analysis should have been what the requirement signaled to employees – that the company and union expect employees to be union members. The court ruled that this restrained and coerced employees in the exercise of their right to refrain from union membership.

Bloomfield Hills, Michigan (August 18, 2005) – A Michigan Court of Appeals agreed with arguments made by lawyers for the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation that imposing monopoly collective bargaining on Brother Rice High School, a private Catholic school, would entangle labor laws with the religious freedoms of the teachers and the school itself. Three judges issued a joint “per curiam” opinion this week overturning a precedent-setting Michigan Employment Relations Commission’s (MERC) ruling that Catholic schools somehow fall under Michigan’s compulsory collective bargaining laws. If the MERC had not been overturned, union officials were expected to forcibly unionize numerous other religious institutions. The dismissal of the claim by the Michigan Educators Association (MEA) is a victory for both religious independence and teacher freedom. The MEA was targeting teachers at the Brother Rice High School for forced unionization. The Foundation filed an amicus curiae brief for the Acton Institute, a religious liberty public policy group, in support of Brother Rice. “It would be unconscionable to force religious schools to bargain with union officials who have an agenda that runs afoul of the teachings of the Catholic Church,” said Stefan Gleason, Vice President of the National Right to Work Foundation. “At the same time, teachers should not be forced to accept the representation of union officials whose agenda they may believe to be morally reprehensible.” The Foundation brief demonstrated that Catholic Church doctrine and the ideology of the MEA union are incompatible, and that Michigan state law was not written in a way to include Brother Rice in the jurisdiction of union representation and state regulation. Ultimately the appeals court agreed that Michigan state law should be interpreted so that parochial schools are not placed under the jurisdiction of state labor laws. Foundation attorneys argued that giving MERC oversight of collective bargaining agreements could lead to the MEA using collective bargaining to highjack the religious teaching process and allow the MEA’s radical political agenda to influence the religious instruction given by Brother Rice teachers. Additionally, because hiring practices at the school necessarily involve religious beliefs, an MEA victory would have meant that the state would be forced to pass judgment upon church doctrine to determine whether the school’s refusal to bargain over certain terms of employment is legitimately based on religious belief.

Knoxville, Tenn. (August 1, 2005) — The Court of Appeals of Tennessee has given a green-light to a Tennessee educator’s lawsuit challenging union officials’ practice of compelling teachers to support political activities as a condition of union membership. The appellate court agreed with arguments made by National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation attorneys that the trial court improperly dismissed a lawsuit filed on behalf of Polk County teacher Dewey Esquinance. Mr. Esquinance is making a constitutional challenge to a statewide teacher union rule that forces teachers to resign from union membership and thereby sacrifice their voice in workplace matters in order to exercise their political and religious freedoms. Esquinance, with the help of Foundation attorneys, filed the suit in April 2003 against the National Education Association’s (NEA) affiliates, the Polk County Education Association and the Tennessee Education Association, in the state of Tennessee Circuit Court of Polk County. The appellate court ruled that the trial court must allow the suit to proceed. If Mr. Esquinance ultimately prevails, teachers will have a constitutional right to remain union members and withhold dues spent by the union on ideological activities. Currently, teachers must resign from union membership under the state’s Right to Work law in order to withhold dues. However, as non-members, teachers lose several privileges that union members enjoy, including voting on the collective bargaining agreement that binds them to certain terms and conditions of employment, as well as a voice in determining the criteria for teacher evaluations, control of sick bank donations, and access to teacher training. As a non-union member, Esquinance automatically forfeits these benefits. “It seems that NEA officials are not as concerned with representing employees as they are with shaking them down to finance a radical political agenda,” said Foundation Vice President Stefan Gleason. Like many educators, Esquinance objects to many aspects of the NEA’s agenda for religious and political reasons, including the NEA’s stances promoting abortion, gun control, and special rights for homosexuals. Every year, the NEA spends millions of dollars in compulsory dues it collects in support of political views and candidates that many teachers find objectionable. Esquinance is challenging the membership dues based on the rights established by the Foundation-won U.S. Supreme Court decision in Abood v. Detroit Board of Education. Under Abood and subsequent rulings, employees have a constitutional right to refuse to pay for union non-collective bargaining activities and ideological activities -- such as politics.