Teachers File Class-Action Lawsuit against Union’s Mandatory Membership and Forced Dues Policies

Union operatives blocked members’ resignations, illegally imposed mandatory collective bargaining

Louisville, Kentucky (September 23, 2009) – With free legal assistance from the National Right to Work Foundation, several Jefferson County educators have filed a federal class-action lawsuit against local and national teacher unions for a series of schemes designed to force unwilling educators into full-dues paying union membership.

The lawsuit alleges that union officials routinely blocked membership resignations for years at a time, automatically enrolled new teachers in the union without their consent, and used a collective bargaining scheme to force county teachers to pay union dues.

The teachers’ lawsuit, filed against the Jefferson County Teachers Association (JCTA) union and its national affiliate, the National Education Association (NEA), in U.S. District Court for the Western District of Kentucky, seeks the return of illegally seized dues, a modification of the union’s contract to allow employees to resign from union membership at any time, and a regular notice from the union that informs public school employees of their right to refrain from membership.

The NEA is also named in the teachers’ suit because it encouraged JCTA officials to continue to block resignation attempts despite the concerns of local educators. Foundation attorneys believe that this lawsuit has the potential to deter similar NEA practices across the country by setting a favorable precedent under the First Amendment guaranteeing the right of teachers to resign from union membership at any time.

Currently, teachers employed in Jefferson County are automatically enrolled as union members and forced to pay union dues unless they explicitly register an objection to JCTA union officials. Moreover, teachers are only permitted to resign from formal union membership during a ten day-window period after an individual teacher’s contract is signed or after the union hierarchy agrees to a new contract with the local school board. If a teacher fails to register an objection to union membership within either period, he or she is forced to remain a union member until the expiration of the union’s five-year contract with the local school board. Many teachers report that JCTA officials never informed them of their right to refrain from joining the union in the first place.

Foundation attorneys believe that any collective bargaining agreement that forces educators to pay union dues to keep their jobs is illegal under state law. Moreover, the Foundation-won Supreme Court precedent Abood v. Detroit Board of Education ensures that teachers and other public employees have the right to resign from union membership. Retaliation or discrimination against employees for deciding against belonging to a union is also illegal.

“The JCTA’s illegal policy has allowed union officials to hold teachers hostage for far too long,” said Stefan Gleason, vice president of the National Right to Work Foundation. “While we’re confident that the Foundation’s lawsuit will be successful, the best way to prevent future abuse of this nature is for Kentucky to adopt a Right to Work law. Doing so would make union membership and dues-payment strictly voluntary.”

Washington State Appeals Court Upholds Teachers’ Right to Restitution for Dues Illegally Spent By WEA Union Officials

After securing U.S. Supreme Court victory, National Right to Work attorneys pick up the pieces of an otherwise impotent campaign finance regulation

Seattle, WA (December 17, 2008) — A recent decision by a Washington State Court of Appeals, Division 2, has ruled union officials can be held liable for illegally spending teachers’ forced union dues under a now-effectively defunct campaign finance regulation.

The ruling means that thousands of Washington State teachers may receive restitution for the amount Washington Education Association (WEA) union officials illegally docked their paychecks to pay for union political expenditures. The ineffective campaign finance law at issue had been adopted in 1992 and has since been voided by the Washington State Legislature.

The teachers are receiving free legal aid from National Right to Work Foundation staff attorneys. In 2007, Foundation attorneys successfully brought the Davenport v. WEA case to the U.S. Supreme Court, which overturned an earlier Washington State Supreme Court decision using the campaign finance law to undermine the First Amendment. The state appeals court ruled Friday on a number of issues, including upholding the teachers’ tort claim for restitution and approving the certification of thousands of employees as a class.

Before it was gutted by amendment in 2007, the Washington law had required union officials to obtain the prior consent of nonunion public employees before spending their mandatory union dues on a small fraction of what the union actually spends on politics. According to an amicus brief filed by the Evergreen Freedom Foundation, the amount of political expenditures actually covered by the law was “miniscule… less than one quarter of one percent of the WEA’s total expenditures.” However, in striking down the law, the state Supreme Court had erroneously found a constitutional “right” for union officials to spend the money of non-union employees who are compelled to pay union dues as a condition of employment.

“Ineffective ‘paycheck protection’ campaign finance laws such as this have unfortunately opened a Pandora’s Box, creating an opportunity for activist courts to award new privileges to union officials and even to jeopardize state Right to Work laws,” said Stefan Gleason, vice president of the National Right to Work Foundation. “While the underlying law was deeply flawed, the National Right to Work Foundation had a duty to limit the broader collateral damage done to employees’ rights by the state court’s response and to fight for the return of dues illegally seized under the now totally ineffective law.”

“Ultimately, Right to Work laws are the only way to protect workers from the misuse of their funds. By making membership and the payment of dues entirely voluntary, Right to Work laws allow employees to prevent the theft in the first place,” stated Gleason.

Coldwater Teacher Files Federal Suit Against Ohio Teacher Union Notorious for Religious Discrimination

Ohio Education Association Union Continues Its Assault on Teachers of Faith

Columbus, OH (December 4, 2008) - A fourth grade teacher from the Coldwater Exempted Village School District has filed a federal suit against the state’s largest teacher union for forcing her to pay compulsory union fees to fund the union whose activities violate her religious faith.

National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation attorneys, providing the teacher with free legal aid, filed the suit this week in the United States District Court for the Southern District of Ohio, Eastern Division.

Kathy Hart, an active member of the Catholic Church, has been a teacher in the Ohio public school system since August 1996. Because the public school she works in is unionized, she works under a collective bargaining agreement which forces her to pay compulsory union fees to the National Education Association (NEA) union and its state and local affiliates - the Ohio Education Association (OEA) union and the Coldwater Teachers Organization (CTO) union. Due to her faith, Hart objects to the unions’ positions on abortion and special rights for homosexuals.

Hart had asked that the union divert her compulsory fees to a charity, thereby accommodating her religious objections to supporting financially unions she believes to be involved in immoral activities.

NEA union officials agreed to allow Hart to redirect her compulsory union dues to a mutually agreed upon charity. However, OEA officials refused to accommodate Hart and used the CTO to collect forced union dues from her paycheck. In response, Hart filed charges with the United States Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) alleging that the union officials’ actions were religious discrimination in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act. The EEOC authorized Hart in September to proceed with her own civil action against the OEA and CTO.

National Right to Work Foundation attorneys have helped Ohio teachers in dozens of cases over the last decade involving harassment by officials at the OEA union and its affiliates.

“OEA union bosses have a long and abusive record of violating employees’ rights by refusing to accommodate religious objectors in the workplace,” said Stefan Gleason, vice president of the National Right to Work Foundation. “The OEA union hierarchy’s ugly policy of forcing teachers to fund unions which offend their consciences will continue until Ohio gives employees the protections of a Right to Work law.”

A Right to Work law secures the right of employees to decide whether or not to join or financially support a union. In the 22 states that have passed Right to Work laws, employees are free to follow their conscience and refrain from supporting an unwanted union without having to resort to costly litigation.

New Milestone: Two Million American Teachers Now Corralled Into Unions, 1.3 Million Forced to Pay Dues

Legal aid foundation and non-union professional teacher group launch campaign to inform educators about their rights and professional alternatives to militant unionism

Washington, DC (August 19, 2008) – As the total number of America’s teachers corralled into union collectives crosses the two million mark, a national legal aid foundation and professional educator group have joined forces in a public information campaign to educate teachers laboring under compulsory unionism about their legal rights and options.

The National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation and the Association of American Educators’ joint program will also inform teachers of professional associations that provide services to teachers who do not want to associate with the increasingly militant and political teacher unions. Many teachers object to the political agenda of teacher union bosses, while others object to knee-jerk union obstruction of school reforms that could increase the quality of education for students.

The public information campaign comes as a new study reveals the number of teachers forced under union “representation” has reached alarming heights. According to a National Institute for Labor Relations Research study released this month, 2.0 million teachers nationwide are now compelled to accept union monopoly control, meaning it is illegal for schools to bargain with individual teachers over employment terms or compensate them based on individual merit.

The study conservatively estimates that the two national teacher unions, the National Education Association (NEA) and American Federation of Teachers (AFT), now collect $1.3 billion dollars annually from 1.3 million teachers and thousands of other school employees in the 27 states and the District
of Columbia that endorse (or do not prohibit) the firing of school employees for refusal to pay NEA or AFT union dues
or fees.

With a combined total of roughly $2 billion in dues flowing into union coffers every year from states with and without right to work protections for teachers, NEA and AFT union chiefs are largely able to control education policy, elect hundreds of politicians, and lobby against education reforms, including proposals to pay high performing educators more through a merit pay system – or hard-to-hire math and science teachers. Teacher union officials’ $2 billion dollar war chest, derived mostly from forced union dues, also makes them a major political force to obtain more special union privileges. The NEA, for example, has announced it will spend $50 million on elections this fall, not including state and local affiliates.

Experts from the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation and Association of American Educators are available for comment on this timely issue, as teachers and students are returning for another school year. To schedule an interview please contact:

Patrick Semmens, National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation at (703) 321-8510 or pts@nrtw.org. And Heather Reams, Association of American Educators at (703) 739-2100 or heather@aaeteachers.org.

Court Strikes Down Ohio Law Forcing Public Employees to Pay Union Dues Unless They Join Certain Religions

**Columbus, OH (June 22, 2007)** — In a victory for employee rights and the freedom of conscience, a St. Marys-area teacher has successfully challenged the constitutionality of a statewide law denying public employees their right to accommodations of religious objections that they have to paying union dues unless the objecting employees belong to certain state-approved religions.

The decision issued by U.S. District Court Judge Gregory Frost struck down the offending law as a violation of the First Amendment’s Establishment Clause and permanently enjoined the Ohio State Employment Relations Board (SERB) from further enforcing the law against employees.

With free legal help from National Right to Work Foundation attorneys, Carol Katter, a 21-year veteran teacher in the St. Marys school district, filed the original complaint in January in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Ohio’s Eastern Division against top officials of the SERB for religious discrimination.

In her complaint, Katter informed the Court that, even though she is a lifelong Catholic with religious objections to the union’s agenda, she was denied her right to a religious accommodation. Katter believes that failing to divert her forced dues from the Ohio Education Association (OEA) union to a charity contradicts her beliefs due to the union hierarchy’s position on hot button political issues such as abortion.

Adding insult to injury, an OEA union official told Katter that she must “change religions” to receive a religious accommodation before SERB. Katter’s complaint challenged the state statute as an unconstitutional establishment of religion and an infringement of her religious free exercise rights. Because Judge Frost struck down the statute on Establishment Clause grounds, he did not need to decide the issue of whether the SERB had violated Katter’s free exercise rights.

The ruling in Katter’s case follows another federal court decree issued last fall that re-affirmed that all public sector employees who have sincere religious objections to union affiliation cannot be forced to associate with and pay dues to a union they find objectionable. That decree was in another Foundation-assisted case challenging similar systematic religious discrimination throughout Ohio. However, for technical reasons, Ohio’s SERB itself was not formally bound by that decree even though it was well aware of its existence.

“Carol Katter’s struggle is part of a pattern of OEA union officials’ willingness to trample on the religious beliefs of the very employees they claim to represent just to stuff their pockets with more forced dues,” stated National Right to Work Foundation Vice President Stefan Gleason. “While the ruling expands the rights available to employees of faith, abuses of forced unionism will inevitably continue until Ohio passes a Right to Work law making union membership and dues payment strictly voluntary.”

Katter also filed a related charge with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) against the OEA union, a state affiliate of the National Education Association, challenging an attempt by union officials to divert her forced dues to the local union rather than a charity. Currently the EEOC is still investigating the charge.

Download the Federal Court's Ruling

Legal Counsel for Petitioners in First Amendment Battle Comment on Supreme Court Oral Argument

**Washington, DC (January 10, 2007)** – Mark Mix, President of the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, made the following statement regarding today’s U.S. Supreme Court oral argument in *Davenport v. Washington Education Association*. The Foundation is a non-profit organization providing free legal aid to victims of compulsory unionism abuse, and whose staff attorneys filed the case in 2003 and successfully appealed the case to the Supreme Court on behalf of lead petitioner Gary Davenport and 4,000 other nonunion Washington State teachers.

“The *Davenport* case is a defensive battle that underscores how labor law is a stacked deck against the individual. In the 28 states without Right to Work laws, millions of employees are forced to choose between paying dues to a union they do not support and losing their job. Washington is one of these states.

“This case is a legal rescue mission that should have never been necessary. In responding to a law trying to limit this abuse, an activist ruling by the Washington State Supreme Court created from whole cloth a constitutional ‘right’ for union officials to spend dues taken from nonunion employees on politics. This precedent could cause sweeping damage to employee rights across America.

“The underlying campaign finance law – known as ‘paycheck protection’ – had been totally ineffective. Because of its fatally narrow definition of what constitutes a political expenditure, it cannot provide meaningful relief to employees forced to pay union dues.

“The real solution is to take away union officials’ special privilege to force employees to pay union dues just to get or keep a job.

“But we cannot allow the Washington court to use this ineffective law as a platform to cause sweeping damage to the First Amendment. If this activist ruling is upheld, even Right to Work laws could come under attack.

“Fortunately, there is a silver lining to this otherwise defensive battle. The Washington Court ruling has presented a major opportunity for the cause of employee freedom.

“National Right to Work Foundation attorneys representing the Petitioning teachers have asked the Justices to correct a problem flowing from a 45 year-old-ruling by this court. In a case that involved union members, this court said 45 years ago that employee ‘dissent is not to be presumed.’ Using this as justification, unions have set up cumbersome opt-out procedures to prevent nonunion members from paying anything less than full union dues.

“But the U.S. Supreme Court can now put a stop to it. National Right to Work attorneys are asking that the Supreme Court take the simple step of clarifying that when employees say no to union membership, they indeed ‘dissent’ from the union!

“This simple clarification – that ‘no’ indeed means ‘no’ – would sweep away the union objection procedures, and nonunion members would be entitled to an automatic reduction in their dues by several hundred dollars. Where employees do not enjoy the protections of a Right to Work law, they could still legally be forced to pay the cost of union bargaining.

“Since there are at least a million nonunion members in America that are forced to pay dues – a ruling on this point would nevertheless be a major breakthrough for employee rights.

“We hope the U.S. Supreme Court gives employees the help that they need in protecting their rights against the tyranny of compulsory unionism.”

An Astounding 35 Groups Sign Briefs Supporting Washington Teachers in U.S. Supreme Court Controversy Over Union Dues

**Washington, DC (November 15, 2006)** – A diverse group of 35 legal foundations, public policy groups, and federal government agencies this week filed supporting briefs asking the nation’s highest court to reverse a novel Washington State Supreme Court decision that found a constitutional “right” for union officials to spend on politics the forced dues extracted from nonunion employees. A failure to overturn the activist Washington ruling might jeopardize America’s 22 state Right to Work laws which ban forced union dues altogether.

The 35 parties from across the country filed 14 amicus (or “friend of the court”) briefs in *Davenport v. Washington Education Association (WEA)* and *Washington v. WEA*, which are scheduled for oral arguments on January 10, 2007. In the Davenport case, National Right to Work Foundation attorneys are representing approximately 4,000 nonunion Washington State teachers. A list of the amici, as well as their underlying briefs, is available on the Foundation’s website.

In addition to asking for a reversal of the Washington State Supreme Court’s novel finding of a constitutional “right” for union officials to spend the compulsory dues of nonunion members, lead counsel Milton Chappell, a 30-year Foundation veteran in assisting union-abused employees, asked the U.S. Supreme Court to clarify that it had never approved a pervasive union procedure designed to force nonunion members to pay full union dues, including hundreds of dollars per employee which are spent for a wide array of activities unrelated to collective bargaining.

While seeking to overturn the Washington State court’s dangerous precedent involving the First Amendment, Foundation attorneys are going on the offensive by asking the High Court to clarify its 45-year-old “dissent is not to be presumed” statement. Union officials have exploited that phrase from a 1961 ruling to force employees who resign union membership to take the additional affirmative step of objecting annually to cut off the use of their forced dues on politics and other non-bargaining functions. A victory on this argument would dramatically increase the impact of previous U.S. Supreme Court rulings won by Foundation attorneys establishing that nonunion employees cannot be lawfully compelled to pay for politics, lobbying, organizing, and a wide array of other non-bargaining activities.

Surprisingly, the Evergreen Freedom Foundation – a longtime proponent of Washington’s well-meant, but ineffective, “paycheck protection” law – argued in its amicus brief that the funds covered by the law were “miniscule… less than ¼ of 1% of the WEA’s total expenditures.” The law only governs a small fraction of union officials’ state and local electioneering expenditures.

“While there may now be nearly universal agreement that the underlying campaign finance statute has been ineffective, all agree that it is indefensible to use it as a springboard to create an even larger problem – a perversion of the long-standing interpretation of the First Amendment,” said Stefan Gleason, vice president of the National Right to Work Foundation. “The Washington ruling cannot be allowed to stand because of the collateral damage it is already causing to employee rights nationwide. Only weeks ago, a Colorado court relied on it in a similar ruling.”

Foundation attorneys and Steven O’Ban of Ellis, Li, and McKinstry of Seattle filed Davenport in 2001 for more than 4,000 Washington teachers who are not union members, but are still forced to pay dues or be fired. In recent days, Washington Attorney General Robert McKenna also filed arguments for the state in a related case, *Washington v. WEA*.

Key Legal Documents

Merits brief filed by National Right to Work Foundation Staff Attorney Milton Chappell and Steve O’Ban (Davenport v. WEA)

Merits brief filed by Washington State Attorney General Robert McKenna (Washington v. WEA)



*Amicus* Briefs

13 Public Policy Groups (Evergreen Freedom Foundation,Cascade Policy Institute, Commonwealth Foundation for Public Policy, Excellent Education for Everyone, Grassroot Institute of Hawaii, Georgia Public Policy Foundation, James Madison Institute, John Locke Foundation, Nevada Policy Research Institute, Pacific Research Institute, Pioneer Institute for Public Policy Research, Small Business Hawaii & Competitive Enterprise Institute)

Association of American Educators

American Legislative Exchange Council

Cato Institute, Reason Foundation & Center for Individual Freedom

States of Colorado, Alabama, Idaho, Ohio, Utah & Virginia

Mackinac Center for Public Policy

Religious Objector Members of the Northwest Professional Educators & Pacific Justice Institute

Pacific Legal Foundation

Institute for Justice

National Federation of Independent Business Legal Foundation & James Madison Center for Free Speech

United States Solicitor General, US Department of Labor, US Department of Justice & Federal Election Commission

Campaign Legal Center

Mountain States Legal Foundation

Teachers File U.S. Supreme Court Arguments Seeking Limits on Union Officials’ Access to Forced Dues

**Washington, DC (August 24, 2006)** —National Right to Work Foundation attorneys took additional steps today to secure U.S. Supreme Court review of a controversial Washington State Supreme Court ruling which struck down a state law requirement that union officials obtain the prior consent of nonunion public employees before spending mandatory union dues for politics. The Foundation attorneys representing Washington teachers filed a reply brief with the U.S. Supreme Court to correct the record after union lawyers attempted to mislead the High Court so that it would not take up the case.

Specifically, the Right to Work brief takes the Washington Education Association (WEA) union to task for deliberately mischaracterizing the Washington Supreme Court’s ruling in order to make it appear justified. Specifically, the union claimed that the Washington law had attempted to ban unions from spending any money on politics, rather than simply banning the use of funds collected from non-union members without their affirmative authorization.

The teachers’ brief also responded to the union lawyers’ assertion that the campaign finance law had somehow placed unfair burdens on the union, even though union officials enjoy extraordinary legal privileges and immunities under Washington State law. As the Foundation’s brief points out, “Who, trying to obtain money from another, would consider it a burden to have to actually ask for the money?”

Foundation attorneys – working jointly with Steven O’Ban of Ellis, Li, and McKinstry of Seattle – originally filed the suit, Davenport v. Washington Education Association, for more than 4,000 Washington teachers who are not union members, but nonetheless forced to pay union dues or fees.

But much to the dismay of nonunion Washington employees, the long-awaited ruling in Davenport by the state supreme court in mid-March struck down the last remaining union dues provisions in I-134, Washington’s troubled “paycheck protection” law, and in the process created a precedent that could be used to attack Right to Work laws across America.

Though the Foundation believes the decision is wrongheaded, the ruling brings into focus how difficult the paycheck protection regulatory approach is, and how ineffective it has been in protecting employees laboring under forced unionism. Even if the state supreme court had upheld the law, I-134 would still only result in individual refunds of $10 per year, on average. Ultimately, only the passage of a Right to Work law in Washington would ensure that union dues are not misused.

“The real solution is to attack forced unionism at its root, rather than try to regulate its ill effects,” said Stefan Gleason, vice president of the National Right to Work Foundation. “The Foundation has no choice but to help mop up the damage to the First Amendment being caused by courts responding to these ‘paycheck protection’ laws.”

The brief can be found here.

Teachers File U.S. Supreme Court Appeal of Ruling Granting Union Officials Right to Nonmembers’ Dues

**Washington, DC (June 14, 2006)** — Responding to a 6-3 Washington State Supreme Court ruling striking down a state law requirement that union officials obtain the prior consent of nonunion public employees before spending mandatory union dues for politics, the National Right to Work Foundation filed an appeal yesterday with the U.S. Supreme Court on First Amendment grounds.

Foundation attorneys – working jointly with Steven O’Ban of Ellis, Li, and McKinstry of Seattle – originally filed the suit, *Davenport v. Washington Education Association (WEA)*, for more than 4,000 Washington teachers who are not union members, but nonetheless forced to pay union dues or fees. Thurston County Superior Court Judge Daniel Berschauer ruled that the teachers had an implied right of action under Initiative-134 to recover the fees the WEA had used – without their authorization – for political purposes. The trial court also certified the case as a class action for the thousands of nonmember teachers.

But a long-awaited ruling in Davenport by the State Supreme Court in mid-March upheld an appellate court’s decision to overturn the trial court – thereby striking down the last remaining union dues provisions in I-134, Washington’s troubled “paycheck protection” law.

The State Supreme Court’s ruling directly conflicts with a decision of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit, noted Justice Richard B. Sanders’ three-member dissent. Justice Sanders said: “The majority turns the First Amendment on its head. . . . [T]he suggestion that a legislative choice to protect dissenting nonmembers by requiring affirmative authorization before using their agency shop fees to influence an election . . . violates the First Amendment . . . ‘borders on the frivolous.’”

Though the Foundation believes the decision is wrongheaded, the ruling brings into focus how difficult the paycheck protection regulatory approach is, and how ineffective it has been in protecting employees laboring under forced unionism. Even if the Supreme Court had reinstated the Thurston County court’s rulings, I-134 would still only result in individual refunds of $10 per year, on average. Substantially greater relief is available to teachers under a settlement of a First Amendment lawsuit brought earlier by Foundation attorneys. Under that settlement, nonmember teachers may annually object and reclaim more than $200 each. Ultimately, however, only the passage of a Right to Work law in Washington would ensure that union dues are not misused.

“The real solution is to attack forced unionism at its root, rather than try to regulate its ill effects,” said Stefan Gleason, vice president of the National Right to Work Foundation. “The Foundation has no choice but to help mop up the damage to the First Amendment being caused by courts responding to these ‘paycheck protection’ laws.”