The U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark 2018 decision in Janus v. AFSCME recognized the basic civil right of public employees to stop putting their hard-earned money where another person’s political mouth was.  

The court ruled that public workers cannot be forced to pay a union for representation they don’t want, and workers can leave a union without losing their jobs. Since then, public unions in many states, including Washington, have been busy trying to keep employees from exercising their rights. And since then, some public employees have sought to protect even more of their rights.  

Voluntary union membership deserves support, but public employees should never be forced to pay mandatory fees to a union as a condition of government employment. The Janus decision meant that teachers, for example, would no longer have to pay for union politicking with which they disagree. It ended some of the frustration government workers had with being told by unions “representing them” to support candidates and issues they oppose — on their own dimes.  

Just as public employees shouldn’t be forced to pay agency fees to a union as a condition of government employment, they shouldn’t be forced to accept a union’s exclusive representation — especially when their views aren’t being represented. To protect workers’ rights in this way, Washington Policy Center has signed onto an amicus (friend of the court) brief with the U.S. Supreme Court in support of a case out of Ohio. If successful, it would put an end to state laws that force public employees to accept a union’s exclusive representation.

The case involves Jade Thompson, a public school Spanish teacher in Ohio. She is forced to accept the Marietta Education Association (MEA) as her exclusive bargaining representative, even though she is not a member of the union and the union does not represent her views. In fact, years ago, the union was involved in a political campaign against her husband when he ran for public office. While Mr. Thompson was running for office, his wife’s union was involved in a political campaign to defeat him. 

“Imagine my dismay,” Thompson wrote in an opinion piece for The Columbus Dispatch, “when I received political propaganda against my husband’s candidacy that was paid for and mailed by an organization related to my own union.” 

Forcing exclusive representation is incompatible with the First Amendment and at odds with the Janus decision.   

As Thompson wrote, “Here I am,  even after the Janus decision, still forced to accept the MEA as my ‘exclusive representative’ ….” She continued, “I am not opposed to collective bargaining. But everyone should have the freedom to decide whether to join a union or be represented by it, particularly if that union does not, cannot, or will not represent that person’s values. The MEA does not seek and never has sought to be my voice, and isn’t that the very essence of ‘representation?’” 

We support Thompson asking the court to end this unconstitutional infringement and protect the rights of other public employees throughout the nation. Read more about the case our colleagues at the Buckeye Institute in Ohio and 39 policy organizations, including Washington Policy Center, are supporting here:  Thompson v. Marietta Education Association. 

“The sheer number of groups asking the U.S. Supreme Court to hear this case demonstrates the depth and breadth of the constitutional problem of forced exclusive representation, which impacts not only Mrs. Thompson of course, but also workers in more than 40 states across the country,” said Robert Alt, president and chief executive officer of The Buckeye Institute and one of Mrs. Thompson’s attorneys.  

Compulsory union-representation laws conflict with principles the Supreme Court has announced in its recent opinions. Here’s a chance for it to bring more consistency in upholding workers’ rights.