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4  JANUS v. STATE, COUNTY, AND MUNICIPAL EMPLOYEES 

Syllabus 

minority rights.  Pp. 27–31.

(3) The government’s proffered interests must therefore justify the 
heavy  burden  of  agency  fees  on  nonmembers’  First  Amendment  in-
terests.
  They  do  not.    The  state  interests  asserted  in  Abood— 
promoting  “labor  peace”  and  avoiding  free  riders—clearly  do  not,  as 
explained  earlier.  And  the  new  interests  asserted  in  Harris  and 
here—bargaining  with  an  adequately  funded  agent  and  improving
the  efficiency  of  the  work  force—do  not  suffice  either.    Experience
shows that unions can be effective even without agency fees.  Pp. 31– 
33. 

(d) Stare decisis does not require retention of Abood.  An analy-
sis of several important factors that should be taken into account in 
deciding whether to overrule a past decision supports this conclusion.
Pp. 33–47. 

(1) Abood  was  poorly  reasoned,  and  those  arguing  for  retaining  it
have recast its reasoning, which further undermines its stare decisis 
effect,  e.g.,  Citizens  United  v.  Federal  Election  Comm’n,  558  U. S. 
310,  363.    Abood  relied  on  Railway  Employes  v.  Hanson,  351  U. S. 
225,  and  Machinists  v.  Street,  367  U. S.  740,  both  of  which  involved 
private-sector  collective-bargaining  agreements  where  the  govern-
ment  merely  authorized  agency  fees.  Abood  did  not  appreciate  the
very  different  First  Amendment  question  that  arises  when  a  State 
requires its employees to pay agency fees.  Abood also judged the con-
stitutionality  of  public-sector  agency  fees  using Hanson’s  deferential 
standard, which is inappropriate in deciding free speech issues.  Nor 
did  Abood  take  into  account  the  difference  between  the  effects  of 
agency fees in public- and private-sector collective bargaining, antici-
pate  administrative  problems  with  classifying  union  expenses  as
chargeable  or  nonchargeable,  foresee  practical  problems  faced  by
nonmembers wishing to challenge those decisions, or understand the
inherently political nature of public-sector bargaining.  Pp. 35–38.

(2) Abood’s  lack  of  workability  also  weighs  against  it.    Its  line  be-
tween  chargeable  and  nonchargeable  expenditures  has  proved  to  be
impossible  to  draw  with  precision,  as  even  respondents  recognize. 
See, e.g., Lehnert v. Ferris Faculty Assn., 500 U. S. 507, 519.  What is 
more,  a  nonmember  objecting  to  union  chargeability  determinations
will  have  much  trouble  determining  the  accuracy  of  the  union’s  re-
ported  expenditures,  which  are  often  expressed  in  extremely  broad
and vague terms.  Pp. 38–41. 

(3)  Developments  since  Abood,  both  factual  and  legal,  have  “erod-
ed”  the  decision’s  “underpinnings”  and  left  it  an  outlier  among  the 
Court’s First Amendment cases.  United States v. Gaudin, 515 U. S. 
506, 521.  Abood relied on an assumption that “the principle of exclu-
sive  representation  in  the  public  sector  is  dependent  on  a  union  or