Source: https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/11-681
Timestamp: 2019-04-23 02:48:46+00:00

Document:
Pursuant to this scheme, respondent SEIU Healthcare Illinois & Indiana (SEIU–HII) was designated the exclusive union representative for Rehabilitation Program employees. The union entered into collective-bargaining agreements with the State that contained an agency-fee provision, which requires all bargaining unit members who do not wish to join the union to pay the union a fee for the cost of certain activities, including those tied to the collective-bargaining process. A group of Rehabilitation Program PAs brought a class action against SEIU–HII and other respondents in Federal District Court, claiming that the PLRA violated the First Amendment insofar as it authorized the agency-fee provision. The District Court dismissed their claims, and the Seventh Circuit affirmed in relevant part, concluding that the PAs were state employees within the meaning of Abood v. Detroit Bd. of Ed., 431 U. S. 209.
(a) In upholding the Illinois law’s constitutionality, the Seventh Circuit relied on Abood, which, in turn, relied on Railway Employes v. Hanson, 351 U. S. 225, and Machinists v. Street, 367 U. S. 740. Unlike Abood, those cases involved private-sector collective-bargaining agreements. The Abood Court treated the First Amendment issue as largely settled by Hanson and Street and understood those cases to have upheld agency fees based on the desirability of “labor peace” and the problem of “ ‘free riders[hip].’ ” 431 U. S., 220–222, 224. However, “preventing nonmembers from free-riding on the union’s efforts” is a rationale “generally insufficient to overcome First Amendment objections,” Knox v. Service Employees, 567 U. S. ___, ___, and in this respect, Abood is “something of an anomaly,” 567 U. S., at ___.
The Abood Court’s analysis is questionable on several grounds. The First Amendment analysis in Hanson was thin, and Street was not a constitutional decision. And the Court fundamentally misunderstood Hanson’s narrow holding, which upheld the authorization, not imposition, of an agency fee. The Abood Court also failed to appreciate the distinction between core union speech in the public sector and core union speech in the private sector, as well as the conceptual difficulty in public-sector cases of distinguishing union expenditures for collective bargaining from those designed for political purposes. Nor does the Abood Court seem to have anticipated the administrative problems that would result in attempting to classify union expenditures as either chargeable or nonchargeable, see, e.g., Lehnert v. Ferris Faculty Assn., 500 U. S. 507, or the practical problems that would arise from the heavy burden facing objecting nonmembers wishing to challenge the union’s actions. Finally, the Abood Court’s critical “labor peace” analysis rests on the unsupported empirical assumption that exclusive representation in the public sector depends on the right to collect an agency fee from nonmembers. Pp. 8–20.
(d) Respondents’ additional arguments for sustaining the Illinois scheme are unconvincing. First, they urge the application of a balancing test derived from Pickering v. Board of Ed. of Township High School Dist. 205, Will Cty., 391 U. S. 563. This Court has never viewed Abood and its progeny as based on Pickering balancing. And even assuming that Pickering applies, that case’s balancing test clearly tips in favor of the objecting employees’ First Amendment interests. Second, respondents err in contending that a refusal to extend Abood here will call into question this Court’s decisions in Keller v. State Bar of Cal., 496 U. S. 1, and Board of Regents of Univ. of Wis. System v. Southworth, 529 U. S. 217, for those decisions fit comfortably within the framework applied here. Pp. 34–40.
Other provisions of the law emphasize the customer’s employer status. The customer “is responsible for controlling all aspects of the employment relationship between the customer and the [personal assistant (or PA)], including, without limitation, locating and hiring the PA, training the PA, directing, evaluating and otherwise supervising the work performed by the personal assistant, imposing . . . disciplinary action against the PA, and terminating the employment relationship between the customer and the PA.” §676.30(b). 1 In general, the customer “has complete discretion in which Personal Assistant he/she wishes to hire.” §684.20(b).
Other than providing compensation, the State’s role is comparatively small. The State sets some basic threshold qualifications for employment. See §§686.10(h)(1)–(10). 2 (For example, a personal assistant must have a Social Security number, must possess basic communication skills, and must complete an employment agreement with the customer. §§686.10, 686.20, 686.40.) The State mandates an annual performance review by the customer, helps the customer conduct that review, and mediates disagreements between customers and their personal assistants. §686.30. The State suggests certain duties that personal assistants should assume, such as performing “household tasks,” “shopping,” providing “personal care,” performing “incidental health care tasks,” and “monitoring to ensure the health and safety of the cus-tomer.” §686.20. In addition, a state employee must “identify the appropriate level of service provider” “based on the customer’s approval of the initial Service Plan,” §684.20(a) (emphasis added), and must sign each customer’s Service Plan. §684.10.
Three of the petitioners in the case now before us—Theresa Riffey, Susan Watts, and Stephanie Yencer-Price—are personal assistants under the Rehabilitation Program. They all provide in-home services to family members or other individuals suffering from disabilities. 3 Susan Watts, for example, serves as personal assistant for her daughter, who requires constant care due to quadriplegic cerebral palsy and other conditions. See App. 18.
Having construed the RLA to contain this restriction, the Street Court then went on to discuss the remedies available for employees who objected to the use of union funds for political causes. The Court suggested two: The dissenting employees could be given a refund of the portion of their dues spent by the union for political or ideological purposes, or they could be given a refund of the portion spent on those political purposes that they had advised the union they disapproved. 6 Id., at 774–775.
Personal assistants also appear to be ineligible for a host of benefits under a variety of other state laws, including the State Employee Vacation Time Act (see Ill. Stat., ch. 5, §360/1); the State Employee Health Savings Account Law (see Ill. Stat., ch. 5, §377/10–1); the State Employee Job Sharing Act (see Ill. Stat., ch. 5, §380/0.01); the State Employee Indemnification Act (see Ill. Stat., ch. 5, §350/2); and the Sick Leave Bank Act. See Ill. Stat., ch. 5, §400/1. Personal assistants are apparently not entitled to the protection that the Illinois Whistleblower Act provides for full-fledged state employees. See Ill. Stat., ch. 740, §174/1. And it likewise appears that personal assistants are shut out of many other state employee programs and benefits. The Illinois Department of Central Management Services lists many such programs and benefits, including a deferred compensation program, full worker’s compensation privileges, 8 behavioral health programs, a program that allows state employees to retain health insurance for a time after leaving state employment, a commuter savings program, dental and vision programs, and a flexible spending program. 9 All of these programs and benefits appear to fall within the provision of the Rehabilitation Program declaring that personal assistants are not state employees for “any purposes” other than collective bargaining. See Ill. Comp. Stat., ch. 20, §2405/3(f ).
Illinois deems personal assistants to be state employees for one purpose only, collective bargaining, 10 but the scope of bargaining that may be conducted on their behalf is sharply limited. Under the governing Illinois statute, collective bargaining can occur only for “terms and conditions of employment that are within the State’s control.” Ill. Comp. Stat., ch. 20, §2405/3(f ). That is not very much.
of bounds when it comes to personal assistants. Under federal law, mandatory subjects include the days of the week and the hours of the day during which an employee must work, 11 lunch breaks, 12 holidays, 13 vacations, 14 termination of employment, 15 and changes in job duties. 16 Illinois law similarly makes subject to mandatory collective-bargaining decisions concerning the “hours and terms and conditions of employment.” Belvidere v. Illinois State Labor Relations Bd., 181 Ill. 2d 191, 201, 692 N. E. 2d 295, 301 (1998); see also, e.g., Aurora Sergeants Assn., 24 PERI ¶25 (2008) (holding that days of the week worked by police officers is subject to mandatory collective bargaining). But under the Rehabilitation Program, all these topics are governed by the Service Plan, with respect to which the union has no role. See §676.30(b) (the customer “is responsible for controlling all aspects of the employment relationship between the customer and the PA, including, without limitation, locating and hiring the PA, training the PA, directing, evaluating, and otherwise supervising the work performed by the PA, imposing . . . disciplinary action against the PA, and terminating the employment relationship between the customer and the PA”); §684.50 (the Service Plan must specify “the frequency with which the specific tasks are to be provided” and “the number of hours each task is to be provided per month”).
Because of Abood’s questionable foundations, and because the personal assistants are quite different from full-fledged public employees, we refuse to extend Abood to the new situation now before us. 19 Abood itself has clear boundaries; it applies to public employees. Extending those boundaries to encompass partial-public employees, quasi-public employees, or simply private employees would invite problems. Consider a continuum, ranging, on the one hand, from full-fledged state employees to, on the other hand, individuals who follow a common calling and benefit from advocacy or lobbying conducted by a group to which they do not belong and pay no dues. A State may not force every person who benefits from this group’s efforts to make payments to the group. See Lehnert, 500 U. S., at 556 (opinion of Scalia, J.). But what if regulation of this group is increased? What if the Federal Government or a State begins to provide or increases subsidies in this area? At what point, short of the point at which the individuals in question become full-fledged state employees, should Abood apply?
Because Abood is not controlling, we must analyze the constitutionality of the payments compelled by Illinois law under generally applicable First Amendment standards. As we explained in Knox, “[t]he government may not prohibit the dissemination of ideas that it disfavors, nor compel the endorsement of ideas that it approves.” 567 U. S., at ___ (slip op. at 8–9); see also, e.g., R.A.V. v. St. Paul, 505 U. S. 377, 382 (1992) ; Riley v. National Federation of Blind of N.C., 487 U. S. 781, 797 (1988) West Virginia Bd. of Ed. v. Barnette, 319 U. S. 624 (1943) ; Wooley v. Maynard, 430 U. S. 705–715 (1977). And “compelled funding of the speech of other private speakers or groups” presents the same dangers as compelled speech. Knox, supra, at ___ (slip op. at 9). As a result, we explained in Knox that an agency-fee provision imposes “a ‘significant impingement on First Amendment rights,’ ” and this cannot be tolerated unless it passes “exacting First Amendment scrutiny.” 567 U. S., at ___ (slip op. at 9–10).
In any event, this effort to recast Abood falls short. To begin, the Pickering test is inapplicable because with respect to the personal assistants, the State is not acting in a traditional employer role. 27 But even if it were, application of Pickering would not sustain the agency-feeprovision.
In recent years, Medicaid expenditures have represented nearly a quarter of all state expenditures. See National Association of State Budget Officers, Summary: Fall 2013 Fiscal Survey of States (Dec. 10, 2013), online at http:// www.nasbo.org. “Medicaid has steadily eaten up a growing share of state budgets.” 29 In fiscal year 2014, “[t]hirty-five states increased spending for Medicaid for a net increase of $6.8 billion.” Ibid. Accordingly, speech by a powerful union that relates to the subject of Medicaid funding cannot be equated with the sort of speech that our cases have treated as concerning matters of only private concern. See, e.g., San Diego v. Roe, 543 U. S. 77 (2004) (per curiam); Connick, supra, at 148 (speech that “reflect[ed] one employee’s dissatisfaction with a transfer and an attempt to turn that displeasure into a cause célèbre” (emphasis added)).
The judgment of the Court of Appeals is reversed in part and affirmed in part, 30 and the case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
1 Although this regulation states clearly that a customer has complete discretion with respect to hiring and firing a personal assistant, the dissent contends that the State also has the authority to end the employment of a personal assistant whose performance is not satisfactory. Nothing in the regulations supports this view. Under 89 Ill. Admin. Code §677.40(d), the State may stop paying a personal assistant if it is found that the assistant does not meet “the standards established by DHS as found at 89 Ill. Adm. Code 686.” These standards are the basic hiring requirements set out in §686.10, see n. 2, infra. Providing adequate performance after hiring is nowhere mentioned in §686.10.
2 It is true, as the dissent notes, post, at 4, that a personal assistant must provide two written or oral references, see §686.10(c), but judging the adequacy of these references is the sole prerogative of the customer. See §676.30(b). And while the regulations say that an applicant must have either previous experience or training, see §686.10(f ), they also provide that a customer has complete discretion to judge the adequacy of training and prior experience. See §684.20(b) (the customer has complete discretion with respect to hiring and training a personal assistant). See also §686.10(b) (the customer may hire a minor—even under some circumstances, a person as young as 14); §686.10(f ) (the customer may hire a personal assistant who was never previously employed so long as the assistant has adequate training); §684.20(b) (criminal record check not required).
3 The other five petitioners are personal assistants under a similar Illinois program called the “Disabilities Program.” See, infra, at 39–40, and n. 30.
4 The employees’ First Amendment claim necessarily raised the question of governmental action, since the First Amendment does not restrict private conduct, and the Hanson Court, in a brief passage, concluded that governmental action was present. This was so, the Court reasoned, because the union-shop provision of the RLA took away a right that employees had previously enjoyed under state law. 351 U. S., at 232–233.
5 A related question arose in Keller v. State Bar of Cal., 496 U. S. 1 (1990) , which we discuss infra, at 37–38.
6 Only four Justices fully agreed with this approach, but a fifth, Justice Douglas, went along due to “the practical problem of mustering five Justices for a judgment in this case.” Id., at 778–779 (concurring opinion).
10 What is significant is not the label that the State assigns to the personal assistants but the substance of their relationship to the customers and the State. Our decision rests in no way on state-law labels. Cf. post, at 10. Indeed, it is because the First Amendment’s meaning does not turn on state-law labels that we refuse to allow the state to make a nonemployee a full-fledged employee “[s]olely for purposes of coverage under the Illinois Public Labor Relations Act,” Ill. Comp. Stat., ch. 20, §2405/3(f), through the use of a statutory label.
11 See Meat Cutters v. Jewel Tea Co., 381 U. S. 676 (1965) .
12 See In re National Grinding Wheel Co., 75 N. L. R. B. 905 (1948).
13 See In re Singer Manufacturing Co., 24 N. L. R. B. 444 (1940).
14 See Great Southern Trucking Co. v. NLRB, 127 F. 2d 180 (CA4 1942).
15 See N. K. Parker Transport, Inc., 332 N. L. R. B. 547, 551 (2000).
16 See St. John’s Hospital, 281 N. L. R. B. 1163, 1168 (1986).
18 Contrary to the dissent’s argument, post, at 10–11, the scope of the union’s bargaining authority has an important bearing on the question whether Abood should be extended to the situation now before us. As we have explained, the best argument that can be mounted in support of Abood is based on the fact that a union, in serving as the exclusive representative of all the employees in a bargaining unit, is required by law to engage in certain activities that benefit nonmembers and that the union would not undertake if it did not have a legal obligation to do so. But where the law withholds from the union the authority to engage in most of those activities, the argument for Abood is weakened. Here, the dissent does not claim that the union’s approach to negotiations on wages or benefits would be any different if it were not required to negotiate on behalf of the nonmembers as well as members. And there is no dispute that the law does not require the union to undertake the burden of representing personal assistants with respect to their grievances with customers; on the contrary, the law entirely excludes the union from that process. The most that the dissent can identify is the union’s obligation to represent nonmembers regarding grievances with the State, but since most aspects of the personal assistants’ work is controlled entirely by the customers, this obligation is relatively slight. It bears little resemblance to the obligation imposed on the union in Abood.
19 It is therefore unnecessary for us to reach petitioners’ argument that Abood should be overruled, and the dissent’s extended discussion of stare decisis is beside the point. Cf. Stoneridge Investment Partners, LLC v. Scientific-Atlanta, Inc., 552 U. S. 148–166 (2008) (declining to extend the “implied” right of action under §10(b) of the Securities Exchange Act “beyond its present boundaries”).
20 The dissent suggests that the concept of joint employment already supplies a clear line of demarcation, see post, at 8–9, but absent a clear statutory definition, employer status is generally determined based on a variety of factors that often do not provide a clear answer. See generally 22 Illinois Jurisprudence: Labor and Employment §1:02 (2012); American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, Council 31 v. State Labor Relations Bd., 216 Ill. 2d 567, 578–582, 839 N. E. 2d 479, 486–487 (2005); Manahan v. Daily News-Tribune, 50 Ill. App. 3d 9, 12–16, 365 N. E. 2d 1045, 1048–1050 (1977). More important, the joint-employer standard was developed for use in other contexts. What matters here is whether the relationship between the State and the personal assistants is sufficient to bring this case within Abood’s reach.
21 The dissent claims that our refusal to extend Abood to the Rehabilitation Program personal assistants produces a “perverse result” by penalizing the State for giving customers extensive control over the care they receive. Post, at 12. But it is not at all perverse to recognize that a State may exercise more control over its full-fledged employees than it may over those who are not full-fledged state employees or are privately employed.
22 A similar statute adopts the same rule specifically as to the U. S. Postal Service. See 39 U. S. C. §1209(c).
26 The Abood majority cited Pickering once, in a footnote, for the proposition that “there may be limits on the extent to which an employee in a sensitive or policymaking position may freely criticize his superiors and the policies they espouse.” 431 U. S., at 230, n. 27. And it was cited once in Justice Powell’s concurrence, for the uncontroversial proposition that “ ‘the State has interests as an employer in regulating the speech of its employees that differ significantly from those it possesses in connection with regulation of the speech of the citizenry in general.’ ” Id., at 259 (opinion concurring in judgment) (quoting Pickering, 391 U. S., at 568). United States v. United Foods, Inc., 533 U. S. 405 (2001) , cited Pickering only once—in dissent. 533 U. S., at 425 (opinion of Breyer, J.). Neither Roberts v. United States Jaycees, 468 U. S. 609 (1984) , nor Knox cited Pickering a single time.
27 Nor is the State acting as a “proprietor in managing its internal operations” with respect to personal assistants. See NASA v. Nelson, 562 U. S. ___ (2011) (slip op. at 1–2, 14).
28 The dissent misunderstands or mischaracterizes our cases in this line. We have never held that the wages paid to a public-sector bargaining unit are not a matter of public concern. The $338 payment at issue in Guarnieri had a negligible impact on public coffers, but payments made to public-sector bargaining units may have massive implications for government spending. See supra, at 18, and n. 7. That is why the dissent’s “analogy,” post, at 20–21, is not illustrative at all. We do not doubt that a single public employee’s pay is usually not a matter of public concern. But when the issue is pay for an entire collective-bargaining unit involving millions of dollars, that matter affects statewide budgeting decisions.
30 The Court of Appeals held—and we agree—that the First Amendment claims of the petitioners who work, not in the Rehabilitation Program, but in a different but related program, the “Disabilities Program,” are not ripe. This latter program is similar in its basic structure to the Rehabilitation Program, see App. to Pet. for Cert. 14a, but the Disabilities Program personal assistants have not yet unionized. The Disabilities Program petitioners claim that under Illinois Executive Order No. 2009–15, they face imminent unionization and, along with it, compulsory dues payments. Executive Order No. 2009–15, they note, is “almost identical to EO 2003–08, except that it targets providers in the Disabilities Program.” Brief for Petitioners 10.In a 2009 mail-ballot election, the Disabilities Program personal assistants voted down efforts by SEIU Local 73 and American Federation State, County and Municipal Employees Council 31 to become their representatives. See App. 27. The record before us does not suggest that there are any further elections currently scheduled. Nor does the record show that any union is currently trying to obtain certification through a card check program. Under these circumstances, we agree with the holding of the Court of Appeals.
Next, the majority emphasizes that the Illinois Legislature deemed personal assistants “public employees” solely “for the purposes of coverage under the Illinois Public Labor Relations Act” and not for other purposes, like granting statutory benefits and incurring vicarious liability in tort. Ill. Comp. Stat., ch. 20, §2405/3(f) (West 2012); see ante, at 6, 22–23; but cf. Martin v. Illinois, 2005 WL 2267733, *5–*8 (Ill. Workers’ Compensation Comm’n, July 26, 2005) (treating caregivers as public employees for purposes of workers’ compensation). 5 But once again, it is hard to see why that fact is relevant. The majority must agree (this Court has made the point often enough) that “state law labels,” adopted for a whole host of reasons, do not determine whether the State is acting as an employer for purposes of the First Amendment. E.g., Umbehr, 518 U. S., at 679. The true issue is whether Illinois has a sufficient stake in, and control over, the petitioners’ terms and conditions of employment to implicate Abood’s rationales and trigger its application. And once more, that question has a clear answer: As I have shown, Illinois negotiates all workforce-wide terms of the caregivers’ employment as part of its effort to promote labor stability and effectively administer its Rehabilitation Program. See supra, at 6–8. As contrasted to that all-important fact, whether Illinois incurs vicarious liability for caregivers’ torts, see ante, at 23, or grants them certain statutory benefits like health insurance, see ante, at 22, is beside the point. And still more so because the State and SEIU can bargain over most such matters; for example, as I have noted, the two have reached agreement on providing state-funded health coverage, see supra, at 7.
Finally, the majority places weight on an idiosyncrasy of Illinois law: that a regulation requires uniform wages for all personal assistants. See ante, at 25. According to the majority, that means Abood’s free-rider rationale “has little force in the situation now before us”: Even absent the duty of fair representation (requiring the union to work on behalf of all employees, members and non-members alike, see infra, at 22–23), the union could not bargain one employee’s wages against another’s. Ante, at 26. 6 But that idea is doubly wrong. First, the Illinois regulation applies only to wages. It does not cover, for example, the significant health benefits that the SEIU has obtained for in-home caregivers, or any other benefits for which it may bargain in the future. Nor does the regulation prevent preferential participation in the grievance process, which governs all disputes between Illinois and caregivers arising from the terms of their agreement. See n. 2, supra. And second, even if the regulation covered everything subject to collective bargaining, the majority’s reasoning is a non-sequitur. All the regulation would do then is serve as suspenders to the duty of fair representation’s belt: That Illinois has two ways to ensure that the results of collective bargaining redound to the benefit of all employees serves to compound, rather than mitigate, the union’s free-rider problem.
And Abood is not just any precedent: It is entrenched in a way not many decisions are. Over nearly four decades, we have cited Abood favorably numerous times, and we have repeatedly affirmed and applied its core distinction between the costs of collective bargaining (which the government can demand its employees share) and those of political activities (which it cannot). See, e.g., Locke v. Karass, 555 U. S. 207–214 (2009); Lehnert v. Ferris Faculty Assn., 500 U. S. 507, 519 (1991) ; Teachers v. Hudson, 475 U. S. 292–302 (1986); Ellis v. Railway Clerks, 466 U. S. 435–457 (1984). Reviewing those decisions, this Court recently—and unanimously—called the Abood rule “a general First Amendment principle.” Locke, 555 U. S., 213–215. And indeed, the Court has relied on that rule in deciding cases involving compulsory fees outside the labor context—which today’s majority reaffirms as good law, see ante, at 37–39. See, e.g., Keller v. State Bar of Cal., 496 U. S. 1–17 (1990) (state bar fees); Board of Regents of Univ. of Wis. System v. Southworth, 529 U. S. 217–232 (2000) (public university student fees); Glickman v. Wileman Brothers & Elliott, Inc., 521 U. S. 457–473 (1997) (commercial advertising assessments). Not until two years ago, in Knox v. Service Employees, 567 U. S. ___ (2012), did the Court so much as whisper (there without the benefit of briefing or argument, see id., at ___ (Sotomayor, J., concurring in judgment) (slip op., at 1–6)) that it had any misgivings about Abood.
Perhaps still more important, Abood has created enormous reliance interests. More than 20 States have enacted statutes authorizing fair-share provisions, and on that basis public entities of all stripes have entered into multi-year contracts with unions containing such clauses. “Stare decisis has added force,” we have held, when overturning a precedent would require “States to reexamine [and amend] their statutes.” Hilton v. South Carolina Public Railways Comm’n, 502 U. S. 197–203 (1991). And on top of that, “[c]onsiderations in favor of stare decisis are at their acme in cases involving property and contract rights.” Payne, 501 U. S., at 828. Here, governments and unions across the country have entered into thousands of contracts involving millions of employees in reliance on Abood. Reliance interests do not come any stronger.
Still, the majority too quickly says, it has no worries in this case: Given that Illinois’s caregivers voted to unionize, “it may be presumed that a high percentage of [them] became union members and are willingly paying union dues.” Ante, at 33. But in fact nothing of the sort may be so presumed, given that union supporters (no less than union detractors) have an economic incentive to free ride. See supra, at 22–23. The federal workforce, on which the majority relies, see ante, at 31, provides a case in point. There many fewer employees pay dues than have voted for a union to represent them. 7 And why, after all, should that endemic free-riding be surprising? Does the majority think that public employees are immune from basic principles of economics? If not, the majority can have no basis for thinking that absent a fair-share clause, a union can attract sufficient dues to adequately support its functions.
1 The majority describes the petitioners as “partial” or “quasi” public employees, a label of its own devising. Ante, at 28. But employment law has a real name—joint employees—for workers subject at once to the authority of two or more employers (a not uncommon phenomenon). See, e.g., 29 CFR §791.2 (2013); Boire v. Greyhound Corp., 376 U. S. 473, 475 (1964) . And the Department of Labor recently explained that in-home care programs, if structured like Illinois’s, establish joint employment relationships. See 78 Fed. Reg. 60483–60484 (2013).
3 The majority claims that the Court developed this law “for use in other contexts,” ante, at 28–29, n. 20, but that is true only in the narrowest sense. The decisions I cite dealt with First Amendment claims that joint or contract employees made against the government. The only difference is that those suits challenged different restrictions on the employees’ expressive activities.
4 In a related argument, the majority frets that if Abood extends to the joint employees here, a “host of workers who receive payments from a governmental entity for some sort of service would be candidates for inclusion within Abood’s reach.” Ante, at 28. But as I have just shown, this Court has not allowed such worries about line-drawing to limit the government’s authority over joint and contract employees in the past. And rightly so, because whatever close cases may arise at the margin (there always are some), the essential distinction between such employees and mere recipients of government funding is not hard to maintain. Consider again the combination of things Illinois does here: set wages, provide benefits, administer payroll, withhold taxes, set minimum qualifications, specify terms of standard contracts, develop individualized service plans, fund orientation and training, facilitate annual reviews, and resolve certain grievances. That combination of functions places the petitioners so securely on one side of the boundary between public employees and mere recipients of public funding as to justify deferral of line-drawing angst to another case.
5 As the opinion’s quadruple repetition of the words “appear” and “apparently” suggests, ante, at 22–23, the majority is mostly guessing as to in-home caregivers’ eligibility for various state programs.
6 The majority also suggests in this part of its opinion that even if the union had latitude to demand higher wages only for its own supporters, it would not do so. See ante, at 27, n. 18. But why not? A rational union, in the absence of any legal obligation to the contrary, would almost surely take that approach to bargaining.
7 See, e.g., R. Kearney & P. Mareschal, Labor Relations in the Public Sector 26 (5th ed. 2014) (“[T]he largest federal union, the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE), represented approximately 650,000 bargaining unit members in 2012, but less than half of them were dues-paying members. All told, out of the approximately 1.9 million full-time federal wage system (blue-collar) and General Schedule (white-collar) employees who are represented by a collective bargaining contract, only one-third actually belong to the union and pay dues”).

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