Opinion ID: 1302283
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: How Much Constitutional Protection is Necessary?

Text: As set forth above, it is clear that application of § 17 to the appellants does, to some extent, implicate freedom of association rights. However, not all associational relationships require the same level of constitutional protection. The United States Supreme Court has developed what appears to be a sliding scale approach when freedom of association rights are implicated. In Roberts, the United States Supreme Court stated: [There] lies a broad range of human relationships that may make greater or lesser claims to constitutional protection from particular incursions by the State. Determining the limits of state authority over an individual's freedom to enter into a particular association therefore unavoidably entails a careful assessment of where that relationship's objective characteristics locate it on a spectrum from the most intimate to the most attenuated of personal attachments.... We need not mark the potentially significant points on this terrain with any precision. We note only that factors that may be relevant include size, purpose, policies, selectivity, congeniality, and other characteristics that in a particular case may be pertinent. [468 U.S. at 620, 104 S.Ct. at 3250-3251.] On the constitutional spectrum, I believe that the associational freedoms implicated by § 17 invoke the application of greater constitutional protection than that applied in ordinary economic legislation cases. As demonstrated, § 17 effectively destroys the rights of the unions to internally govern and the rights of individuals to organize as they desire. These functions go to the heart of the effectiveness of any group or organization. [13] In the briefs submitted to this Court, the parties disagree regarding the appropriate scrutiny applicable to the challenged act. The state argues that only a rational basis is appropriate. Conversely, the appellants contend that strict scrutiny should be applied when examining the constitutionality of § 17. Because § 17 infringes greatly on First Amendment freedom of association rights, I would apply an intense level of scrutiny rather than simply a rational basis test. Particularly, in instances such as this, I agree with the United States Supreme Court's statement in NAACP and would impose the closest scrutiny. Typically, legislation that affects public employee labor unions is examined for a rational basis. However, as demonstrated, this case involves implication of the freedom of association. In Brown v. Alexander , the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit applied strict scrutiny when confronted with a freedom of association issue similar to the one presented in this case. The plaintiff union members challenged a Tennessee statute which deprive[d] them and their unions of the benefit of payroll deductions for union dues, if they failed to satisfy certain articulated statutory conditions. 718 F.2d at 1420. Thus, other unions that met the statutory conditions were exempt from the statute and were permitted the benefit of a dues checkoff. Initially, the court found that no essential First Amendment right was involved in the seeking of a dues checkoff provision. [14] However, the statute at issue conditioned dues checkoff on, inter alia, an independent employee organization. [15] Thus, the court examined statutory condition number 6, which implicated freedom of association concerns. The court struck this subsection of the act after applying strict scrutiny, stating: We believe this subsection directly limits freedom of association between labor organizations, and their members or members of other such organizations, and thus it could restrain or restrict freedom of association, a fundamental first amendment right. The advocacy of particular policies and practices of parent or affiliated organizations may well be directly affected by this limitation, and thus it requires strict scrutiny....