Opinion ID: 4453185
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Janus’s Case

Text: Plaintiﬀ Mark Janus was formerly a child‐support special‐ ist employed by the Illinois Department of Healthcare and Family Services. Through a collective bargaining agreement between Illinois’s Department of Central Management Ser‐ vices (“CMS”) (which handles human resources tasks for Illi‐ nois’s state agencies) and defendant American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (“AFSCME”), Coun‐ cil 31, AFSCME was designated as the exclusive representa‐ tive of Mr. Janus’s employee unit. Mr. Janus exercised his right not to join the union. He also objected to CMS’s with‐ holding $44.58 from his paycheck each month to compensate AFSCME for representing the employee unit in collective No. 19‐1553 7 bargaining, grievance processing, and other employment‐re‐ lated functions. Initially, however, Mr. Janus was not involved in this liti‐ gation. The case began instead when the then‐governor of Il‐ linois challenged the Illinois Public Labor Relations Act (“IPLRA”), which established an exclusive representation scheme and authorized public employers and unions to enter into collective bargaining agreements that include a fair‐share fee provision. 5 ILCS § 315/6. Under that law, a union desig‐ nated as the exclusive representative of an employee unit was “responsible for representing the interests of all public em‐ ployees in the unit,” whether union members or not, § 315/6(d). Fair‐share fees were earmarked to compensate the union for costs incurred in “the collective bargaining process, contract administration and pursuing matters aﬀecting wages, hours and conditions of employment.” § 315/6(e). The district court dismissed the governor for lack of stand‐ ing, but at the same time it permitted Mr. Janus (and some others) to intervene as plaintiﬀs. Mr. Janus asserted that the state’s compulsory fair‐share scheme violated the First Amendment. He recognized that Abood stood in his way, but he argued that Abood was wrongly decided and should be overturned by the high court. Although the lower courts that first considered his case rejected his position on the ground that they were bound by Abood, see Janus v. AFSCME, Council 31, 851 F.3d 746, 747–48 (7th Cir. 2017) (“Janus I”), Janus pre‐ served his arguments and then, as he had hoped, the Supreme Court took the case. This time, the Court overruled Abood. Janus, 138 S. Ct. at 2486 (“Janus II”). It held that agency‐shop arrangements that require nonmembers to pay fair‐share fees and thereby 8 No. 19‐1553 “subsidize private speech on matters of substantial public concern,” are inconsistent with the First Amendment rights of objectors, no matter what interest the state identifies in its au‐ thorizing legislation. 138 S. Ct. at 2460. This is so, the Court explained, because “the First Amendment does not permit the government to compel a person to pay for another party’s speech just because the government thinks that the speech furthers the interests of the person who does not want to pay.” Id. at 2467. Several aspects of the Court’s opinion are relevant to Mr. Janus’s current claim for damages. First, the Court character‐ ized the harm inflicted by the agency‐fee arrangement as “compelled subsidization of private speech,” 138 S. Ct. at 2464, whereby “individuals are coerced into betraying their convictions,” id. It was not concerned in the abstract with the deduction of money from employees’ paychecks pursuant to an employment contract. Rather, the problem was the lack of consent (where it existed) to the use of that money—i.e. to sup‐ port the union’s representation work. In other words, the case presented a First Amendment speech issue, not one under the Fifth Amendment’s Takings clause. The Court found that any legitimate interest AFSCME had in those fees had to yield to the objecting employees’ First Amendment rights. In so doing, it rejected the approach to free riding that earlier opinions had taken, holding to the con‐ trary that “avoiding free riders is not a compelling interest” and thus Illinois’s statute could not withstand “exacting scru‐ tiny.” 138 S. Ct. at 2466. Yet it came to that conclusion only after weighing the costs and benefits to a union of having ex‐ clusive representative status: on the one hand, the union in‐ curs the financial burden attendant to the requirement to No. 19‐1553 9 provide fair representation even for nonmembers who de‐ cline to contribute anything to the cost of its services; on the other hand, even with payments of zero from objectors, the union still enjoys the power and attendant privileges of being the exclusive representative of an employee unit. The Court’s analysis focused on the union rather than the nonmembers: the question was whether requiring a union to continue to rep‐ resent those who do not pay even a fair‐share fee would be suﬃciently inequitable to establish a compelling interest, not whether requiring nonmembers to contribute to the unions would be inequitable. Nor did the Court hold that Mr. Janus has an unqualified constitutional right to accept the benefits of union representa‐ tion without paying. Its focus was instead on freedom of ex‐ pression. That is why it said only that the state may not force a person to pay fees to a union with which she does not wish to associate. But if those unions were not designated as exclu‐ sive representatives (as they are under 5 ILCS §§ 315/6 and 315/9), there would be no obligation to act in the interests of nonmembers. The only right the Janus II decision recognized is that of an objector not to pay any union fees. This is not the same as a right to a free ride. Free‐riding is simply a conse‐ quence of exclusivity; drop the duty of fair representation, and the union would be free to cut oﬀ all services to the non‐ members. Finally, the Court did not specify whether its decision was to have retroactive eﬀect. The language it used, to the extent that it points any way, suggests that it was thinking prospec‐ tively: “Those unconstitutional exactions cannot be allowed to continue indefinitely,” 138 S. Ct. at 2486; “States and public‐ sector unions may no longer extract agency fees from 10 No. 19‐1553 nonconsenting employees,” id; “This procedure violates the First Amendment and cannot continue,” id. In the end, how‐ ever, the Court remanded the case to the district court for fur‐ ther proceedings, in particular those related to remedy. Id. at 2486.