Opinion ID: 4549623
Heading Depth: 4
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Federal Issue

Text: The federal question at the heart of plaintiﬀs’ complaint was, as they twice pleaded, whether “the Defendants’ 2012 CBA was renewed, modified, [or] extended on or after March 11, 2015.” This language was taken from Wisconsin’s Act 1, leading plaintiﬀs to argue that it raises a question of only state law: whether the state statute applies to defendants’ 2015– 2018 collective bargaining agreement. The problem for plain‐ tiﬀs is that that question necessarily asks when defendants’ agreement became binding in all other respects, in whole (by No. 19‐3142 15 renewal or extension) or in part (by modification). That is a question of federal labor law. Application of the state statute must depend on this question of federal law if the state statu‐ tory language is to serve its apparent purpose of avoiding an unconstitutional impairment of contracts. See Sweeney v. Pence, 767 F.3d 654, 666–67 (7th Cir. 2014). Wisconsin is not entitled to give an independent answer to this question, diﬀerent from federal law. Mohr v. Metro East Mfg. Co., 711 F.2d 69, 71 (7th Cir. 1983) (“the Supreme Court has opted for uniform rules for questions of [labor] contract formation”); see also, e.g., Operating Engineers Local 139 Health Benefit Fund v. Gustafson Constr. Corp., 258 F.3d 645, 649 (7th Cir. 2001); Atchley v. Heritage Cable Vision Assocs., 101 F.3d 495, 500 n.2 (7th Cir. 1996). Wisconsin law could not give a diﬀer‐ ent answer on when a labor contract begins to bind the parties without threatening the certainty and uniformity guaranteed by § 301 of the Taft–Hartley Act. See Local 174, Teamsters v. Lu‐ cas Flour Co., 369 U.S. 95, 103–04 (1962). Federal law controls.