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Reconciling Agency Fee Doctrine, The First Amendment, And The Modern Public Sector Union, Courtlyn G. Roser-Jones
Reconciling Agency Fee Doctrine, The First Amendment, And The Modern Public Sector Union, Courtlyn G. Roser-Jones
Northwestern University Law Review
Few institutions have done more to improve working conditions for the middle class than labor unions. Their efforts, of course, cost money. To fund union activities, thousands of collective bargaining agreements across the nation have long included provisions permitting employers to require employees to pay “fair share” or “agency” fees. In public unions—when the employer is the government—this arrangement creates tension between two important values: the First Amendment’s protection against compelled expression and the collective benefits of worker representation. When confronted with this tension forty years ago in Abood v. Detroit Board of Education, the Supreme Court struck an …