A University of Illinois hospital worker has brought a class action lawsuit against both the union that represented him and the state of Illinois, asking a federal judge to declare unconstitutional a state law he said the union and the state’s university system has relied on to continue to take union dues from workers’ pay unconstitutionally, even after workers leave the union.
In December, attorney Joseph Morris, of the firm of Morris & De La Rosa, of Chicago, and attorneys with the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation, of Springfield, Va., filed suit in Chicago federal court on behalf of named plaintiff Jonathan Shepard.
Defendants in the action include Service Employees International Union Local 73; the University of Illinois Board of Trustees; and Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, in his capacity as the state’s chief executive.
Joseph Morris
| Acton.org
According to the complaint, Shepard is a Cook County resident who has worked at the University of Illinois Hospital and Health Science System in Chicago as a mental health counselor.
In that role, he is represented by SEIU Local 73, which represents all UI Health workers in Shepard’s so-called “technical bargaining unit.”
According to the complaint, Shepard agreed on Aug. 21, 2020, to become a SEIU member and to allow the University of Illinois, as his employer, to deduct union membership dues from his paychecks.
The next day, however, Shepard allegedly signed and dated letter to the SEIU informing them of his desire to resign from the union, and cease any dues withdrawals from his pay.
However, according to the complaint, Shepard held onto the letter because he was told by SEIU officials that he “could not immediately resign from the union.”
When SEIU members went on strike at UI Health beginning Sept. 14, Shepard allegedly then sent the letter to the union, formally objecting to the deduction of union dues from his checks.
On Oct. 5, the SEIU allegedly replied to his letter by refusing to honor his request to stop collecting dues, because they said his request fell within a so-called “irrevocability period” that was set by a provision within the Illinois Education Labor Relations Act (IELRA.) The union allegedly told Shepard he had only a 15-day window each year to cancel the deductions. Otherwise, the SEIU would continue to garnish his pay, according to the complaint.
The complaint claims the SEIU and the University of Illinois has carried out this same action against other U of I workers who have attempted to leave the union and put a halt to the collection of dues.
Shepard’s complaint asserts this behavior, and that provision of the IELRA on which the union has relied, are both unconstitutional.
The complaint asserts they both conflict with the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2018 decision in Janus v American Federation of State County and Municipal Employee.
In that decision, the high court ruled state laws permitting unions to collect fees from non-union government workers without their consent violate the workers’ free speech and freedom of association rights.
In this case, Shepard’s attorneys claim neither he or other UI Health employees were notified of their rights to object to the dues collection at any point in the onboarding or union authorization process.
“… By seizing payments for SEIU (from Shepard and other U of I employees like him) after they provided notice that they resigned their union membership and objected to the deduction or payment of union dues or fees, … compelled the Plaintiff and Class members to subsidize SEIU and its speech over their objections and as a condition of their employment,” Shepard’s attorneys asserted in the complaint.
The class action lawsuit is seeking a court order declaring the union and the state violated the constitutional rights of Shepard and others like him, and striking down the provision in the IELRA dealing with union dues deductions.
The lawsuit further seeks unspecified compensatory damages for Shepard and other U of I employees like him, from whom the SEIU continued to collect dues after the workers resigned from the union and objected to the dues collection.
The class action is one of the most recent of a string of such lawsuits targeting state governments and unions representing government workers in Illinois and elsewhere in the U.S.
In most decisions to date, judges in Chicago and elsewhere have refused to force unions to refund the allegedly unconstitutionally collected fees, declaring they collected the fees in “good faith” reliance on state law.
The Supreme Court has put off a decision on that CTA worker’s appeal petition several times since September, according to the court’s docket.