A federal appeals panel has ruled a Waukegan teacher can't continue suing a teachers union which she claims she joined under the mistaken belief membership was mandatory. The judges said governmental workers' right to refrain from union membership does not override a voluntarily signed agreement to join, so she can't seek a payout beyond the union's voluntary refund of her dues.
Circuit Judge Ilana Rovner delivered the ruling Jan. 6, with agreement from Circuit Judges Amy St. Eve and David Hamilton, of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit. The ruling favored the Lake County Federation of Teachers Local 504 and Waukegan Community School District 60 in a 2020 action brought against them by Ariadna Ramon Baro.
In August 2019, Ramon Baro joined the Waukegan school district as an English-as-a-Second-Language teacher. At that time, she also joined the teachers union, because she claimed she believed membership was mandatory. The one-year agreement Ramon Baro signed with the union authorized the district to deduct dues from her paychecks.
Jeffrey Schwab
| Liberty Justice Center
A few days later, Ramon Baro said she learned membership was optional. She then asked the union to revoke her membership, but the union reminded her that her agreement was in effect for one year, court documents said. Ramon Baro then sued in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, seeking a refund of her dues and revocation of her membership. She argued continued deduction of dues breached her right to free speech and assembly, as spelled out in the U.S. Supreme Court's 2018 Janus decision.
The Janus decision said unions cannot make government workers join unions, then still draw "fair share fees," instead of dues, from paychecks of workers who refuse membership.
Soon after Ramon Baro lodged the suit, the union canceled her membership and refunded the $329 in dues that had been collected, according to court papers. The union also gave her $500 for her legal costs in bringing the suit. Ramon Baro refused the money and pressed the lawsuit, now seeking unspecified punitive damages.
On appeal to the Seventh Circuit, Judge Rovner agreed, noting the Seventh Circuit addressed the issue, raised by Ramon Baro, in a 2021 ruling.
"We ruled that Janus’s reasoning was limited to nonmembers who were being forced to subsidize union speech with which they had chosen not to associate. 'Janus said nothing about union members' who 'freely chose to join a union and voluntarily authorized the deduction of union dues, and who thus consented to subsidizing a union,'" Rovner said, quoting the 2021 ruling.
Rovner added: "The voluntary signing of a union membership contract is clear and compelling evidence that an employee has waived her right not to join a union. Ramon Baro voluntarily signed a valid contract, became a union member, and accepted the terms and conditions of union membership."
Ramon Baro claimed she did not know membership was optional, so her membership was not freely chosen. However, Rovner would have none of that.
"By the plain language of the contract, the agreement was a 'voluntary authorization and assignment,' intended to 'be irrevocable.' Ramon Baro's signature on the contract further attested that it was 'signed freely and voluntarily,'" Rovner pointed out.
In Rovner's view, it is "irrelevant" whether Ramon Baro believed she had to join the union.
"The First Amendment protects our right to speak. It does not create an independent right to void obligations when we are unhappy with what we have said," Rovner said.
Ramon Baro has been represented by attorneys Jeffrey M. Schwab and James J. McQuaid, of Liberty Justice Center in Chicago.
The union has been defended by John M. West and Joshua B. Shiffrin, of Bredhoff & Kaiser, of Washington, D.C., as well as by Robert E. Bloch and George A. Lescombe III, of Dowd, Bloch, Bennett, Cervone, Auerbach & Yokich, of Chicago.