Attempt to derail Workers’ Rights Amendment fails

An effort to block voters from deciding whether Illinois’ constitution should establish rights for workers has been derailed by a Seventh Judicial Circuit Court Judge in Springfield.

The ruling is a key victory in an election that expects to have millions of dollars spent by billionaires to attack workers’ rights in general and the proposed constitutional guarantee in particular.

Judge Raylene DeWitte Grischow, a Republican, in May rejected a lawsuit by the conservative Liberty Justice Center to stop the state from spending taxpayer funds to place the Workers’ Rights Amendment on the November ballot.  The Liberty Justice Center is tied to the right-wing Illinois Policy Institute, which joined with the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation to represent Mark Janus in the landmark Janus v. AFSCME  case, which made its way to the U.S Supreme Court in 2017, when the Court determined that public-sector non-union members don’t have to pay union “agency fees” even if they benefit from the union’s work on their behalf.

The ruling could be appealed.

The ballot measure – which needs 60% of those voting on the measure itself, or a majority of those voting in the overall election – would make Illinois one of a few states that guarantee the right to collective bargaining as part of their constitutions. If successful, it would prevent future state General Assemblies from passing anti-union “Right-To-Work” legislation without voters’ approval.

The Illinois General Assembly in May 2021 overwhelmingly passed the proposed amendment, which will be on the ballot as “Amendment 1.” If approved, it would establish a constitutional right for Illinois employees to organize and bargain collectively through representatives of their choice to negotiate “wages, hours, and working conditions and to protect their economic welfare and safety at work.”

The measure also would prohibit state and local governments from adopting “Right-To-Work” laws or ordinances that outlaw union-security agreements requiring workers benefiting from union contracts to share in the costs of union representation.

In April, the Liberty Justice Center’s Jacob Huebert and the Illinois Policy Institute’s Mailee Smith filed a 27-page suit claiming that the federal National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) preempts state laws that regulate collective bargaining and therefore can’t use public funds to place the question before voters.

Judge Grischow disagreed, saying there were “no reasonable grounds” for keeping the measure off the ballot. In her nine-page decision, Grischow said that “some parts of the amendment were clearly not preempted, and that the legislature had properly placed the proposal on the ballot.

“Petitioner’s claims fail as a matter of law, and impermissibly seek an advisory opinion as to constitutional issues … [which] may never progress beyond the realm of the hypothetical,” Grischow wrote. “There is no basis for denying the voters the opportunity to decide whether to enact a state right to collective bargaining as a supplement or backup to federal rights secured by the NLRA.

“The proposed Amendment would serve at least three permissible purposes,” she continued. “First, it would create rights for public employees, which Petitioners concede is not preempted by the NLRA. Second, it would restrain the power of the General Assembly to pass laws restricting union-security agreements, a subject left open to the states. Third, it would act as a state-law failsafe to preserve rights for private-sector employees in the event the federal government ever decided to abandon the NLRA.

“There are no grounds for denying the voters the opportunity to decide whether to add the Workers’ Rights Amendment to the Illinois constitution,” she added.

The Illinois General Assembly in May 2021 passed by a bipartisan vote – 49-7 in the state Senate, and 80-30 (with 3 “present”) in the state House. Peoria’s Sen. Dave Koehler and Rep. Jehan Gordon-Booth were co-sponsors of the measure.

Illinois State Senator Ram Villivalam (D), who authored the measure, told Don Wiener of the Center for Media and Democracy that old and new barriers to organizing “have only exacerbated the income inequalities and wage gaps existing between diverse groups, especially the huge difference in what workers get and what management gets. Putting collective bargaining rights into the state constitution is a way for workers, unions and the community to move forward.”

Besides the Illinois Policy Institute and Liberty Justice Center, organizations opposing the Workers’ Rights Amendment include the Illinois Chamber of Commerce, the Illinois Manufacturers’ Association, and the National Federation of Independent Business.