C.J. Sam Spade, concurring in part and dissenting in part,I. The Northeast Judicial DecisionI think the end result held by the majority is correct on this matter, but the reasoning is particularly atrocious.
It is a well-established rule in Anglo-Saxon law and American jurisprudence that where a matter may be decided by the common law or statute without resort to the Constitutional question that the Court should rule based upon the narrower ground.
Undisputed evidence was presented at oral argument that a written contract did not exist between UNEPSE, its employees and the Northeast Region. As such, employees who were members of UNEPSE were retained by the Northeast Region an implied contract, not an express contract.
At common law in American jurisprudence, with which our Constitution and Laws are based upon, such employees function as "at-will employees" of their employer, the Northeast government, and are thus free to leave the "contract" at any point of their employment, without consequences. No statute of the Northeast Region or of the Atlasian government has been attested to which changes this result.
Accordingly, when UNEPSE employees left their jobs and started striking, they merely exercised this lawful right and did not violate any statute or regulations. They cannot be fined for this unilateral action, as the Northeast Region could, similarly, not be fined for firing the UNEPSE employees from their jobs. The Practical Labor Policy Act does not impact this decision, as it deals with "new" contracts solely and Section 4 was not utilized.
Therefore, I agree with the majority that the damages imposed by the Northeast CJO must be struck down and the decision vacated. I disagree, however, with the majority's reasoning that a right to strike or a right to collectively bargain is found fully within Article VI, Section 10 or that such a rule is relevant or applicable to adjudication of this contract dispute.II - The "Practical Labor Policy Act"I dissent in full with the Court's decision on the Act as the issue of the Act's constitutionality is not yet ripe for adjudication.
III - Article VI, Section 10Since the majority has touched upon this Section, I believe that I should put forth my general thoughts on its interpretation, which conflicts greatly with the majority's reasoning.
The key mistake by the majority, in my view, lies in a misreading of the actual text of the Constitutional provision in question. Whether this error is driven by force of politics or legal confusion, the fact is that it will lead to incorrect judicial decisions and stifle lawmaking.
The text of Article VI, Section 10 says:
The majority seems to think that "persons in employment shall have the right to..." also means that "unions shall have the right to..." Under this reasoning, inclusion of the union's "right to strike" and the union's "right to collectively bargain" naturally follows from the incorrect conclusion that the language protects the collective rights of the union. I cannot agree with this reasoning.
Rather, I think that the "right to organize" protects individual rights, not collective rights. The language of the text specifically grants the right to "persons in employment", not to unions or organizations. If it did, it would have made explicit the groups that deserve protection. Since it does nothing of the sort, it therefore follows that no protections have been granted to these collective organizations.
Moreover, the term "person", in the many instances where it appears in the Bill of Rights, should, in most these instances, refer to individuals. Although the question of "corporate personhood" may well appear before the Court in the future when addressing provisions of the Bill of Rights, the additional language "in employment" gives clear guidance that the persons described in Article VI, Section 10 are individuals, not corporations or other organizations.
In short, the right of "persons in employment" to "organize for purposes of collective bargaining" consists of three basic rights. Since the text "organize for purposes of collective bargaining" is akin to "unionize", the Constitution, therefore, protects the right of any individual who is employed to:
1) Create/form a union;
2) Join a union (or not join a union); and
3) Leave a union (or join another union).These are the boundaries to which the right found in Article VI, Section 10 forms and to which
only the Senate is allowed to regulate or restrict
only "on the grounds of vital National interest". Any legislation, therefore, whether regional or federal, which touches
directly upon the individual worker's right to do either of these three things
must be unconstitutional save the sole limited exception mentioned above.
Admittedly, much labor law does not touch directly on these rights. Indeed, 99% of laws which regulate collective entities (i.e. unions or similar organizations), such as The Practical Labor Policy Act or other laws which may limit the right to strike or define the terms of collective bargaining, do not directly impact an individual's right to engage in the aforementioned three rights.
However, this does not necessarily mean that such laws always escape the grasp of Article VI, Section 10. Rather, I believe that in certain instances, laws passed by the legislature or the Senate may run afoul of the Constitution even though they only
indirectly impact an individual's right to unionize, as outlined above.
For example, if a law or regulation in question unnecessarily restricts (1) the ability of the union to take action to benefit its members, (2) the ability of the union maintain negotiations in collective bargaining, or (3) the rights of union members in daily work activities, then such a law may
indirectly punish those individuals who wish to exercise the right to unionize to such an extent that it constitutes an infringement of their right to organize outlined in Article VI, Section 10.
In other words, I would hold that any labor laws which indirectly impact an individual's right to unionize are unconstitutional as violations of the "right to organize" under Article VI, Section 10, if they fail this test:
1) The challenger of the law must show that it renders an individual's right to organize substantially meaningless (i.e. one of the three basic rights listed above);
2) If this burden is met, the government must, in turn, provide an compelling government interest for the regulation and show that the regulation is narrowly tailored to that interest. (the only compelling government interest being "a vital national interest")
Part of me wishes to make a few more comments about the faults of the majority decision, but I think this describes my position accurately, and there is no need to bore anyone.
