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Davenport v WEA developments
May 17, 2007 by Ross Runkel at LawMemo
Washington state law requires unions to get pre-expenditure permission (an "opt in" requirement) from non-members before using their agency shop payments for political purposes.
The US Supreme Court is poised to decide whether the Washington State Supreme Court erred by holding that law unconstitutional as an abridgement of free speech. Davenport v. Washington Education Association.
Now the Washington legislature has amended the statute to be more favorable to the union. So the impact of the US Supreme Court's decision will apply only to expenditures that pre-dated the amendment.
On May 11, 2007 the Washington State Legislature amended the statute by adding one sentence that clarifies the meaning of the word "use." The statutory amendment:
A labor organization does not use agency shop fees when it uses its general treasury funds to make such contributions or expenditures if it has sufficient revenues from sources other than agency shop fees in its general treasury to fund such contributions or expenditures.
All parties have filed supplementary briefs within the past few days. All briefs are here.
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