Can Non-Union Employees Be Forced by Statute to Pay Service Fees to a Union that Pays for a Union’s National Litigation?

In some circumstances, the law requires employees who refuse to join unions to pay service fees to the unions that represent their local collective bargaining unit. As one would guess, these laws often upset non-union employees who believe that their First Amendment rights of association and speech are being infringed. Consequently, there has been a substantial amount of litigation about whether the government can force a person to contribute to a Union. In the latest case to grapple with this issue, Locke v. Karass, the United States Supreme Court held that non-Union employees may be charged a share of a union’s “national litigation expenses” if the litigation is appropriately related to collective bargaining and the local unit may ultimately be benefited by the contribution.