Federal Court Upholds Nurse’s Right Not to Fund Union Lobbying

The courthouse of the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the 1st Circuit in Boston on Feb. 4, 2021. screenshot/Google Maps

A federal appeals court rejected a health care union’s request that the judges reconsider their decision upholding the right of nurses not to be required to fund the labor group’s political lobbying.

The United Nurses and Allied Professionals (UNAP) union had asked the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the 1st Circuit to reconsider its September 2020 ruling upholding Rhode Island nurse Jeannette Geary’s right not to be charged assessments used to cover the costs of lobbying and other political activities.

In its September decision, the judges, including former Supreme Court Justice David Souter, said they saw “no convincing argument that legislative lobbying is not a ‘political’ activity’” for which Geary can’t be forced to fund.

The September decision also upheld the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) ruling in Geary’s favor, saying the board was correct that Supreme Court precedent dictated that nonmembers could never be required to fund union lobbying.

Geary has been represented pro bono throughout her fight, which began in 2009, by attorneys from the National Right to Work Foundation (NRTWF).

The foundation won the landmark 1988 Supreme Court decision in Communications Workers of America v. Beck that guaranteed the right of individuals not to have to pay dues for political activities they don’t support.

“Geary, who worked as a nurse at Kent Hospital in Warwick, Rhode Island, filed unfair labor practice charges [in 2009] after UNAP officials failed to provide her evidence of a legally required independent audit of its breakdown of expenditures. She also challenged the union’s forcing her and other employees to pay for union lobbying activities in state legislatures,” the NRTWF said in a statement on Feb. 4.

“The Foundation-won Beck decision mandates that private-sector workers in states without Right to Work protections can only be forced to pay union dues for union activities ‘directly germane’ to the union’s bargaining functions, which excludes political activity like lobbying. In another Foundation-won case, Hudson, the Court held that union officials must provide an audited financial breakdown of how forced union dues are being spent.”

There are currently 27 states that have adopted “Right to Work” laws that guarantee an individual no person can be forced to join a union as a condition of employment.

Previously, under President Barack Obama, the NLRB had ruled against Geary in 2012. But then, in a March 2019 decision, the board reversed itself, saying, according to the NRTWF statement: “The NLRB ruled 3–1 that union officials violate workers’ rights by forcing nonmembers to fund any union lobbying activities.