Episode description

As unions have become more reliant on government largesse over the last few decades, putting their future fortunes into the hands of the government, the question of whether the Constitution’s First Amendment and its Freedom of Association apply to the concept of Exclusive Representation is called into question.

In this episode, labor attorney Alex MacDonald, from Littler’s Workplace Policy Institute shares some of the details of his paper: Political Unions, Free Speech, and the Death of Voluntarism: Why Exclusive Representation Violates the First Amendment [in PDF]

Shorter: Union membership is now political. So can the government still require people to associate with a union?