Teachers (NEA)

For some three decades, a series of court rulings have established a basic principle:  Unions, whether in the private or the public sector, may not route dues collections toward political purposes against their members’ will.  The U.S. Supreme Court last June defended that principle for public-sector employees.  By a unanimous vote, the court restored Washington State’s “paycheck protection” law, concluding that the state affiliate of the National Education Association (NEA) had to obtain advance written consent from fee-paying nonunion teachers before spending their payments on political causes.  The High Court is due to have its hands full in a similar case next door in Idaho.  On March 31, the Court agreed to hear Ysursa v. Pocatello Education Association, an appeal of a federal circuit court ruling.

Union officials and their employees are not immune to gambling fever.  And a good many in recent years have resorted to stealing to feed their habit.  So it has been with Claraliene Gordon, former president of the Camden Education Association (CEA), an affiliate of the National Education Association (NEA).  On November 15, Gordon was indicted in New Jersey state court for diverting nearly $15,000 in union funds for personal use.  She allegedly had spent thousands of those dollars on gambling trips in Atlantic City.

Dissenting teachers in Washington State put forth a long and mighty effort, and were rewarded for their patience – even though the rewards may be more psychic than monetary.  In a unanimous 9-0 decision, the U.S. Supreme Court on June 14 ruled in favor of the right of nonunion employees to exercise discretion over how their mandatory union fees are spent.  Consolidating the cases of Davenport v. Washington Education Association (No. 05-1589) and Washington v. Washington Education Association (No. 05-1657), the Court upheld a Washington State law passed by voter referendum a decade and a half ago giving public-school teachers the right to withhold payments for what they might consider objectionable political purposes.  In so doing, the court overturned a state decision holding this “paycheck protection” law to be a violation of a union’s free-speech rights.  At the same time, it’s a limited victory.  The High Court sidestepped the issue of constitutionality of union forced-dues collections.  Moreover, just weeks before the decision, the state’s union-friendly Democrat political establishment gutted the law.

Joseph Cari and Steven Loren saw gold in Illinois teachers’ union pensions.  Where the two Chicago lawyers went wrong was trying to mine it.  On September 15, 2005 the pair pleaded guilty in federal court to charges related to an ongoing criminal probe into pension kickbacks involving the Teachers Retirement System (TRS) for the State of Illinois.  The system, with more than $30 billion in assets, serves hundreds of thousands of active and retired school employees represented by the Illinois Federation of Teachers and the Illinois Education Association – unions, respectively, affiliated with the American Federation of Teachers and the National Education Association.  Cari and Loren, free on bail, now are helping the prosecution, apparently willing to testify against a bigger fish, who like them,