> THOMAS , J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which ROBERTS , C. J.,
and ALITO, SOTOMAYOR, K AGAN, G ORSUCH, K AVANAUGH, and BARRETT , JJ.,
joined. JACKSON, J., filed an opinion concurring in part, dissenting in
part, and concurring in the judgment.
I'm always curious! I suppose we can call this one nearly unanimous? I skimmed her dissent and couldn't make much sense of it, seemed to be pretty technical?
She concurred in the judgement, so she agrees that Starbucks should have won. She was only dissenting on the reasoning behind it. The judgement was unanimous.
Despite the politics around the court and the idea that the court is divided, most Supreme Court decisions are unanimous or close to it. Opinions like this one provide alternate legal theories to use later.
Thank you. Not sure why anyone would write an article about a Supreme Court decision without describing the actual vote. The immediate outcome might be the same, but there’s a big difference in context and meaning between a 5-4 decision and a 9-0 decision.
The unanimity should also be an indicator of the technicality of the decision. This isn't some broad statement on the power of unions or organizing laws, it's a narrow clarification of the set of conditions the NLRB has to meet to grant preliminary injunctions.
Yeah, very much this. I personally classify this kind of event as “a nothingburger that looks like a somethingburger so people will get worked up anyways.”
SCOTUS also ruled in the abortion pill case [1]. 9-0 decision that the plaintiffs do not have standing to sue the FDA, thus the rules the FDA added to ease access to abortion pills stand. The crux of the argument being that they can present their case to the executive or legislative branches, but the courts are the wrong place to address the plaintiffs' concerns.
It does matter because lack of standing is something that keeps the FDA safe from activists using the court to get their way when they can't do it through the executive or legislative system.
The bigger issue with the FDA will be if a drug/food company sues them over a mandated safety procedure/requirement.
Not because I think it's the wrong decision. I thought it was incredibly obvious. So obvious that nobody could possibly have passed such a law unless they expected a partisan court to concoct a reason to back it.
At best I expected a 5-4 decision in favor of the right choice. Having all 9 justices make a decision that runs contrary to the ideology of a majority of them should make me question my belief that they will always choose ideology first and find a justification afterwards.
And yet... "lack of standing" is frequently used when they know they'll look bad, so they pretend the question doesn't actually exist.
I know why it was formed: a large set of cases that were decided along partisan grounds, and where I consider the reasoning not merely incorrect but atrociously bad.
>Having all 9 justices make a decision that runs contrary to the ideology of a majority of them should make me question my belief that they will always choose ideology first and find a justification afterwards.
This is an effect of media quite literally lying about the nature of the SCOTUS. The vast majority of cases they rule on are settled on apolitical lines. There has been a concerted effort in the past ~5 years to undermine the legitimacy of the court by trying to portray it as some hackneyed partisan legislature. Do some things get decided on political lines? Absolutely, but not any more than the SCOTUS has always handled these things.
Populists, both left and right, benefit from eroding the perceived legitimacy of independent institutions.
"Packing the court" has a very specific meaning in the US, so it may be different in the Kings's English, but here it means filling courts with more judges for the purpose of ideologically outnumbering the other side. The US does not have a set size for its Supreme Court, but the number of Justices has remained (more or less) 9 for the whole modern history of the US.
Also the Alito's wife thing is a great example of the media effort to undermine the legitimacy of the Court. By fabricating a narrative that an upside down American flag or the Pine Tree flag are "dedicated symbols of January 6th" or some nonsense, the media further damages the credibility of the court. The truth of the matter is, Alito's wife flew the flag upside down as a kind of SOS about a neighborhood dispute. Upside down flags equaling distress have been a standard that I learned about as a child. The Pine Tree flag has a huge history going back to the Revolutionary war, and has been flow at every kind of event conceivable. Simply being flown on January 6th does not mean that Jan 6thers suddenly own it, any more than BLM owns it, or a music festival or county fair own it.
Most cases are settled on apolitical lines because the cases themselves are apolitical. They are usually of little interest outside the judicial system itself.
The cases that receive the most reporting are the ones that most affect people's lives. That's not bias on the part of the press. Nobody cares whether "the 60-day filing deadline in 5 U.S.C. § 7703(b)(1)(A) is not jurisdictional." (Harrow vs DoD). The press is accurately reflecting the cases that matter.
This was a difficult case for them to "follow their heart" in because the lower court had given standing that was so egregiously out of place that it would mean that standing would be given in similar cases having nothing to do with abortion. This could threaten some other sacred cows, and they never wanted that broad definition of standing in the first place.
Some (e.g. the Strict Scrutiny podcast) have speculated that some cases are meant to make the SC look moderate, by giving them softballs to rule unanimously against the underlying ideological position they would normally uphold.
You can come find a lot of bad things about the current US supreme court (it's not hard).
But they judges still pride themself about their position including their integrity. So especially for thing which are not very important fundamentals for their world personal political ideology they have been pushing a relative consistent approach where you can normally argue that it's a reasonable ruling if looking at it from a out of context perspective.
Like out of context the repelling of the previous supreme court decision wrt. abortion makes sense (laws should be made by the legislative organ not the jurisdicative organ and that ruling required a law to be made, which didn't happen). Through in context things are very different....
Also to be clear this applies to many but not all of their recent decisions.
It’s easy to issue opinions until anyone responsible for enforcement disregards them, with my apologies to Andrew Jackson. Like a currency, the power and value is a shared delusion until it isn’t. Respect is earned. The current court is not earning a whole lot of respect at the moment.
These people didn’t get there purely politically and without merit.
Please consider your perspective but consider if there’s any possible oversight in such a perspective. I try doing that and it’s often helpful to notice things i had not earlier.
> In 2022, workers at a Starbucks cafe on Poplar Avenue in Memphis became among the first in the company to unionize. Early in their efforts, they allowed a television news crew into the cafe after hours to talk about the union campaign. Starbucks fired seven workers present that evening, including several who belonged to the union organizing committee.
Whether Starbucks was engaging in unfair labor practices was not determined in this case. This case only concerns what test courts should use to determine whether granting an injunction is necessary.
What's American tech? I'm a Canadian employed by a Canadian company that is contracted by an American company to develop software for an international, but primarily American, audience. Am I working on American tech?
Despite what everyone seems to think, SCOTUS isn't actually a permanent unelected legislature and can't just make interventions out of nowhere. Who would you sue to get that ruling? How do you define "American tech"? How do you propose to impose speech restrictions on Americans speaking to foreigners about it?
(Personal interest: I'm a Brit working in the UK for an American parent company)
You bring up a good point about the US Supreme Court. My limited understanding as a US citizen is that they are there to interpret laws, not make them. I don't know how well that works in practice so I'm willing to be swayed on that stance if someone with more legal experience can present compelling arguments.
Chief Justice Roberts brought this issue up on his dissent on the Obergefell vs Hodges case few years ago. The constitution never addresses the topic on the legality of gay marriage and thus the court should not be the vehicle for delivering that decision; that responsibility falls squarely upon the legislative branch.
> The constitution never addresses the topic on the legality of gay marriage and thus the court should not be the vehicle for delivering that decision
The constitution did not address interracial marriage either, and yet Loving v Virginia was a critical piece of liberation through litigation (and very similar arguments apply!)
I'm a remote worker like this. Legally though I'm not an employee, but a legal entity (individual entrepreneur, same as a company in this context) that provides consulting service. Would you ban foreign companies from providing IT services to american ones?
It's so weird to me that legally companies can't defend themselves against employees working against them, if it's under the guise of a union.
If an employee is disruptive, hostile, negative and harmful to the environment for any other reason, of course they'd be fired, but if they're agitating for a union then it all becomes protected activity.
If an employee was working against the financial interests of the company in favor of the interests of a competitor, a supplier or a favored customer of course they'd be fired, but if it's a union then it becomes protected activity.
To be clear, I'm not making any judgement on unions or at-will employment or anything as being good or bad, or appropriate/inappropriate in any given situation, industry, etc. I just think it's super weird that from the perspective of the employer, you have an obviously cancerous group inside your organization which is actively working to harm you, but you're not allowed to defend against. It's weird.
The other scenarios you have mentioned did not escalate to the point of mass organized violence in the past. If they did I would expect government intervention to prevent that kind of escalation too!
Employees who attempt to organize are not doing so to help a supplier or favored customer. They're doing it to improve their relationship with their employer. When you deal with management at a large corporation, you are rarely ever dealing on a 1:1 basis with someone. You are dealing with a group of people. So why should employees not have the same opportunity?
Some particularly weird parts of that have come when the protection of the union actively conflicts with other employer mandates, like hostile working environments — e.g. from 2015-2017 the NLRB went after Cooper Tire for firing an employee who had used racist slurs on the picket line
Because it's a compromise that turned a situation that in the past became violent into a peaceful one. Not all rules are written in blood but this one is. So long as everyone plays by the rules the dispute is mediated civilly through the courts instead of the streets.
The best defense against unions forming is strong state and federal labor protections but for the life of me I can't understand why certain folks in power seem hell-bent on rolling them back. They have been incredibly effective in the US, they're not adversarial, and they benefit everyone without workers having to do anything. "Right-to-work" states always act so shocked when workers form unions to get those protections back like that isn't exactly why those laws were passed.
It helps to put it this way: A union is a corporation that has an exclusive contract to provide labor. Company A does not hire the employees. Company B (the union) does. Company A cannot take disciplinary actions against the employees of B, they don't work for company A, they work for company B. This is actually how union contracts work.
Most union employees don't understand this; They think they work for company A when it's convenient for them, and company B when it's convenient for them, cherry-picking whatever suits them at the moment. Because legal formalisms aren't real and human behavior is, unions provide a thin veneer over petty human squabbles, one that mostly works.
Most union agitators absolutely understand this, but will never admit it. In classic orwellian fashion, they are the pigs, "overthrowing" the farmers "for the good of the farm animals" with every intent of just becoming the new farmers.
> you have an obviously cancerous group inside your organization which is actively working to harm you
This level of adversarial thinking is part of the problem. They're your employees, not your enemy.
A sibling comment alludes to violence; the history of labour organizing is full of employers opening fire on their employees, or hiring third parties to do so. The formalization of labour organizing and protected rights gives people a means to negotiate on a more equal footing that doesn't lead to violence.
The scope of protected activities is not unlimited. It's a balance, and governments generally choose to impose on the employer to provide a right to the employees.
> You have a right to strike, picket, and protest regarding work-related issues, but there are limitations and qualifications on the exercise of that right. Your right to engage in these activities depends on the object or purpose of the action, on its timing, or on the conduct of those involved.
> have an obviously cancerous group inside your organization
Is comparing unions to cancer not a judgement? Your comment reads anti-union and oblivious to the concept of worker’s right and the history to corporations literally attacking union members.
It makes sense in the context of the history of unions and legislation regarding them in the US. The overall idea is that both employers and unions are limited in what they can do to each other, and in exchange we have less violence of the sort that happened when companies broke strikes with hired guns like the Pinkertons. Like with many regulations, both sides think they are getting screwed more than the other side.
The problem with this ruling is it's out of the Supreme court's jurisdiction. The supreme court/federal courts do not have jurisdiction over all legal cases, and they can be stripped of the ability to hear cases. That's what happened with the creation of the NLRB.
Article 3 section II
> In all the other cases before mentioned, the Supreme Court shall have appellate jurisdiction, both as to law and fact, with such exceptions, and under such regulations as the Congress shall make.
Congress made an exception with the creation of the NLRB which means the supreme court should not have heard this case.
The Supreme court isn't though. It's only the final arbiter when congress hasn't explicitly removed that power from them.
This is the supreme court claiming power to itself that it has no right to by the constitution.
The supreme court, according to the article I just cited, is the final arbiter by default, but not by right. Congress can strip that right from them. This is why, for example, the supreme court does not hear military tribunal cases.
The Supreme Court though, has the power to determine when Congress can do that, and can’t do that. In other words, the SCOTUS has authority over Congress’s ability to determine SCOTUS authority.
So it’s kind of a moot point. Yes, officially they shouldn’t, in practice they do, and the law is what is practiced (otherwise adultery is still illegal in Minnesota).
> the SCOTUS has authority over Congress’s ability to determine SCOTUS authority.
Not really. Congress can, for example, impeach 1 or all of the supreme court justices. The supreme court cannot stop themselves from being removed from the court. They can claim authority and that they have the right to do that, but they are not above congress, they are coequal.
> Yes, officially they shouldn’t, in practice they do, and the law is what is practiced (otherwise adultery is still illegal in Minnesota).
Agreed, ultimately the ball is in congress's court (which they will most certainly drop). Congress could decide that this is the supreme court taking too much power and remove them all, but they aren't going to do that because this is likely a decision most representatives are perfectly fine with. So nothing will likely happen here. I'm just saying that this decision is one that the court never should have heard, not that practically they have heard it, and their enforcement is likely to stand.
I’m saying you’re presenting an amateur-hour legal theory on why our highest court shouldn’t have taken the case, because Congress said they couldn’t. Even though there are constitutional restrictions to when Congress can make such exemptions, and the SCOTUS can rule on them as they please (in practice).
Your argument to the contrary is about as interesting as Soverign Citizen understandings of law. I suppose we’re still ruled by George III and have been in a 248-year state of rebellion.
The NLRB relies on other courts to grant injunctions, which is the matter at hand here. The SC has not ruled on the underlying case or even whether an injunction should be granted - only what test the lower court should have used to determine that.
Yes, but remember that the Supreme Court also has the power to interpret the constitution and declare laws unconstitutional.
But I don’t think your reading is quite right. If congress could simply declare exemptions to Supreme Court appellate review, the court would have no power at all.
Right, but this is the court declaring the constitution unconstitutional. Something anyone that subscribes to originalism or textualism should be disturbed by.
Considering the constitution doesn’t explicitly talk about workers unions at all other than the generic freedom of association(1), whatever, there’s plenty of room for interpretation.
(1)And even that is subject to law, free association with terrorists isn’t a good idea.
Let’s also not forget this is a 9-0. If you are accusing all of our judges as being activists, across all political lines, I know who the real activist is.
Look, if you’re going to allege corruption and votes for sale here, I think it’s a little more potent when you suggest he’s gotten better compensation than some “free coffee”
> For the foregoing reasons, we hold that district courts must apply the traditional four factors articulated in Winter when considering the Board’s requests for a preliminary injunction under §10(j). We therefore vacate the judgment of the Court of Appeals and remand the case for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but it sounds like this is just about a temporary injunction to give the employees their jobs back while the actual labor case gets decided? The lower court used the two part McKinney test to grant the injunction, and the Supreme Court said no, you have to use the four part Winter test like other district courts, go back and decide again.
For anyone getting just reading the headline, the thing at issue was an injunction to “reinstate the workers while the agency's in-house administrative case against the Seattle-based company proceeds”.
With the SCOTUS ruling, the decision on that injunction will just occur again, but with a different legal test. The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) could still get the same injunction for the workers under the new test, though it is apparently more difficult.
The overall case against Starbucks could still be won or lost, and the legal tests for that haven’t changed.
The decision was essentially 9-0 with Justice Jackson dissenting in part but concurring in judgement.
2 fun angles I hardly ever hear any talk about: There is the company, there are the employees but you rarely hear the customer get organized in a permanent way. How bad does the coffee have to get? The other angle is the size of the corporation. You can easily demonstrate that economy of scale is beneficial for many industries. Making all local coffee places the same is a horrible idea. It reminds me of Magnasanti the dystopian mega city where people don't flee because everything is exactly the same everywhere.
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[ 2.0 ms ] story [ 128 ms ] threadIf you're curious, who.
[1] https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/23pdf/23-235_n7ip.pdf
The bigger issue with the FDA will be if a drug/food company sues them over a mandated safety procedure/requirement.
Not because I think it's the wrong decision. I thought it was incredibly obvious. So obvious that nobody could possibly have passed such a law unless they expected a partisan court to concoct a reason to back it.
At best I expected a 5-4 decision in favor of the right choice. Having all 9 justices make a decision that runs contrary to the ideology of a majority of them should make me question my belief that they will always choose ideology first and find a justification afterwards.
And yet... "lack of standing" is frequently used when they know they'll look bad, so they pretend the question doesn't actually exist.
This is an effect of media quite literally lying about the nature of the SCOTUS. The vast majority of cases they rule on are settled on apolitical lines. There has been a concerted effort in the past ~5 years to undermine the legitimacy of the court by trying to portray it as some hackneyed partisan legislature. Do some things get decided on political lines? Absolutely, but not any more than the SCOTUS has always handled these things.
Populists, both left and right, benefit from eroding the perceived legitimacy of independent institutions.
Also the Alito's wife thing is a great example of the media effort to undermine the legitimacy of the Court. By fabricating a narrative that an upside down American flag or the Pine Tree flag are "dedicated symbols of January 6th" or some nonsense, the media further damages the credibility of the court. The truth of the matter is, Alito's wife flew the flag upside down as a kind of SOS about a neighborhood dispute. Upside down flags equaling distress have been a standard that I learned about as a child. The Pine Tree flag has a huge history going back to the Revolutionary war, and has been flow at every kind of event conceivable. Simply being flown on January 6th does not mean that Jan 6thers suddenly own it, any more than BLM owns it, or a music festival or county fair own it.
The cases that receive the most reporting are the ones that most affect people's lives. That's not bias on the part of the press. Nobody cares whether "the 60-day filing deadline in 5 U.S.C. § 7703(b)(1)(A) is not jurisdictional." (Harrow vs DoD). The press is accurately reflecting the cases that matter.
Some (e.g. the Strict Scrutiny podcast) have speculated that some cases are meant to make the SC look moderate, by giving them softballs to rule unanimously against the underlying ideological position they would normally uphold.
But they judges still pride themself about their position including their integrity. So especially for thing which are not very important fundamentals for their world personal political ideology they have been pushing a relative consistent approach where you can normally argue that it's a reasonable ruling if looking at it from a out of context perspective.
Like out of context the repelling of the previous supreme court decision wrt. abortion makes sense (laws should be made by the legislative organ not the jurisdicative organ and that ruling required a law to be made, which didn't happen). Through in context things are very different....
Also to be clear this applies to many but not all of their recent decisions.
These people didn’t get there purely politically and without merit.
Please consider your perspective but consider if there’s any possible oversight in such a perspective. I try doing that and it’s often helpful to notice things i had not earlier.
Interesting context.
move the whole things for a "wtf is the US doing now" into a "okey sucks but makes sense" territory
(Personal interest: I'm a Brit working in the UK for an American parent company)
Chief Justice Roberts brought this issue up on his dissent on the Obergefell vs Hodges case few years ago. The constitution never addresses the topic on the legality of gay marriage and thus the court should not be the vehicle for delivering that decision; that responsibility falls squarely upon the legislative branch.
The constitution did not address interracial marriage either, and yet Loving v Virginia was a critical piece of liberation through litigation (and very similar arguments apply!)
If an employee is disruptive, hostile, negative and harmful to the environment for any other reason, of course they'd be fired, but if they're agitating for a union then it all becomes protected activity.
If an employee was working against the financial interests of the company in favor of the interests of a competitor, a supplier or a favored customer of course they'd be fired, but if it's a union then it becomes protected activity.
To be clear, I'm not making any judgement on unions or at-will employment or anything as being good or bad, or appropriate/inappropriate in any given situation, industry, etc. I just think it's super weird that from the perspective of the employer, you have an obviously cancerous group inside your organization which is actively working to harm you, but you're not allowed to defend against. It's weird.
The best defense against unions forming is strong state and federal labor protections but for the life of me I can't understand why certain folks in power seem hell-bent on rolling them back. They have been incredibly effective in the US, they're not adversarial, and they benefit everyone without workers having to do anything. "Right-to-work" states always act so shocked when workers form unions to get those protections back like that isn't exactly why those laws were passed.
Most union employees don't understand this; They think they work for company A when it's convenient for them, and company B when it's convenient for them, cherry-picking whatever suits them at the moment. Because legal formalisms aren't real and human behavior is, unions provide a thin veneer over petty human squabbles, one that mostly works.
Most union agitators absolutely understand this, but will never admit it. In classic orwellian fashion, they are the pigs, "overthrowing" the farmers "for the good of the farm animals" with every intent of just becoming the new farmers.
This level of adversarial thinking is part of the problem. They're your employees, not your enemy.
A sibling comment alludes to violence; the history of labour organizing is full of employers opening fire on their employees, or hiring third parties to do so. The formalization of labour organizing and protected rights gives people a means to negotiate on a more equal footing that doesn't lead to violence.
> You have a right to strike, picket, and protest regarding work-related issues, but there are limitations and qualifications on the exercise of that right. Your right to engage in these activities depends on the object or purpose of the action, on its timing, or on the conduct of those involved.
https://www.nlrb.gov/about-nlrb/rights-we-protect/the-law/em...
> have an obviously cancerous group inside your organization
Is comparing unions to cancer not a judgement? Your comment reads anti-union and oblivious to the concept of worker’s right and the history to corporations literally attacking union members.
Article 3 section II
> In all the other cases before mentioned, the Supreme Court shall have appellate jurisdiction, both as to law and fact, with such exceptions, and under such regulations as the Congress shall make.
Congress made an exception with the creation of the NLRB which means the supreme court should not have heard this case.
This is the supreme court claiming power to itself that it has no right to by the constitution.
The supreme court, according to the article I just cited, is the final arbiter by default, but not by right. Congress can strip that right from them. This is why, for example, the supreme court does not hear military tribunal cases.
So it’s kind of a moot point. Yes, officially they shouldn’t, in practice they do, and the law is what is practiced (otherwise adultery is still illegal in Minnesota).
Not really. Congress can, for example, impeach 1 or all of the supreme court justices. The supreme court cannot stop themselves from being removed from the court. They can claim authority and that they have the right to do that, but they are not above congress, they are coequal.
> Yes, officially they shouldn’t, in practice they do, and the law is what is practiced (otherwise adultery is still illegal in Minnesota).
Agreed, ultimately the ball is in congress's court (which they will most certainly drop). Congress could decide that this is the supreme court taking too much power and remove them all, but they aren't going to do that because this is likely a decision most representatives are perfectly fine with. So nothing will likely happen here. I'm just saying that this decision is one that the court never should have heard, not that practically they have heard it, and their enforcement is likely to stand.
I’m saying you’re presenting an amateur-hour legal theory on why our highest court shouldn’t have taken the case, because Congress said they couldn’t. Even though there are constitutional restrictions to when Congress can make such exemptions, and the SCOTUS can rule on them as they please (in practice).
Your argument to the contrary is about as interesting as Soverign Citizen understandings of law. I suppose we’re still ruled by George III and have been in a 248-year state of rebellion.
(Actual exceptions like this would violate separation-of-powers principles and typically get struck down.)
But I don’t think your reading is quite right. If congress could simply declare exemptions to Supreme Court appellate review, the court would have no power at all.
This is an activist action by the entire court.
(1)And even that is subject to law, free association with terrorists isn’t a good idea.
Let’s also not forget this is a 9-0. If you are accusing all of our judges as being activists, across all political lines, I know who the real activist is.
Look, if you’re going to allege corruption and votes for sale here, I think it’s a little more potent when you suggest he’s gotten better compensation than some “free coffee”
Correct me if I’m wrong, but it sounds like this is just about a temporary injunction to give the employees their jobs back while the actual labor case gets decided? The lower court used the two part McKinney test to grant the injunction, and the Supreme Court said no, you have to use the four part Winter test like other district courts, go back and decide again.
They're nothing more than unelected politicians working for moneyed interests.
With the SCOTUS ruling, the decision on that injunction will just occur again, but with a different legal test. The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) could still get the same injunction for the workers under the new test, though it is apparently more difficult.
The overall case against Starbucks could still be won or lost, and the legal tests for that haven’t changed.
The decision was essentially 9-0 with Justice Jackson dissenting in part but concurring in judgement.