National Labor Relations Board Maintains Consistency in Preemption

Suits Filed Against Arizona and South Dakota Laws Restricting Card Check

Read the full article (CAP Action)

On Friday, the National Labor Relations Board, or NLRB, sued the states of Arizona and South Dakota seeking to invalidate those states’ constitutional amendments that prohibit private-sector employees from choosing to unionize through a procedure known as card check. The lawsuit is unsurprising, and it continues a long precedent of striking down state laws preempted by the National Labor Relations Act, or NLRA.

Still, some conservative politicians and corporations are apoplectic about these lawsuits. Rep. Lynn Westmoreland (R-GA) wrote that the suits “[step] over the 10th Amendment and the rights of states to determine their own laws.”

Geoffrey Burr, chair of the Coalition for a Democratic Workplace, which counts the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Americans for Prosperity, and Freedom Works as members, claims the lawsuits are a “move against the voters and workers of Arizona and South Dakota … [and] simply another example of the Board placing the interests of union bosses above those of employees, businesses and the American public.”

Yet on many other occasions, conservatives—including some of these same parties—have argued that the NLRA preempted other state efforts to regulate labor relations. Not surprisingly, those laws would have made it easier for workers to join unions.

Read the full article (CAP Action)