MADISON, WI (WTAQ) – Unlike the Act 10 limits on public union bargaining, Wisconsin’s right-to-work bill for private companies may not attract as many lawsuits if it’s passed.
Over a half-dozen suits challenged the legality of Act 10 before the Wisconsin Supreme Court ruled it to be constitutional a year ago.
Marquette law professor Paul Secunda says it’s not likely that organized labor would win a lawsuit against the right-to-work bill — which is up for a vote in the state Senate Wednesday, and in the Assembly next week.
Secunda tells the AP the bill’s language is similar to that of the last two right-to-work laws passed in Indiana and Michigan.
A spokeswoman for Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald said the GOP modeled its bill to the other two states, to make sure it passes legal muster.
Last year, Indiana’s Supreme Court threw out two challenges to its right-to-work law. One challenge said it was unconstitutional to make unions give services to non-union employees without compensation.
The federal appeals court in Chicago later threw out a claim that federal laws trumped Indiana’s right-to-work statute.
In Michigan, a judge refused to throw out that state’s law, after state police closed the Capitol while the measure was being debated in 2012.
A federal judge agreed that Michigan’s law does not go against federal law, but other arguments in that suit have yet to be ruled upon.
(Story courtesy of Wheeler News Service)
