Wisconsin appeals panel guts bargaining rights for public workers

The panel reversed a judge's decision to restore collective bargaining powers for public workers after a decade of protest.MILWAUKEE (CN) — A Wisconsin appellate panel revived a controversial labor law Wednesday, stripping certain public employees of collective bargaining powers.“This is not a close case. Under these standards, we can easily locate a reason for the choices the Legislature made,” Judge Mark Gundrum said in the panel’s 33-page majority opinion, joined by Judge Shelley Grogan. “The fact that the Legislature did not include all employees who could be described as providing services related to public safety in the favored collective bargaining category does not render the law irrational.”Seven unions filed the lawsuit in 2023, arguing Act 10 violates the state constitution’s equal protections clause by dividing public employees into groups of “general” employees and “public safety” employees. Those in the former group faced stiff restrictions on their collective bargaining rights, while the latter group was spared.The public safety group includes most firefighters, law enforcement officers and state motor vehicle inspectors, excluding conservation wardens, Capitol police and UW-system police.The general group includes all other public workers. Act 10 eliminated collective bargaining for this group outside of base wage raises, subjected unions to annual recertification elections requiring most of all employees and saddles those unions with the bill.Dane County Circuit Court Judge Jacob Frost struck down 85 sections of the law related to the worker distinction in 2024, finding they violate the equal protection guarantees of the Wisconsin Constitution.On Wednesday, an appellate panel reversed Frost’s judgment and reinstated the full force of Act 10. In its opinion, the panel ruled the Legislature had a rational basis for narrowly defining which public safety employees fall within which category.The panel relied on the Wisconsin Supreme Court’s reasoning in a related case, where it found the Legislature indeed had a rational basis for carving out the public safety group under Act 10.The law was passed ostensibly to improve the state’s fiscal health and exercise greater control over public expenditures, but the unions argue then-Governor Scott Walker, a Republican, simply sought to target labor unions for political reasons.They pointed to several public employee unions and associations that endorsed Walker during his 2010 campaign and had been subsequently exempted from the law’s restrictions on union activities, claiming quid pro quo.However, the state high court previously found the state has a legitimate interest in curtailing costs where possible.The panel chastised the circuit court for ignoring the Wisconsin Supreme Court reasoning: “That rational basis does not disappear simply because a party presents a reframed equal protection argument a decade after both our supreme court and the Seventh Circuit unequivocally concluded that Act 10 survives a rational basis review.”In its 2024 order, the circuit court acknowledged certain workers were included in the exempt “public safety” category because their functions were too vital to risk labor unrest, presenting a rational basis.Police officers and firefighters, for example, work under dangerous conditions and future recruiting requires maintaining certain working conditions.Even if there were no such explanation, the panel asserted Wednesday that it is not the role of the judiciary to second-guess such classifications.“Our role is limited to determining whether any rational basis exists for the Legislature’s choice … We may only conclude the law violates equal protection ‘if no sound reason for the action can be hypothesized,’” the panel wrote.Judge Lisa Neubauer disagreed with that reasoning in her 24-page dissent, arguing instead that the Legislature must also present a rational definition of the public safety group to satisfy equal protection.She pointed to Frost’s decision highlighting conservation wardens and Capitol or university police, who were left out of the public safety group for no rational reason.“These excluded employees perform the same types of work, suffer the same risks and have the same sort of authority (such as to make arrests and enforce the laws), yet are placed into the general employee group with employees with whom they share no similarity,” Frost said.Act 10 has survived several legal challenges since it became law in 2011, including two federal lawsuits that reached the Seventh Circuit and another that failed at the Wisconsin Supreme Court.Neither party could be reached for comment by press time.Subscribe to our free newslettersOur weekly newsletter Closing Arguments offers the latest about ongoing trials, major litigation and rulings in courthouses around the U.S. and the world, while the monthly Under the Lights dishes the legal dirt from Hollywood, sports, Big Tech and the arts.Additional Reads