On Wednesday, the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the Alabama Education Association (AEA), the state’s teachers’ union and most powerful liberal political organization, can no longer receive dues from their members by automatic payroll deduction.
When Republicans came into power in 2010, they passed a bill stopping government employees from arranging for a salary deduction to pay dues that would go to fund partisan political activity. Alabama’s state government was essentially saying, in an effort to purify the governing process, we — the state government of Alabama — are going to separate ourselves from partisan political activity and stop collecting money for organizations who use that money to influence elections.
The law applied equally to all organizations, not just the AEA, but the teachers’ union felt like the law would be particularly damaging to their ability to fund their political operation. They also felt like they were being targeted by Republicans, who they had fought tooth and nail for decades. As a result, AEA sued in state court to preserve its ability to collect dues by payroll deductions.
The past three years have been filled with a complicated sequence of court rulings and legal maneuvers.
A federal judge blocked enforcement of the new law in 2010, allowing the AEA to continue on business as usual. Then a federal appeals court gave the green light for the state to enforce the law in 2011. But when the Alabama state comptroller initiated the process to stop salary deductions, AEA sued again, this time in state court. A Montgomery Circuit judge at that point issued a ruling preventing the comptroller from halting the payroll deductions. Once again, the AEA was allowed to continue on business as usual.
At that point, the Alabama Supreme Court was given two questions to answer with regard to interpreting the law:
1. Does the law prohibit private giving by state employees, in addition to halting the salary deductions?
And 2. Does it apply only to organizations who use their dues to influence elections, or does it also apply to influencing ballot referenda?
The answers to those two questions about how the Alabama Supreme Court interpreted the law were very important to the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals on the federal level. For instance, if the highest court in Alabama interpreted the law to mean that private giving by government employees was not allowed, there would be potential First Amendment issues with the law.
About four months ago, the Alabama Supreme Court finally answered those two questions. They said the law still allowed private giving by state employees, but there was some ambiguity as to whether or not it applied to organizations who seek to influence ballot referenda, in addition to elections.
After reviewing the state Supreme Court’s answers, the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals this week gave the full green light for the law to fully go into effect.
But in spite of all that, the Montgomery Court’s injunction blocking enforcement of the law is still in place. And for the past 3 years, the AEA has been fillings its coffers with money from salary deductions for the 2014 election cycle.
However, the federal court’s ruling likely signals the beginning of the end of business as usual for the AEA. The law still needs to work its way through the painfully slow Alabama judicial branch. But the AEA’s complicated and effective legal strategy is probably doomed to fail in the end.
There will soon be a day in Alabama when the state government no longer collects dues for any organization who uses those dues for electioneering.
So what does that mean for the Alabama Education Association?
For years, the AEA’s tens of thousands of members have had a few dollars each month extracted from their paychecks without even having to pay any attention to it. Once the new law goes into effect and they have to actually “opt in,” will many of them simply never get around to doing it? Or even worse for AEA, will many of the conservative teachers around the state realize they don’t want their money going toward advancing the AEA’s leftwing political agenda and purposefully stop paying?
Many conservative teachers have said for years that the only reason they maintained their membership was for the liability insurance. But that’s no longer necessary since the State of Alabama recently began providing public school employees the same liability coverage they had been giving other state workers for years.
When Republicans first passed the law prohibiting the AEA’s payroll deductions in 2010, then-AEA head Paul Hubbert orchestrated a massive mobilization of grassroots workers to flood teachers’ lounges around the state and implore educators to sign up with AEA on a bank draft. The National Education Association, the AEA’s national partner, helped fund and staff the operation. Over the course of a couple of months with hundreds of field staffers, the AEA was able to sign up somewhere around 90 percent of their members to maintain their affiliation with the group.
That suggests that the AEA could potentially survive with only minimal financial damage after the new law goes into effect. But even a 10-25% decrease in dues could cost the AEA’s political arm millions of dollars.
On top of that, many political observers question whether Hubbert’s successor, Dr. Henry Mabry, could field such a well organized grassroots effort. The staff turnover at the AEA has been significant since Mabry took over, and many of the experienced field operatives have moved on after growing frustrated with their new leadership.
But even if the AEA can successfully get many of their members to once again opt in to having their union does extracted each month via bank draft, that is still a far less stable stream of income than AEA’s current system of relying on payroll deductions.
Rather than signing up for an entire year, public school employees will be paying their dues on a month to month basis and could drop out at any point. If their account briefly has insufficient funds, the bank draft stops. If they get upset with something the AEA does, they immediately stop paying each month.
AEA’s income could suddenly become a roller coaster that rises and falls with the political tide.
So even if the new law doesn’t ultimately decimate their bottom line overnight, it will almost certainly force them to be more responsive to their members. And that alone could force the AEA to rethink their political strategy. And maybe, just maybe, the state’s most powerful liberal force would have to finally begin moving to the right, or face irrelevance.
Follow Cliff on Twitter @Cliff_Sims
