Wisconsin public worker and teacher unions have achieved major legal victory Monday with a ruling that restores the collective bargaining rights they lost under the 2011 law. state law it sparked weeks of protests and made the state the center of a national battle over union rights.
That law, known as Act 10, effectively ended most public employees’ ability to bargain over pay raises and other issues, and forced them to pay more for health insurance and pensions.
According to Dane County Circuit Judge Jacob Frost’s ruling, all public sector employees who lost their collective bargaining power will have it restored to what it was before 2011. They will be treated the same as police, fire and other public safety unions that were exempted by law.
Republicans have vowed to immediately appeal the ruling, which is likely to eventually go before the Wisconsin Supreme Court. This only reinforces the importance April elections that will determine whether the court remains controlled by liberal justices 4-3.
Former Gov. Scott Walker, who proposed the legislation that catapulted him onto the national political stage, condemned the ruling in a post on the social media platform X as “brazen political activism”. He said that makes the state Supreme Court election “that much more important.”
Proponents of the law said it gives local governments more control over workers and the powers they need to cut costs. Repealing the law, which allowed schools and local governments to raise money through higher employee contributions for benefits, would bankrupt those entities, proponents of Act 10 argued.
Democratic opponents argue that the law has hurt schools and other government agencies by taking away employees’ ability to collectively bargain over their wages and working conditions.
Union leaders were overjoyed by the ruling, which affects tens of thousands of public servants.
“We realize we still have a fight in the courts, but make no mistake, we’re ready to keep fighting until we’re all back at the table,” said Ben Gruber, conservationist and president of AFSCME Local 1215.
The legislation was proposed by Walker and passed by the Republican-controlled Legislature despite weeks of mass protests that drew as many as 100,000 people to the Capitol. The law has withstood numerous legal challenges over the years, but this was it brought first since the Wisconsin Supreme Court shifted to liberal control in 2023.
This is claimed by seven unions and three union leaders who filed the lawsuit law should be repealed because it creates unconstitutional exemptions for firefighters and other public safety employees. Attorneys for the Legislature and state agencies countered that the exemptions were legal, had already been upheld by other courts, and that the case should be dismissed.
But Frost sided with the union in July, saying the law violates equal protection guarantees in the Wisconsin Constitution by dividing public employees into “general” and “public safety” employees. It ruled that general employee unions, such as those representing teachers, could not be treated differently from public safety unions, which were exempt from the law.
His ruling from Monday listed dozens of specific provisions in the law that must be annulled.
Wisconsin Republican Assembly Speaker Robin Vos said he is looking forward to appealing the ruling.
“This lawsuit comes more than a decade after Act 10 became law and after many courts have rejected the same meritless legal challenges,” Vos said in a statement.
Wisconsin Manufacturers and Commerce, the state’s largest business lobbying organization, also condemned the ruling. WMC President Kurt Bauer called Act 10 “a key tool for policymakers and elected officials to balance budgets and find savings for taxpayers.”
The Legislature said in court filings that the arguments presented in this case were rejected in 2014 by the state Supreme Court. The only change since that ruling is the makeup of the Wisconsin Supreme Court, attorneys for the legislature argued.
Act 10 effectively ended collective bargaining for most public unions by allowing them to bargain only for base wage increases that are no greater than inflation. It also disabled the automatic withdrawal of union dues, required an annual vote for union recertification and forced public workers to pay more for health insurance and pensions.
The law was the signature legislative achievement of Walker, who was the target of the recall election he won. Walker used his struggles with unions to mount a failed 2016 presidential run.
Frost, the judge who handed down Monday’s ruling, looks like he signed the petition recall Walker from office. None of the lawyers asked for his exemption from the proceedings and he did not withdraw. Frost was appointed to the bench by Democratic Gov. Tony Evers, who signed the impeachment motion against Walker.
The law also has led to a dramatic decline into union membership throughout the country. The nonpartisan Wisconsin Policy Forum said in a 2022 analysis that since 2000, Wisconsin had the largest decline in the share of its workforce that is unionized.
In 2015, the GOP-controlled Wisconsin Legislature approved a right-to-work bill that limited the power of unions in the private sector.
The public sector unions that brought the suit are the Abbotsford Education Association; American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees Locals 47 and 1215; Beaver Dam Educational Association; SEIU Wisconsin; Association of Teaching Assistants Local 3220 and International Brotherhood of Teamsters Local 695.
