Baisley v. IAM

United States Court of Appeals
for the Fifth Circuit

No. 20-50319

Arthur Baisley,

Plaintiff—Appellant,

versus

International Association of Machinists and
Aerospace Workers,

Defendant—Appellee.

Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Western District of Texas
USDC No. 1:19-CV-531

Before Clement, Ho, and Duncan, Circuit Judges.
Edith Brown Clement, Circuit Judge:
The International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers
(“IAM”) is the exclusive union representative for United Airlines
employees like Arthur Baisley. Baisley is not a union member. But, following
longstanding practice and established case law, the IAM required Baisley—
like all other dues objectors—to opt out of paying full union dues.
Baisley sued to invalidate the opt-out procedures as violative of his
First Amendment rights, the Railway Labor Act (“RLA”), 45 U.S.C. § 152,
Eleventh, and the IAM’s Duty of Fair Representation. Finding Baisley’s
United States Court of Appeals
Fifth Circuit
FILED
December 22, 2020

Lyle W. Cayce
Clerk
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No. 20-50319
2
claims foreclosed by the same precedents that animated the IAM’s
procedures, the district court dismissed his suit under Federal Rule of Civil
Procedure 12(b)(6). Upon de novo review, see Lampton v. Diaz, 639 F.3d 223,
225 (5th Cir. 2011), we reach the same conclusion and affirm.
Baisley’s challenge is far from novel. The Supreme Court has
previously upheld the challenged statute, Section 2, Eleventh of the RLA,
against facial and as-applied challenges. Ry. Emps.’ Dep’t v. Hanson, 351 U.S.
225 (1956); Int’l Ass’n of Machinists v. Street, 367 U.S. 740 (1961). In Street,
the Court said that the RLA contemplates “forc[ing] employees to share the
costs of negotiating and administering collective agreements,” but not
“forcing employees, over their objection, to support political causes which
they oppose.” Street, 367 U.S. at 764. Accordingly, the Court construed the
statute “to deny the unions, over an employee’s objection, the power to use
his exacted funds to support political causes which he opposes.” Id. at 768–
69. Moreover, Street said, “dissent is not to be presumed—it must
affirmatively be made known to the union by the dissenting employee.” Id.
at 774.
Following Street, which we recognized as “the seminal case on the
matter,” this court approved this very union’s opt-out procedures. Shea v.
Int’l Ass’n of Machinists & Aerospace Workers, 154 F.3d 508, 513 (5th Cir.
1998); id. at 515 (allowing opt-out procedure under the RLA, while striking
union requirement that nonmembers annually renew objections). Just a few
years ago, we reaffirmed an identical system. See Serna v. Transp. Workers
Union of Am. AFL-CIO, 654 F. App’x 665, 665–66 & n.1 (5th Cir. 2016)
(mem.) (“Shea obliges us to uphold the union’s current opt-out policy.”).
Against that line of private-sector cases, Baisley presents the Supreme
Court’s recent trio of decisions in Knox v. SEIU, Local 1000, 567 U.S. 298
(2012), Harris v. Quinn, 573 U.S. 616 (2014), and Janus v. AFSCME, Council
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31, 138 S. Ct. 2448 (2018). Baisley especially points to Janus’s declaration
that such opt-out procedures impose an unconstitutional burden on public
employees’ First Amendment rights. Id. at 2486. But Janus and those other
cases dealt with public-sector unions, so it is undisputed that applying them
to this private-sector dispute would require us to extend into a new realm.
The difficulty for Baisley is that Janus itself cautions against such an
extension. So, indeed, do Knox and Harris.
Knox, which says nothing about private unions, notes that “[b]ecause
a public-sector union takes many positions during collective bargaining that
have powerful political and civic consequences, the compulsory fees
constitute a form of compelled speech and association that imposes a
‘significant impingement on First Amendment rights.’” Knox, 567 U.S. at
310–11 (quoting Ellis v. Ry. Clerks, 466 U.S. 435, 455 (1984)) (citation
omitted). And Harris warns against “fail[ing] to appreciate the difference
between the core union speech involuntarily subsidized by dissenting public-
sector employees and the core union speech involuntarily funded by their
counterparts in the private sector.” Harris, 573 U.S. at 636. “In the public
sector, core issues such as wages, pensions, and benefits are important
political issues, but that is generally not so in the private sector.” Id. These
admonitions give us serious pause.
Janus itself says it is unclear whether “the First Amendment applies
at all to private-sector agency-shop arrangements” like this one. Janus, 138
S. Ct. at 2480 (emphasis added). It is “questionable” whether “Congress’s
enactment of a provision [of the RLA] allowing, but not requiring, private
parties to enter into union-shop arrangements was sufficient to establish
governmental action.” Id. at 2479 n.24. And even if the First Amendment
does apply here, “the individual interests at stake still differ,” for the reasons
articulated in Harris. Id. at 2480 (citing Harris, 573 U.S. at 636). If Knox and
Harris have us pumping the brakes, Janus brings us near a full stop.
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Baisley’s response is hardly reassuring. He urges extension because
Knox tells us that Street’s approval of opt-out procedures was mere “dicta.”
Knox, 567 U.S. at 312–13 (citing Street, 367 U.S. at 774). With that foundation
removed, Baisley says, Shea is ours to reconsider anew. See, e.g., Shea, 154
F.3d at 513. Of course, it is not so simple. We are bound to follow a prior
panel’s opinion “until the decision is overruled, expressly or implicitly, by
either the United States Supreme Court or by the Fifth Circuit sitting en
banc.” United States v. Kirk, 528 F.2d 1057, 1063 (5th Cir. 1976). Just as
important, it is not clear that we should. Perhaps Street creates an opening
to reconsider Shea’s First Amendment holding. See Shea, 154 F.3d at 515. If
so, that just brings us right back to Janus’s query whether “the First
Amendment applies at all.” Janus, 138 S. Ct. at 2480. Street’s opt-out
language may be dicta, but it remains to be seen how the Supreme Court will
interpret that distinction in a private-sector dispute. Cf. Rizzo-Rupon v. Int’l
Ass’n of Machinists & Aerospace Workers, 822 F. App’x 49 (3d Cir. 2020)
(unpublished) (upholding union opt-out procedures against facial challenge).
Indeed, that is the question for the whole Janus line. And, amidst all
this uncertainty, we are reminded of the Supreme Court’s caution: “If a
precedent of this Court has direct application in a case, yet appears to rest on
reasons rejected in some other line of decisions, the Court of Appeals should
follow the case which directly controls, leaving to this Court the prerogative
of overruling its own decisions.” Rodriguez de Quijas v. Shearson/Am. Express
Inc., 490 U.S. 477, 484 (1989). Heeding that advice, we find no constitutional
infirmity in the IAM’s opt-out procedures under the settled decisions of the
Supreme Court and this Circuit. By extension, Baisley’s constitutional-
avoidance statutory and Duty of Fair Representation claims also fa il.
AFFIRMED.
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