Title
Urging the United States Congress to respond to the Supreme Court ruling in Epic Systems Corp. v. Lewis by passing legislation that guarantees the right of workers to pursue class action lawsuits in Federal Court.
Body
WHEREAS, On May 21, 2018, the Supreme Court banned certain workers from collectively bargaining for their rights in federal court. In a 5-4 decision delivered by Justice Neil Gorsuch, the Supreme Court sided with businesses by barring class action lawsuits for federal labor violations. The majority ruled that the 1925 Arbitration Act, which allows employers to prohibit employees from pursuing collective legal actions, trumps the 1935 Labor Relations Act. Under this ruling, private sector employees who sign arbitration contracts must make federal claims on an individual basis; and
WHEREAS, The ruling was issued to decide three separate cases in which employees attempted to collectively sue their respective companies, claiming violations of the Fair Labor Standards Act related to underpayment of employees. The cases involved tens of thousands of nonunion employees. In all three cases, employees tried to use class-action lawsuits because the amount they could obtain from individual law suits would be overshadowed by the legal fees they would be required to pay; and
WHEREAS, This Supreme Court decision greatly impacts the ability of workers to assert their claims in federal court. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg, joined by Justices Breyer, Sotomayor and Kagan, wrote a dissenting opinion in which she called court's decision "egregiously wrong." According to the dissent, the ruling opinion by the Supreme Court returns the country to a time in the late 19th century when workers were forced into so-called "yellow dog contracts", in which workers were forced to take jobs strictly on the employer's terms and were forbidden from joining labor unions. She also asserted that the decision was antithetical to eighty years of labor law...
Click here for full text