[EL] Serious Question About Knox v. SEIU

Fri Jun 22 11:46:16 PDT 2012

I think the boring answer to this question, but probably the most on
point legally, is that the insurance company is spending their own money
and the SEIU is spending another person's money. Now, we as customers
may think of it as "our money" but once you give it to an insurance
company--for whatever rate/cost, whatever they plan to do with it, etc,
it is THEIR money. They don't need our permission on how to spend it. In
the case of the SEIU, they are taking someone elses money out of their
paycheck. 

Central Washington University
Associate Professor of Political Science 
manwellerm at cwu.edu
509-963-2396

*The first lesson of economics is scarcity. There is never enough of
anything to fully satisfy all who want it. The first lesson of politics
is to disregard the first lesson of economics.* * Thomas Sowell
>>> "Liptak, Adam"  06/22/12 7:02 AM >>>

This interesting article by Benjamin Sachs in the Columbia Law Review
explores these questions:

http://columbialawreview.org/assets/pdfs/112/4/Sachs.pdf

________________________________________
From: law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu
[law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu] On Behalf Of Samuel
Bagenstos [sbagen at gmail.com]
Sent: Friday, June 22, 2012 9:57 AM
To: richardwinger at yahoo.com
Cc: law-election at uci.edu
Subject: Re: [EL] Serious Question About Knox v. SEIU

Maybe.  But (a) maybe every insurance company in my state is engaged in
some ideological/political expenditures (if not all on the same side or
the same issue), and I'd just prefer that my money go to paying claims
and associated administrative expenses rather than subsidizing political
speech on issues that I have not made my own; and (b) I don't
necessarily have to work in the public sector, not all public sector
jobs are unionized, and not all unionized public sector jobs are
represented by the same union.  If I don't like AFT, I can work as a
teacher in a private school (where, if I have a union, it won't be a
public sector one), or a charter school (where if I try to unionize
they'll fire me for sure!), or I can work in a next-door district
represented by NEA.

Samuel R. Bagenstos
Professor of Law
University of Michigan Law School
625 S. State St.
Ann Arbor, MI  48109
sambagen at umich.edu
http://web.law.umich.edu/_FacultyBioPage/facultybiopagenew.asp?ID=411
http://disabilitylaw.blogspot.com/
Twitter: @sbagen

On Jun 22, 2012, at 9:48 AM, Richard Winger wrote:

I think the problem with this very thoughtful analogy is that you have a
choice of auto insurance companies, and a choice of health insurance
companies.  But if you are a worker in a union shop, you don't have a
choice of labor unions; there is only one.

Richard Winger
415-922-9779
PO Box 470296, San Francisco Ca 94147

--- On Fri, 6/22/12, Samuel Bagenstos > wrote:

From: Samuel Bagenstos >
Subject: [EL] Serious Question About Knox v. SEIU
To: law-election at uci.edu
Date: Friday, June 22, 2012, 6:44 AM

Yesterday's decision in Knox v. SEIU, and particularly the broad dicta
in the majority opinion, lead me to ask the following question:  If I
live in a state where (a) state law requires me to buy liability
insurance as a condition of registering a car, and (b) some or all of
the auto insurance companies in my state spend money to advocate for or
against ballot propositions regarding insurance regulation, am I
constitutionally entitled to a rebate of the portion of my premium that
went to such expenditures?  Is the insurance company required to make a
Hudson-style disclosure of its political and ideological expenditures so
I can opt out?

There could be an easy or obvious answer to this question, but I am
interested in others' thoughts.

Samuel R. Bagenstos
Professor of Law
University of Michigan Law School
625 S. State St.
Ann Arbor, MI  48109
sambagen at umich.edu
http://web.law.umich.edu/_FacultyBioPage/facultybiopagenew.asp?ID=411
http://disabilitylaw.blogspot.com/
Twitter: @sbagen

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