Rebecca Friedrichs, the lead plaintiff in the case before the U.S. Supreme Court that would allow non-members to receive benefits without paying union dues, was recently interviewed for Campbell Brown’s website. She described how thrilled she is to be the name and face of the lawsuit to curb Union power. She explained that she was a union rep but no one listened to her. She opposes tenure. She wanted a classroom aide but the union got her a raise instead.
If her side prevails, she will get neither a raise nor a classroom aide.
Behind the Scenes with Rebecca Friedrichs: Teacher Details a Surreal Day at the Supreme Court
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Her explanation, roughly translated: “A bicycle, because a vest has no sleeves.”
She actually said,:”When this lawsuit came around…” This shows beyond a shadow of a doubt that she DID NOT start this lawsuit. It was and is backed by the ed-deform movement. Also, I do not believe for one second that her coworkers are hugging her and giving her praise. She worse than any union busting scab because she is trying to destroy everything that 99% of teachers want and work for. I hope she is reading this right now. You are not a friend of ours. You will be putting good teachers out in the gutter due to this “lawsuit”. You have no heart and you sold your soul to corporate goons who want to make all public schools private.
Public Sector Unions Pin Hopes on Antonin Scalia Going Rogue
By Bill Blum – The conservative Supreme Court justice holds the key to their fate in a case with blockbuster potential.
http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/public_sector_unions_pin_hopes_on_scalia_going_rogue_20160112/
Read this excellent article on this case…and the public comments which are mainly in favor of the union…but some so ignorant it makes me wonder if these folks ever studied American history and the rise of the union movement…and how, coupled with universal free public education, it helped create what used to be the greatest Middle Class any industrialized nation has ever had.
I strongly feel that Ms. Friedrichs should not consider herself a teacher where she has shown to the nation that she embraces the deceptive tactics of the union busters.
It would be so ironic if she’s the first to be terminated under the Friedrichs ruling if SCOTUS decides to side with her. If that were to happen and she goes through those lean days of hunger and she’s given food, she can always reject it because she wanted cooking utensils instead.
She has probably been offered a high paying job by the deformers, as Broad has done by hiring Deasy and Austin. We will never know if there was a quid pro quo offered her by the deformers.
Same goes for the ‘kids’ who were plaintiffs in Vergara.
Perhaps contracts will be voided and she will not have seniority or tenure, and will be offered a starting contract not subject to negotiation. Unless the oligarchs have paid her enough to get by for life she may yet experience the reasons for tenure. I hope she receives all that she deserves.
So her union didn’t listen to her, and the NEA/AFT convention didn’t listen to her, and she got a raise instead of a classroom aide, and she believes vouchers give parents choice about schools, and she works with some tenured teachers who are not as competent and committed as she is, and she believes tenure protects incompetent teachers from being fired, and her union colleagues ostracize her either because she is now anti-union or because they are too frightened by the big and bad union to join her, so she agreed to be the symbol of a lawsuit that could cripple public sector unions all across the U.S.
Makes sense, right?
Only if you ignore U.S. labor history for the last 150 years.
What a terrible legacy she will have if the 5 Regressive Corporate Surpremes see things her way.
I am retired from teaching now, but for the first 18 years of my 32 year career, I was a vocal union rep. I also felt not listened to at times, and I also worked with a few lazy teachers who should have been written up if their equally lazy administrative supervisors had done the necessary follow-ups and paperwork, but I never gave up on unions and I ersonally saw how tenure protected outspoken teachers such as I was from retaliation for exercising my free speech rights. I also was extremely grateful for the benefits my union negotiated for us.
Friedrichs seems to have lost sight of the bigger picture as far as public sector unions nationwide and their millions of members are concerned, and her enthusiastic willingness to become the front for a regressive, oligarchic attack on unions makes her more than a little suspicious in my eyes. If her motivation is principle, then she is terribly mistaken about the future “hope” a ruling in her favor will bring. If it is revenge, then that is despicable because of all the harm a ruling in her favor will bring.
She doesn’t get this bit about majority rule. She didn’t get what she wanted. Really sad.
She reminds me of the little child who does get her way and wants everyone on the playground to suffer. Then when the school gets rid of the playground it’s everyone else’s fault.
That was exactly the impression I got. No one wanted to do what I wanted so I will tear it all down. I would say she could switch schools if this one is not a good fit. She could teach at a non Union charter school or private school.
She definitely does not have the long view of public education. If teachers start giving up salary because the states are not living up to their obligations, then the states never will.
Thank you Holley for the best analogy. In the same vein, those suckers who supported communists in VN, are suffering with communists today, plus all of their loved ones as well. Monks, priests, commanders, and teachers, who foolishly believed in communist empty promises, are suffering greatly. However, it is too late to enjoy democracy which they were once having under democratic country or Southern VN.
Yes, Friedrichs will get what she asks for sooner or later. Back2basic.
She didn’t feel as if her union listened to her. If she wins, wait until she sees how much voice she has in her classroom without her union! And she’ll take the rest of her down with us.
I think she has 28 years and near retirement with benefits. This is true of some of the other plaintiffs. No consequences unless states start pulling a Detroit and clawback from retirees.
Something more going on. Rational adults do not embark on a scorched earth crusade simply because other people disagree with them as Friedrich is doing. Most people compromise and work things out as an organization. There has to be more to the story.
One wonders why Friedrich didn’t just leave for a non-union job – there are plenty.
Center for Individual Rights scavenged for plaintiffs amongst the Disgruntled. Eventually, they found enough.
It will be sad when teaching is de-professionalized and public schools dismantled.
MathVale: similar thoughts occurred to me too.
I am reminded of someone quite like Ms. Friedrichs. Remember the interview Bill Gates did with the WaPo [with Lyndsey Layton]?
Rheephormsters big and small seem to share many of the same modifiers: in this case, petty and petulant.
That’s how I see it…
😎
There are so many flaws with Friedrichs arguments. First and foremost, she acts as if it was only the union who is preventing her from having a teacher’s aide or the claim that it’s wrong if you have all these years of experience, you start at the bottom if you switch jobs. Guess what? I’m sure her local union supports this. However, it takes two sides to negotiate. It’s easier to blame the union for not getting her way, when in actuality, it’s often those holding the purse strings (her district) who won’t do the right thing by teachers AND students
This from the on-line January 6 2016 edition of The American Prospect (the bedfellows in Friedrichs):
Anti-union SCOTUS Challenge Threatens Church-State Separation
SARAH POSNER
JANUARY 6, 2016
The Friedrichs v. California Teachers Association case not only puts public-sector unions in danger, it risks opening a new chapter in the war over religion in public schools.
A version of this article was originally published in the December 2015 issue of Clarion, the newspaper of the Professional Staff Congress-CUNY.
On Monday, the Supreme Court will take up Friedrichs v. California Teachers Association, a case with profound implications for the future of public-sector labor unions, and the labor movement as a whole. At issue is the underpinning of public-sector unionism—that public employees who opt out of union membership can still be obligated to pay for their individual share of the services and collective bargaining they receive from the union. The Court could even decide to make union membership an opt-in rather than an opt-out proposition, allowing the public employees unions are required to represent to glean the benefits of representation without paying dues.
While the plaintiffs in Friedrichs base their claims on a free speech argument that many find dubious, tucked away in the case lies another, real First Amendment concern: the separation of church and state. The lead plaintiff in the challenge before the High Court is Rebecca Friedrichs, a teacher in California’s Savanna School District; she is joined in the suit by nine additional individuals, and one organization: the Christian Educators Association International (CEAI), which bills itself as an alternative to the “secular” teachers’ unions, and argues openly that the Constitution does not bar teachers from imparting their Christian faith in their classrooms.
Should those unions find themselves on the losing side of the Friedrichs case, an important bulwark against the incursion of religion in public schools will be undermined.
“Many public-school educators believe that they must make their schools God-less under the banner of ‘separation of church and state,’” CEAI’s executive director, Finn Laursen, has written, “to the extent that an environment is created that is hostile to religion.”
The teachers’ unions, Laursen maintains, “have such control that student needs become secondary” to those of the union. In that “hostile” public-school environment, according to Laursen, “the sin nature [sic] of mankind is accepted and even promoted.” There are “forces are at work,” he writes, that aim to “control the minds of our children by systematically promoting such things as sexual orientation being genetically driven and same sex marriage being acceptable under the banner of tolerance.”
Representing CEAI and the other plaintiffs is the Center for Individual Rights, a pro-bono law firm whose donors are linked to the Koch brothers, the billionaires known for their opposition to labor unions.
The CEAI casts public schools as settings ripe for proselytizing, and its members as the foot soldiers in a battle for the students’ minds—and souls. “There are over 50 million students in our public schools, 70 million parents, three and a half million teachers,” Laursen said in a 2007 video titled “Christian Teacher Core Values.” That represents nearly 124 million people, he added, “many of them spiritually and morally bankrupt. We know the truth, and we need to send our missionaries into that area.”
In its brief asking the Supreme Court to take up the Friedrichs case, a petition the Court granted in June, CEAI makes no mention of its positions on church-state separation, secularism, or its conservative Christian beliefs. But in materials disseminated through its website, in media interviews, and at its events, CEAI makes clear that it aims to help teachers skirt the Constitution by claiming that their right to free religious expression is thwarted by the separation of church and state.
This strikes directly at the First Amendment’s Establishment Clause, which states that the government, including public schools, may not endorse or appear to endorse a particular religion. CEAI officials have claimed that this principle is not in the Constitution; in fact, one has called the assertion of constitutional church-state separation “a lie.”
Laursen declined to be interviewed for this article.
Founded in 1953 in California as the Fellowship of Christian Educators, CEAI now presents itself as an alternative to the National Education Association (NEA), which it claims promotes secular, liberal political positions that conflict with Christian values. The association currently has chapters in 20 states; its website says its mission is “to encourage, equip, and empower educators according to biblical principles.”
The history of evangelical involvement in anti-union activity dates back at least to the 1930s, according to Baruch College history professor Clarence Taylor. At the time, many conservative evangelicals viewed unions as part of a supposed communist threat, and business-allied leaders, such as James Fifield and Abraham Vereide, organized events to evangelize against the New Deal. (Vereide convened prayer breakfasts for business elites and Fifield founded the Spiritual Mobilization movement.) The fear of unions intensified in evangelical circles during the Cold War and amid the backlash against movements for racial equality and women’s rights. In 1979, the newly founded Moral Majority played a significant role in electing Ronald Reagan to the presidency.
“When looking at that long history, clearly by the 1970s, the Christian right decided to get involved in politics,” Taylor said in a telephone interview. “They particularly targeted unions because they saw them as strong opposition to their agenda,” including officially sanctioned prayer in public schools.
Not that all evangelicals hew to an anti-union line. Many evangelicals not only support but belong to labor unions, said Ken Estey, an associate professor of political science at Brooklyn College. A monolithic view of their position on unions, said Estey, “doesn’t capture the complexity in American evangelicalism, especially on the social justice side.”
The legal claims in Friedrichs rest on the assertion that paying agency fees (also described by unions as “fair share” fees) to the California Teachers Association violates the plaintiffs’ free speech rights because of their disagreements with CTA’s political positions. But agency-fee payers—teachers who have opted out of union membership, and are consequently mandated only to pay for their share of services the union provides on their behalf, such as collective bargaining—are not required to pay for the union’s political activities.
But in Friedrichs, CEAI argues that the Christian group and its 600 California members—including six of the individual plaintiffs in Friedrichs—are “fundamentally opposed to many of the positions taken by teachers’ unions, both within the collective bargaining process and outside of that process.” The group’s argument frames the collective-bargaining process as an expression of politics in and of itself, and therefore a violation of the freedom of association guaranteed under the First Amendment.
In a section of its website devoted to warning prospective members of the National Education Association’s “liberal political stance,” CEAI notes, “You may also be surprised at what you find as you compare your Christian beliefs with the agendas of the NEA and realize your membership dollars makes [sic] the NEA’s agenda possible.”
Furthermore, CEAI maintains, California’s agency shop laws have the “effect of creating a drain on CEAI’s resources.” According to Laursen’s affidavit filed in the case, the “scheme operated by” the teachers’ union causes CEAI to spend money counseling its members on how they can opt out of union fees based on religious objections, rather than spending money on other services for its members.
Those services include providing backing to CEAI’s member teachers when their school districts censure them for crossing that church-state separation line.
The CEAI, Laursen has said, is “here to encourage, equip, and empower Christian educators in our public schools … to become transformational agents.” The organization will, according to its website, offer members “prayer support,” “guidance on establishing prayer groups in your building,” and connections with “ministries that equip you to be an effective witness for Jesus our Lord in your school or district.”
CEAI often takes positions that are in conflict with prevailing law on the major church-state separation issues in the public schools. In 2006, after a federal judge in Pennsylvania ruled in Kitzmiller v. Dover Area School District against teaching “intelligent design”—a theory that life and the universe were created by an intelligent entity—in public schools as a violation of the Constitution, Laursen insisted that teachers be permitted to teach “the controversy,” terminology creationists use to portray the teaching of creationism as simply another viewpoint. (One of the benefits of CEAI membership is discounted tickets to the Creation Museum in Petersburg, Kentucky.)
With the exception of its anti-union claims in the Friedrichs case, CEAI’s forays into the legal system have involved what it has framed as the defense of teachers expressing their faith in the classroom. These assertions have been routinely rejected by the courts as violating the First Amendment’s Establishment Clause.
But CEAI’s educational agenda, however popular with its members, has consistently been rejected in the courts. With the exception of its anti-union claims in the Friedrichs case, CEAI’s forays into the legal system have involved what it has framed as the defense of teachers expressing their faith in the classroom. These assertions have been routinely rejected by the courts as violating the First Amendment’s Establishment Clause.
In 2010, Laursen served as an expert witness in hearings reviewing the termination of John Freshwater, a middle school science teacher in Mount Vernon, Ohio, who was fired in 2008 for refusing to follow school district directives to remove displays of religious texts and the Ten Commandments from his classroom. Freshwater’s troubles began in 2007 when a student sued the school district, alleging that the veteran teacher had burned a cross into the student’s arm with a Tesla coil. The school district settled the case with the student out of court.
In CEAI’s Teachers of Vision Magazine, Laursen recounted his testimony at Freshwater’s administrative proceedings challenging the teacher’s dismissal. “I invested over two hours clarifying the religious freedoms teachers have in our public schools that were relevant in Mr. Freshwater’s case,” Laursen wrote. “All the pieces of the testimony lined up with the key issues of the case and the peace of the Lord could be felt during the process.”
When Freshwater filed a separate federal case against the school district, claiming that its actions violated his First Amendment right to his free exercise of religion, Laursen said in a statement that he was “happy to serve someone of such high moral character as John Freshwater as a member of CEAI. John is proving to be a hero of the faith.”
Although Freshwater ended up dropping his First Amendment case against the district, his appeal of his termination went all the way to the Ohio Supreme Court, which ruled in his employer’s favor in 2013. Chief Justice Maureen O’Connor wrote in the majority opinion that Freshwater “not only ignored the school district’s directive, he defied it.” He did not have a “Free Exercise” right to display those items in his classroom, she added, “because they were not a part of his exercise of his religion. Freshwater’s willful disobedience of these direct orders demonstrates blatant insubordination.” The U.S. Supreme Court denied review of the case in 2014.
CEAI also sought to intervene in a case in the Santa Rosa School District in Florida, where, in 2009, the school district had settled a lawsuit brought by the American Civil Liberties Union, that had charged numerous Establishment Clause violations. The school district’s conduct was “over the top,” said Daniel Mach, director of the ACLU Program on Freedom of Religion and Belief, who cited a high school teacher handbook that required school personnel to “embrace every opportunity to inculcate, by precept and example, the practice of every Christian virtue.” Mach said that teachers and coaches regularly led students in prayer, and some teachers “were effectively teaching Sunday school lessons in public school classes” and “proselytizing students, sometimes with a bullhorn.”
The school district admitted liability and agreed to a comprehensive settlement. But CEAI, represented by a religious-right law firm known as Liberty Counsel—the same outfit that represented the Kentucky clerk Kim Davis in her quest to deny marriage licenses to same-sex couples last year—intervened in a bid to vacate the consent decree. “They invented these fanciful readings of the consent decree,” said Mach. These included concerns that teachers would be barred from saying, “God bless you” if someone sneezed, or—in the case of one CEAI member—from praying quietly in the stands if her grandson, who attended school in the district, was injured in a wrestling match.
The court ruled their fears “objectively unreasonable,” a “strained interpretation of the decree,” and denied CEAI’s motion to intervene. The CEAI later brought its own lawsuit, which resulted, in 2011, in only minor clarifications of the consent decree, such as spelling out that saying “God bless you” does not violate the
Establishment Clause.
Although it is not apparent from reading CEAI’s Supreme Court brief, if the Friedrichs plaintiffs are successful, the ripple effect of their efforts could do more than undermine unions: It could open another chapter in the war over religion in public schools, emboldening groups such as CEAI to intensify efforts to allow public school teachers to endorse and promote religion with their students once their best-organized opponents—the teachers’ unions—are weakened.
This is absolutely fascinating. Always so much to a story than first appearances. Thank you.
It’s all meaningless at this point. The case is LOST for us. We have much more important things to think about than the salt-in-wound examination of the plaintiffs and their awful stories.
It’s not IF we lose the case. We have LOST the case. There is no chance.
Lets answer these questions: what have our unions done for the last decade or more to make a case like Friedrich’s an impossibility?
What have our unions done to make sure that they would lose no members if a case like Friedrich’s succeeded?
Who cares about the people involved in the Friedrichs case. Meaningless. We lost….that’s all there is here. Lets deal w that abyss.
New judges will mean new decision
Court as political as congress now.
While I’ve been busy teaching full-time and struggling to maintain sanity in the classroom with all the political policy insanity imposed on me and my students by my state and federal governments, I assume my union officials were well-aware of what was headed to the Supreme Courts.
But I heard and saw absolutely NOTHING from any of them. Not about what we should/could be doing to counter the narrative. Nothing about organizing actions or union-boosting campaigns. Absolutely nothing about making our union members feel more connected to and supportive of and dedicated to the survival of our unions. All I’ve heard is how thankful I should be for the wonderful work of our Congress people for passing ESSA and my governor (in NY) for placing a “moratorium” on testing consequences.
I certainly understand the idealistic concept of unions, (family members are organizers and have been activists and even jailed for actions,) and still believe there’s a way for them to return to relevancy and at the same time become more responsive to member concerns. But too often these days it feels they’re complicit with the enemy.
Of course, the answer isn’t to destroy the unions. The answer isn’t what Ms. Friedrich’s pretends. The answer is to take them back. The answer is, once again, REVOLUTION.
Anyone?
In California, we have been working very hard on making sure union members were aware of the Friedrichs case and working on plans to help mediate any damage if SCOTUS rules in favor of the plaintiffs. I’m sorry that that has not been your experience.
I agree. Most of the teachers in our building (including the reps) are unaware of the Friedrichs case. Never got a word about it from IFT or AFT. IFT is too busy offering summer and weekend PD (which we must pay for) on Common Core. AFT is too busy supporting Hillary Clinton and bad federal education policy. The leadership has helped create the apathy and ignorance so many teachers have regarding unions. Younger teachers, especially, do not see any relevancy in the union.
Sad.
This is one strange interview.
The part that stymies me is her request to CTA for an aide (she really should have used the term paraprofessional) for her classroom. She was representing her own selfish and outdated needs as a teacher when she made that request, and not the collective group as a whole.
That particular statement clearly communicates that she is unequivocally misrepresenting (lying would be more appropriate) the fundamental processes of CTA and how the school funding formulas work in CA to SCOTUS as well as to the press. She’s saying: “I couldn’t get an aide, so CTA doesn’t really help children. Woe to me! I think I’ll sue CTA because of this! Can someone help me here?” Then the corporate deformers stepped in to help her achieve her goals.
But, let’s take everyone else down in the process.
Is Ms. Friedrich incapable of differentiating instruction to meet the needs of all her students without an aide? Grow with the times Ms. Friedrich–you don’t need an aide to be an effective educator. If you can’t stay current and relevant to your profession, you don’t belong.
Also, isn’t your site administrator supposed to handle requests for teacher’s aides (an outdated mode of intervention) through site-based decision making with the use of Title 1 and LCAP funding? Isn’t this what CTA “bargains” for at the state level– more school funding with more flexible formulas–and not just for salaries/benefits? Does she not comprehend that? But, she asked CTA for an aide? She’ll be getting a lot less than an aide when the dust settles from her delusions of grandeur.
After 25 years teaching, you’d think Ms. Friedrich would at least have a fundamental understanding of what her role is as an educator in the current era and how it has evolved over time. She evidently does not.
What a tool.
Bring on the REVOLUTION! I am ready!
There’s no doubt that leadership has made decisions that the majority of teachers disagree with, but never would turn their back on the Union. Instead ignition for new leadership!
I also think she will get a lucrative offer from some Deform organization. The fact that she met with Brown is telling. A true public school teacher would have turned her down.
IMHO, Teachers’ Union should declare Friedrich’s case as teachers’ choice group which has its own function. Just drop them completely without any attachment by refund all membership fee and get rid of them. Let Supreme Court and reformer group deal with them.
Finally, the rest 3.5 million of teachers should restructure and propose new regulations and rules for a new election of union leaders. That is an amicable and sensible revolution without wasting time in fighting nonsense with those half-baked and inconsiderate educators.
All true educators need to focus on students’ learning, as well as on opt-out movement against invalid testing scheme, greed corporate and hedged fund which is a serious threat to the well-being of teaching profession and public education as a whole.
Back2basic
You are brilliant! It’s exactly what should have preempted this case. And the National’s have been complicit for all you mention, as well as these grossly unfair evaluation schemes. It is time to break them apart, and rebuild from ground up. New bylaws for sure, especially a cap on leadership’s obscene salaries. Corruption needs to be rooted out and destroyed. Only a mass collaboration of educators from around the country can do this. Anybody know of any groups starting such a campaign?
There also need to be term limits for all leadership, from national to local. And I’m talking terms of 2 or 3 years. Leadership needs to be teaching in the classroom instead of schmoozing with the wealthy.
Could Friedrichs v. CTA Be Labor’s ‘Citizens United’?
By Bill Raden
Good article…
Scalia died, looks like Friedrichs will have to keep her benefits and salary and her retirement.
Rebecca Friedrichs and her anti-union co-plaintiffs are in favor of something that will harm children, will harm teachers, and will harm our nation. On the face of it, her rhetoric seems reasonable. She says she never wanted to have the union represent her and doesn’t want to pay dues. I would put to her that there is a simple solution for this problem: work in a school that doesn’t have union representation. Most charter schools don’t. But no. What she wants is something that will end unions altogether and that, for children, teachers and our nation would be a very bad thing indeed.
Unions keep children safe by insisting on and monitoring class size maximums. Were it not for unions, schools would stuff as many students in a classroom as possible. I have worked in classrooms that were overcrowded. In such environments, the students get less teacher feedback and are more likely to get into altercations with other students over space and materials. In this and other ways, the union advocates for students.
Unions keep teachers safe by giving them living wages, preserving a fairer disciplinary system, and protecting health and pension benefits. It also protects seasoned teachers who might otherwise be fired simply due to higher wages than their younger or more poorly educated peers. Unionized workers earn 30% more than their non-union counterparts and lack essential protections. Without due process protecting teachers, they could be let go for any disagreement with authority. Without union protection, teachers could end up working in a hostile work environment in which they are unfairly treated and unfairly paid.
Unions are good for our nation. Ever since the Supreme Court ruled that corporations are people, unions have been more important than ever in advocating for politicians and policies that protect the working classes. Union busting has led to more power for corporations and to less power for the working classes. This has been instrumental in creating a stratification of wealth that devastates families. This is another way that unions are good for students.
If Friedrich and her friends don’t want to be protected by a union, they have plenty of opportunities to work at non-union schools. If they work at a union school, they should contribute to the fund that protects them.