SCOTUS poised to ban strikes.

The Glacier case.

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Today city-wide early voting begins.

On the Illinois ballot is a constitutional amendment that guarantees the right to collective bargaining.

Illinois workers already have the legal right to join a union and collectively bargain a contract. A state constitutional amendment would protect this right from future governors and legislatures who may have other ideas.

Right to work laws were on the agenda of Governor Bruce Rauner who we turned out of office four years ago.

But while Illinois is poised to expand union rights by way of a constitutional provision, the United States Supreme Court is poised to take away a fundamental right of unions: The right to strike.

The eroding of union and workers’ rights has been coming for a while, even before the total MAGA take-over of the Supreme Court.

In 2018 the Court ruled in the Janus case against the right of workers to have a union shop.

Now the MAGA Court has agreed to decide whether federal labor law bars a Washington concrete company from suing a union for destroying its property by calling a strike that led to mixed concrete hardening and becoming useless.

The justices granted Glacier Northwest Inc's petition for review of a Washington Supreme Court decision that said employers cannot sue unions under state law over conduct such as striking that is protected by the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA).

When the Court rules in favor of Glacier, as is likely, it will turn back the clock on labor’s right to strike that has had legal precedent established since 1959.

The right to strike, including the financial harm that would result from a strike, is protected by the National Labor Relations Act.

Causing the boss financial harm is precisely the point of striking.

Glacier wants the union to pay them for striking.

Glacier is backed by corporate groups seeking to expand their power in the face of rising union organizing successes to recoup money from unions for financial harms incidental to labor activity.

Glacier is also supported by right-wing groups like the Landmark Legal Foundation, one of the leading organizations behind the “school choice” movement for expanding religious education, and an opponent of teachers' unions.

In August 2017 Glacier drivers went on strike to support Local 147 in negotiations over a new contract for 80 to 90 cement truck drivers, according to court filings. At least 16 drivers returned trucks still loaded with concrete to the company’s yard and left them running, according to the the union.

Glacier's managers were forced to scramble to dispose of the concrete, which hardens within 20 to 30 minutes after the trucks shut off and can damage the vehicles. They say that they missed a planned delivery to a customer as a result.

The strike ended a week later with new collective bargaining agreement.

But Glacier sued Local 146 for conspiracy to destroy its concrete. The company alleged the union sabotaged its business by timing the strike so concrete would be destroyed.

The Washington Supreme Court kicked the case out. It held that the state claims were preempted by federal law under U.S. Supreme Court precedent from 1959.

In accepting the case, the SCOTUS has signaled its likely decision. In deciding for Glacier the Court would hold unions responsible for financial losses caused by a strike and would make a strike so costly that their decision has to be seen as an attempt to limit their use.

In the face of this major attack on union rights, how should the unions respond?