Arizona’s lawless legislature smacked-down in the courts again

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

Arizona's Tea-Publican controled legislature is a lawless legislature; they do whatever they please without regard for the Constitution or the rule of law. Many of them suffer under the delusion that "I AM the law!" As a result, nearly every piece of substantive legislation passed by our lawless legislature winds up in court where, far more often than not, the courts hand them a smack-down for their lawless conduct. And we the taxpayers get the "privilege" of paying for their legal fees and costs.

Today, the courts handed our lawless legislature yet another defeat, this time in their war on organized labor. (Bonus: Also a defeat for the "Kochtopus" ALEC and Goldwater Institute, who drafted these bills). The Arizona Capitol Times (subscription required) reports Federal judge rules in favor of Arizona labor unions:

A federal judge handed Arizona unions a
legal victory by finding two 2011 bills regulating paycheck deductions
and picketing unconstitutional.

The United Food and Commercial Workers and the Arizona Education
Association challenged laws passed as SB1363 and SB 1365.   U.S.
District Court Judge Murray Snow granted an injunction against SB1365,
which never went into effect because of the legal challenge, and voided
most of SB1365.

SB1365 required employees to give their consent before an employer
could deduct money from their paychecks for “political purposes.”   In
his March 29 order, Snow found the law was discriminatory because it
exempted public safety unions. The bill’s sponsor, former Sen. Frank
Antenori, said in 2011 that he excluded public safety unions to avoid
their opposition and because they told him they operate differently than
most other unions.

* * *

SB1363 limited picketing by prohibiting unruly picketers and lowered the standard for defaming an employer.

“The United Food and Commercial Workers tried to tell the Legislature
what they were doing was unconstitutional, but they just didn’t
listen,” UFCW spokesman Bob Grossfeld said.

Snow let stand provisions that prohibit picketers from preventing
people from crossing a picket line.   He also allowed a provision
requiring the Secretary of State to keep a no trespass list identifying
businesses that “have established private property rights to their
establishment and any related real property in this state.” Police are
required to have the list so when they respond to complaints of unlawful
picketing they can remove the the picketers from the property.

The Court focused on the same reason for striking down similar legislation in previous years — exempting public safety unions violates equal protection. You must treat them all equal under the law. I seem to recall that i predicited this outcome would happen at the time.