Naked Capitalism has the article Harris v. Quinn: Will the Supreme Court Abolish Public Sector Unions on Monday.

I couldn’t figure out exactly how to choose quotes from the article to convey the seriousness of the issue without overstepping copyright bounds and depriving them of your going to their web site to actually read the story.  Below I  have chosen both quotes of quotes and some original content from the article without making clear which is which.

Possibly the most bloody attack on unionists was Ludlow, Colorado in 1913 where J.D. Rockefeller and his Colorado Fuel and Iron Company had state militia and hired special deputies attack and try to crush coal miners there. Conflict ranged for months until the militia opened machine-fire on a tent city of mineworkers family and then soaked tents in oil and put them to the torch. Women and children huddled in pits to escape the falmes; in one, eleven children and two women were found burned to death at the hands of the militia.
.
.
.
[Harris vs. Quinn] asks whether a state may compel even those public employees who elect not to join a union to pay fees to the union, since they benefit from the collective bargaining agreements it negotiates.

A “yes” answer would compromise the rights of workers to disassociate themselves from a union, rights grounded in the freedoms of speech and association. A “no” answer would compromise the rights of workers to form a union that can robustly defend their most fundamental interests.
.
.
.
UPDATE We hear about Hobby Lobby v. Burwell from Democrats because it’s framed as an issue in “identity politics.” We don’t hear about Harris v. Quinn from Democrats because that’s an issue of economic justice. Never mind that home health workers are overwhelmingly female, or that public sector unions are disproportionately female and minority. So here the Democrats have placed themselves in the ludicrous position of defending women’s right to contraception with Hobby Lobby, while not defending women’s ability to pay for it with Harris v. Quinn. That won’t stop them from fundraising on it, or course. I mean, come on.

The point of the Naked Capitalism article is that we could be on a  short path back to our nation’s brutal history of trying to suppress unions.  In this age of the internet and instant communication, it may be harder to hide this brutality.  It could lead to an early end to the brutality, or it could lead to outright civil war.  Does this seem like an experiment it is worthwhile to try?  Is this what our Constitution is all about?  Does our Supreme Court lack the wisdom to sort this out in a way that preserves the nation?

Refer back to my previous post Nick Hanauer: The Pitchforks Are Coming For Us Plutocrats to envision one of the possible outcomes.

Reader MardyS posted a link to the Mother Jones article Unions Should Brace Themselves for a Major Supreme Court Loss.

I posted the following comment on the article:

The unions should negotiate in their contracts that non-union employees must receive no more than union wages minus the cost of union dues. The employer does not need to give the difference to the unions, they just keep the money. Next the unions should negotiate for union discounts at many merchants. With enough of this enacted, it would be costly to not be a union member. However, people would be free to decide for themselves whether or not to join the union.

Some other possibilities come to mind.

To prevent cheating, union discounts from merchants should go through the credit card companies who would make sure the recipient was actually a union member. This might be more secure than having to show a union membership card that could be counterfeited.

Union dues should be tax deductible as a business expense, if they aren’t already deductible.