Free Republic

The U.S. Supreme Court last week agreed to hear a case that has labor union bosses worried. Very worried. In the case, Friedrichs vs. California Teachers Association, Rebecca Friedrichs and nine other California public schoolteachers are challenging the requirement that they pay mandatory "fair share" fees to a union. They argue that being forced to pay these fees, even those that only go toward collective bargaining and contract administration, is a violation of their right to free speech under the U.S. Constitution. Why? Because they don't agree with the political views of the teachers union that wants their money. The...

America’s founders, largely distrustful of centralized power, created several checks and balances into the U.S. Constitution to help ensure that one person, or one group of people, would not be able to unilaterally exert his or their will over the American citizenry. First, the federal government itself was divided into three separate and distinct branches–each holding the capability (and responsibility) to check the power of the other. Second, the Bill of Rights was made part of the Constitution for the protection of individual liberties. Third, the “free and independent states” of the nation retained their sovereignty and independence after the...