Any day now, perhaps as soon as Thursday, the Supreme Court will issue a decision that more than any other case this term will reveal to us the heart and soul of the Roberts Court at the end of Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr.’s 14th year.
The case is Janus v. American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees. It presents the question of whether the court will adhere to its 41-year-old precedent under which states can require public employees who object to joining a union to nonetheless pay their fair share of the union’s costs of the collective bargaining from which all employees benefit.
I’ve just made a bold claim for a case that’s not at the top of most people’s Supreme Court watch lists. What about Trump v. Hawaii, the case on the validity of the president’s Muslim travel ban, also due for a decision in the coming days? That case is extremely important, of course, but here’s the difference: There was no way the court was going to avoid a case presenting fundamental questions of presidential authority. But Janus is a case, it’s fair to say, of the Supreme Court’s own creation.