Collective Actions

In recent companion pieces marking the 10-year anniversary of Wal-Mart Stores v. Dukes,[1] counsel for Wal-Mart celebrated the judicial assault on class actions and urged that it continue,[2] while counsel for the plaintiffs rightly observed that discrimination class actions are not dead yet.[3] As class action practitioners who have represented employees, consumers, tenants, and others, we take this opportunity to respond to the…

Earlier this month, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (“ICE”) reported that Carlos Escobar-Mejia, a 57-year-old Salvadoran man, died in custody at the Otay Mesa Detention Center in California. Mr. Escobar-Mejia was the first reported individual in ICE detention to die from COVID-19. Though Mr. Escobar-Mejia had lived in the U.S. for over 40 years, an immigration judge during a recent bond hearing had…

Mass layoffs have unfortunately become an economic reality during the COVID-19 pandemic. Employees should know, however, that federal and New York employment laws can provide important rights for employees who lose their jobs in a mass layoff. The federal Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) Act protects employees of a business with 100 or more full-time workers. An employer who…

Any day now, the Supreme Court will issue its decision in Epic Systems Corp. v. Lewis,[1] a case that will determine whether employers can force employees to resolve legal claims through individual arbitration, without recourse to class or collective proceedings. Section 7 of the National Labor Relations Act would seem to prohibit such arbitration clauses. Specifically, Section 7 grants employees the right…

In a precedent-setting decision late last month, the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit deemed an employee arbitration agreement unenforceable on the ground that it violated the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA). The decision is a major win for employees because it recognizes their right to challenge unlawful employment policies and conditions by engaging in collective legal…

The recent big news in lawyer land is the nomination of Chief Judge Merrick Garland of the US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit to replace Justice Scalia. He is, by all appearances, eminently qualified, a model public servant, and at least a tad (I say in jest) to the left of the late Justice Scalia. That should be…

Arbitration agreements are quickly becoming employers’ best and most common defense against class action lawsuits by their employees. As discussed in the recent New York Times article “Arbitration Everywhere, Stacking the Deck of Justice,” in addition to depriving employees of the opportunity to have their claims heard in court, arbitration agreements often waive employees’ right to participate in class actions, a crucial…

As I’ve noted previously on this blog, it is important for workers to understand how forced arbitration—a seemingly innocuous procedural issue—undermines their civil rights. Earlier this week I talked with Roberta Steele, Program Director at the National Employment Lawyers Association.  Roberta’s work focuses on issues that prevent workers from having full and equal access to the courts.  Prior to joining NELA,…

As women’s rights activists chart a new course in the wake of the Supreme Court’s Hobby Lobby decision, will they increasingly take the feminist fight directly to corporations with weak records on gender equality? In the wake of last week’s ruling, pockets of activists have taken to social media and mounted protests at locations of the religiously conservative arts-and-crafts chain, which can now opt…