The highest court of the United States on a decision on Tuesday handed down a major victory to organized labor with a deadlock vote of 4 to 4.
This decision is related to a case that could have crippled the ability of public unions to collect fees from workers who don't want to pay for its collective bargaining activities and thereby chose not to join it.
The final outcome of the case is also a stark illustration on how the absence of one judge, the late Antonin Scalia, who died last month, has significantly curtailed the power of the four remaining conservatives in turning the law to the right.
With Scalia's absence, the eight-member Supreme Court released a one-sentence unsigned opinion which upheld a decision of the lower court favoring the unions that collects fees from nonmembers.
The court's decision means all public sector unions which represents around 7.2 million workers countrywide can go on collecting fees from nonmembers that back their activities such as collective bargaining.
Meanwhile, union members will keep on paying higher fees that also cover specific political expenses.
"This allows us to continue to be strong advocates," said Eric C. Heins, president of the California Teachers Association.
"Disallowing agency fees would have substantially weakened an already hollowed labor movement," noted Angela Cornell, in emphasizing the high stakes. She is a Cornell Law School professor.
The case was brought to the court by 10 California schoolteachers. If the ruling went in their favor, it will affect millions of government workers and will also weaken public-sector unions.
These two sectors will lose the financial support from both workers and those who chose not to join public unions, while they benefit from the collective bargaining activities of the groups they don't want to support financially.
When the case was argued in January, the late Justice Scalia has thrown questions that were consistently against the unions.
