President's weekly report — September 11, 2015

September 11, 2015 | By ROB RIVETT

Equality under the law: Race-preferences in university admissions

Pacific Legal Foundation has been leading the fight for equality under the law since its founding in the early 1970s.  Back in 1978, we argued against racial preferences in the Supreme Court in the Bakke v. Regents of the University of California. And we have been fighting for Abigail Fisher for years.  Her case is back at the Supreme Court, and PLF once again filed in support of her and equality under the law.  You can read our amicus brief — which was joined by an impressive list of organizations — by checking our lead attorney, Joshua Thompson’s blog post on the filing.

Right to work: Teacher union dues

In addition to Fisher, PLF filed another amicus brief in the Supreme Court this week in Friedrichs v. California Teachers Association. This case asks whether the California teachers’ union may garnish wages of non-union members to support the unions’ collective bargaining and other political activities, without those workers’ consent.  PLF’s brief details how politicking pervades the unions’ agendas, through collective bargaining, to lobbying, to active participation in elections. You can read more about the case in lead attorney Deborah La Fetra’s blog post.

Clean Water Act — Jurisdictional determination

This week the United States Corps of Engineers filed a petition for writ of certiorari to the Supreme Court in our Hawkes v. Corps of Engineers case. In this case the Eighth Circuit agreed with PLF that Clean Water Act jurisdictional determinations are reviewable in court. The Corps does not want their JDs reviewable, so they filed the certiorari petition.  PLF already filed a cert. petition pending before the Supreme Court on this issue, which means that the Supreme Court is getting asked to review this issue from both sides. PLF’s lead attorney Reed Hopper has the exciting details in this blog post.