Law Professor’s Anti-Union Suit Sees Long Odds in First Circuit

The First Circuit signaled it’s unlikely to rule that labor unions violate free speech by forcing representation on all employees in a case that seeks to undo appeals court precedent and crack the foundations of labor law.

“We have a Law of the Circuit Doctrine,” Chief Judge David Barron said during oral argument Thursday. “We don’t likely overrule as a panel, or treat as overruled, or undermine a prior panel decision. That’s just the law,” Barron said.

A University of Massachusetts law professor is up against decades of case law in the Supreme Court, First Circuit, and other courts that ...