High Court OKs State Law Allowing Strikes by Public Employees

The Supreme Court today allowed California public employees to engage in strikes that pose no “substantial and imminent threat to the health or safety of the public.”

The justices, without comment, refused to hear an appeal by Los Angeles County officials who said a 1976 sanitation workers’ strike violated federal anti-pollution laws.

In a highly controversial ruling that triggered calls for legislative action, the California Supreme Court last May ruled that some strikes by public workers are legal.

The state court threw out a damage award of about $335,000 against Local 660 of the Los Angeles County Employees Assn. The union had called a strike against a county sanitation agency over wage and benefit demands in 1976.

Put Managers to Work

The agency, Los Angeles County Sanitation District No. 2, used managers to operate sewage treatment and garbage disposal facilities during the 11-day strike.

The state Supreme Court said: “Strikes by public employees are not unlawful . . . unless or until it is clearly demonstrated that such a strike creates a substantial and imminent threat to the health or safety of the public.”

The state court was not called upon in the ruling to decide whether the strike violated federal anti-pollution laws. The sanitation agency first raised that issue in unsuccessfully seeking a rehearing before the state court.

In the appeal acted on today, the county agency said the California court ruling “is in direct conflict” with the Federal Water Pollution Control Act and another 1976 federal law that regulates solid waste disposal.

Pumping Raw Sewage

The agency said the sanitation workers strike was “designed to force the district to cease operations and pump raw sewage into the waterways and Pacific Ocean.”

“The district will be forced (in future strikes) to violate the federal act and be subjected to substantial civil and/or criminal liability by reason of conduct that the California Supreme Court has legalized,” the appeal said.

In another case affecting California, the court today allowed states to limit the fees that people who win medical malpractice lawsuits may pay their lawyers.

The justices, citing the lack of “a substantial federal question,” let stand a 1975 California law that imposes such limits.

The law was challenged as an infringement of free-speech rights because it bars people who sue for medical malpractice from spending money as they wish for “constitutionally protected advocacy.”

Medical Malpractice

The law at issue, passed by the Legislature as one response to the medical malpractice insurance crisis of the 1970s, states that a lawyer’s contingency fee in a malpractice case may not exceed certain percentages.

The law allows a 40% fee for the first $50,000 recovered; one-third of the next $50,000; 25% of the next $100,000; and 10% of any additional amount over $200,000.

In other action, the court:

--Granted an emergency request by Indiana officials that the state’s current redistricting plan remain in effect next year while the court considers whether the districts are valid.

--Agreed to review recent federal laws that cut food stamp costs by limiting eligibility for family members who live together but may maintain separate households under the same roof.

--Ruled against a convicted Arkansas murderer who pleaded guilty after he was misinformed by his lawyer as to when he would be eligible for parole.