United States Tenth Circuit

In an action brought by various Utah labor unions claiming that Utah's Voluntary Contributions Act (VCA) violates the First Amendment by restricting public employees' political speech, summary judgment for the unions is affirmed where: 1) state restrictions on payroll systems owned and maintained by independent local governments and school boards do not fall under the nonpublic forum exception to ordinary First Amendment analysis; 2) because the VCA regulates political contributions, "exacting scrutiny" applies; and 3) the VCA is unconstitutional as applied to municipalities, counties, school districts, and other local public employers.

Appellate Information

• Decided 01/10/2008
• Published 01/11/2008

Judges

• Before LUCERO and MURPHY, Circuit Judges, and ROBINSON,District Court Judge.

Court

• United States Tenth Circuit

Counsel

• For Appellees:
  
• Nancy L. Kemp, Assistant Utah Attorney General, Salt Lake City, UT, (Mark L. Shurtleff, Utah Attorney General, and Thom D. Roberts, Assistant Utah Attorney General, with her on the briefs), for Defendant-Appellant., Jeremiah A. Collins, Bredhoff & Kaiser, P.L.L.C., Washington D.C. (Michael T. McCoy and Clover R. Meaders, Utah Education Association, Murray, UT, Arthur F. Sandack, Salt Lake City, UT, David J. Strom and Stephanie Baxter, Washington, D.C;  Thomas A. Woodley and Douglas L. Steele, Woodley & McGillivary, Washington, D.C;  Larry P. Weinberg, Washington, D.C, with him on the brief), for the Plaintiffs-Appellees., Maxwell A. Miller and Scott S. Bell, Parsons Behle & Latimer, Salt Lake City, UT, filed an amici curiae brief on behalf of Defendant-Appellant.