Home Media Center News Releases

Washington, D.C.—The National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU) asked the Supreme Court to reject a lower court decision that would sharply limit the ability of federal workers to have their constitutional and other important legal claims heard in federal court.

In a friend-of-the-court brief, NTEU argued that the appeals court decision would have “sweeping implications” for federal employees by calling into question the authority of federal courts to handle a broad range of cases they traditionally have heard.

The decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit held that federal employees could not obtain injunctions against violations of their constitutional and other legal rights if their claims were covered by the grievance and arbitration procedure of a negotiated labor agreement.

NTEU has worked for many years, in both the courts and in Congress, to ensure that federal workers have access to the federal courts to secure relief against violations of their legal rights. NTEU’s efforts have included aggressively opposing efforts by the government to persuade courts to dismiss federal employees’ legal actions claims without even considering their merits, and advocating successfully for a 1994 amendment to the Civil Service Reform Act of 1978 (CSRA) to reverse an earlier court decision that held that federal workers lose their rights to judicial review if their contract contains a grievance procedure.

“It is extremely important to federal workers that they be able to resort to the federal courts when their constitutional and statutory rights are violated,” said NTEU National President Colleen M. Kelley. “NTEU itself has a long history of using federal court litigation to protect our members’ legal rights. We hope that our participation in this case before the Supreme Court will help the Court understand the broad ramifications of endorsing the Ninth Circuit’s decision in this case.”

The case at issue, Whitman v. U.S. Department of Transportation (No. 04-1131), involves a challenge to the plaintiff’s constitutional and statutory rights arising out of the drug-testing program of the Federal Aviation Administration.

The Ninth Circuit appeals court held that because the employee might have been able to file a contractual grievance to challenge the program, he could not file a lawsuit in federal court to enjoin it.

The union’s brief argues that the appeals court’s decision is contrary to a provision of the Civil Service Reform Act which Congress amended in 1994—at NTEU’s urging—precisely for the purpose of ensuring the opposite result.

The impact of the amendment is that the existence of a negotiated procedure under which an employee, through his union, might contest an action taken against him would not deprive the employee of his individual entitlement to resort to the federal courts to vindicate his constitutional and other important rights.

NTEU is the largest independent federal union, representing 150,000 employees in 30 agencies and departments.