JUNE 5, 2009:NWLP
6/2/09
10:18 AM
Page 2
Union officials affirm Sotomayor for High Court
WASHINGTON, D.C. (PAI) —
The AFL-CIO and Change to Win la-
bor federations are giving strong back-
ing to federal appellate judge Sonia So-
tomayor, President Barack Obama’s
nominee for the first U.S. Supreme
Court vacancy during his White House
term.
Sotomayor, 54, now a judge on the
2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in
New York City, was nominated by
Obama to succeed Associate Justice
David Souter, who intends to retire at
the end of June.
Retiring AFL-CIO President John
Sweeney called Sotomayor, the first
Hispanic-American Supreme Court
nominee, “a brilliant jurist” who
“would bring a direct and personal un-
derstanding of the struggles workers
face every day.”
Anna Burger, chair of Change to
Win, said there are few people with So-
tomayor’s legal acumen and accumu-
lated wisdom. “But beyond her bril-
liance, her three-decade career in the
law and her distinguished record, Judge
Sotomayor’s personal story of achieve-
ment has given her a rare insight into
b h
m k
the lives of people who get up and go to
work each day to make a better life for
their families.”
Sotomayor was raised in a South
Bronx public housing project by par-
ents who moved from Puerto Rico. Her
mother was a nurse and her late father
worked in a factory. She graduated
from Princeton University summa cum
laude, edited the Yale Law Journal,
served as a New York City prosecutor
and corporate lawyer before being ap-
pointed to the bench by President
George H. W. Bush in 1992.
Sweeney added that Sotomayor has
consistently interpreted U.S. labor laws
in the manner in which they were in-
tended. “She has enforced the rights of
all workers to be free of all types of dis-
crimination at work, to be the paid the
correct wages, and to receive health
benefits to which they are entitled. She
has recognized that persecution for
union activity can be a basis for grant-
ing asylum in the U. S,” he said.
A database search turned up three
notable Sotomayor rulings on labor is-
sues, including one high-profile deci-
sion four years after she became a U.S.
Bennett Hartman
Morris & Kaplan, llp
Attorneys at Law
Oregon’s Full Service Union Law Firm
Representing Workers Since 1960
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PAGE 2
District Judge in 1991. Her injunction
against the baseball team owners ended
their 1995 intransigence that forced the
unionized players to strike. The strike
lasted a few days and her court order
made clear the owners had to bargain
in good faith and reach a contract.
A second Sotomayor case is pend-
ing before the current Supreme Court,
but that decision will occur before she
joins the bench, assuming the Demo-
cratic-run Senate confirms her nomina-
tion.
That case, argued earlier this year,
involves the city of New Haven’s years-
old exam for its firefighters. When New
Haven gave the exam for the promo-
tions, the whites and one Hispanic-
American passed, and all the blacks
did not. The city threw out the test as
racially biased in its effect. Those who
passed the test sued.
The federal district court in Con-
necticut ruled for the city, and a three-
judge 2nd Circuit panel, including So-
tomayor, agreed. But other Republican-
appointed 2nd Circuit judges who were
not on the panel were upset enough to
file their own dissent, urging the
Supreme Court to take the case, which
it did.
The third Sotomayor ruling in-
volved a health benefits case. In 2005,
the administrator of Empire Health
Choice Assurance, Inc., a health plan
for New York-based federal workers,
sued the estate of a dead worker trying
to recover benefits the plan had paid
before the worker died. Sotomayor
wrote for a three-judge appellate panel,
which ruled 2-1 for the worker’s heirs.
Sotomayor said there was no federal
jurisdiction. She ruled “it was not
enough” that the health care plan was
created by federal law, since the plan
“was not an instrumentality of the fed-
eral government, but merely the result
of federal legislation.”
...Wyden health bill is sick
(From Page 1)
with quality, affordable health insur-
ance for every American,” he said.
In addition to taxing benefits, union
officials are protesting two other as-
pects of the bill: Union members would
be forced to give up their negotiated
health care plans whether they liked
them or not; and the bill doesn’t include
a public option for workers to choose
from.
Asked by a reporter why labor was-
n’t pursuing a single-payer plan to elim-
inate all the wrangling over health care
reform, Tom Chamberlain, president of
the Oregon AFL-CIO, said a single-
player plan isn’t going to happen.
“I don’t know if we ever get to sin-
gle-payer in this country,” he re-
sponded. “What you’re talking about is
tearing completely down the existing
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system and starting from scratch. I just
don’t see how that’s going to happen.”
Wyden introduced SB 391 in Febru-
ary. The bill has a dozen co-sponsors,
including Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), Daniel
Inouye (D-Hawaii), Arlen Specter (R-
Penn), Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.), Mary
Landrieu (D-La), Mike Crapo (R-
Idaho), Bill Nelson (D-Fla.), Debbie
Stabenow (D-Mich.), Maria Cantwell
(D-Wash.), Lamar Alexander (R-
Tenn.), Lindsey Graham (R- S.C.), and
Bob Bennett (R-Utah).
“We’re deeply disappointed that
Wyden won’t commit to a public op-
tion,” Allen said.
The three unions are sharing the cost
of the $60,000 radio ad buy on stations
airing in Portland and Eugene.
The group also has a Web site:
www.stopwydenshealthtax.com.
%HHVRQ &KLURSUDFWLF
Paying the
price for
health
insurance
• Health insurance premiums for
Oregon working families have sky-
rocketed, increasing 85 percent from
2000 to 2007.
• For family health coverage in
Oregon during this time, the average
annual combined premium for em-
ployers and employees rose from
$6,654 to $12,321.
• For family health coverage in
Oregon from 2000 to 2007, the av-
erage employer’s portion of annual
premiums rose 77 percent, while the
average worker’s share grew by 111
percent.
• From 2000 to 2007, the median
earnings of Oregon workers in-
creased 18 percent, from $22,401 to
$26,444. During that time health in-
surance premiums for Oregon work-
ing families rose 4.7 times faster
than median earnings.
• Profits at 10 of the country’s
largest publicly-traded health insur-
ance companies — Aetna, Ameri-
group Corp., Centene Corp., CIGNA
Corp., Coventry Health Care Inc.,
Health Net Inc., Humana Inc., Unit-
edHealth Group Inc., Universal
American Corp., and WellPoint —
rose 428 percent from 2000 to 2007,
from $2.4 billion to $12.9 billion, ac-
cording to U.S. Securities and ex-
change Commission filings.
• In 2007 alone the chief execu-
tive officers at these companies col-
lected combined total compensation
of $118.6 million — an average of
$11.9 million each. That is 468
times more than the $25,434 an av-
erage American worker made that
year.
From Health Care for
America Now! May 2009
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JUNE 5, 2009
