NYPD’s tactic: strike while still getting paid

When police begin to behave as an armed force unaccountable to civilian authority, it presents something of a moment of truth for many conservatives and Republicans who must decide which comes first for them, being pro-police or pro-rule-of-law.

Turning its back on elected and appointed civilian authority, New York’s paid constabulary has unilaterally reduced its writing of traffic tickets and minor summonses by 94 percent [New York Post] The job action hits New York City government in the pocketbook by stopping the lucrative flow of tickets, a tactic that has also been observed in other cities’ police labor disputes [Glenn Reynolds] It comes at a time when the Patrolmen’s Benevolent Association is angling for higher pay from the city [NYDN on an earlier stage in the tensions], and, even more remarkably, when unions have been pushing a bill that would further insulate cops accused of wrongdoing from city disciplinary authority [E.J. McMahon, New York Post] “It amounts to a public act of extortion by the police,” contends the New York Times in an editorial [via Scott Greenfield, who also comments].

Does the ticketing strike endanger the city public? The answer could be embarrassing for the police unions either way: either it does, in which case the police have put public safety at risk as a bargaining chip, or it does not, which would tend to support Reynolds’ comment that much of “‘law enforcement’ is really just a system designed to squeeze money out of the citizenry.” [Conor Friedersdorf, who argues that conservatives in particular should spot what’s wrong with “an armed, organized army rebelling against civilian control”]

In the past Republicans have tended to give police unions a pass for political reasons, but that may be changing [Lucy Morrow Caldwell, National Review; David Brooks, New York Times; Eleanor Clift, Daily Beast; Coyote] James Taranto at the WSJ recalls how some Wisconsin police refused to enforce the law against occupiers intent on taking down Gov. Scott Walker. Amity Shlaes, whose books include a biography of Calvin Coolidge, recalls Coolidge’s role as governor of Massachusetts in breaking the Boston police strike, which made him a national hero.

Earlier on unions’ role in impeding oversight of excessive-force claims. In 1992, protesting NYPD officers “blocked Brooklyn Bridge, tramped on cars, and assaulted reporters” [New York Times via @nickconfessore] while in 2011 some of their ranks attacked cameramen trying to cover ticket-fixing arraignments. Also from Memory Lane: the time Mayor Bloomberg, in one of his most irresponsible moments, urged police to strike to force policy changes.

A different view: Talking Points Memo hears from a self-described progressive cop in suburban New York. [edited shortly after posting to add new introduction] More: NPR (blue flu, “depolicing”, “rulebook protest”).

The ten-bests continue

Adding to our list of lists, a few more: John Steele’s top ten legal ethics stories of 2014, National Law Journal via TaxProf’s list of ten legal education stories, and James Beck’s ten best pharmaceutical-law cases from a defense perspective, to go with the earlier list of ten worst. Daniel Schwartz has three predictions about labor and employment law (intensifying battles over NLRB; alarm at wave of regulation coming out of the administration; Supreme Court continues to meander and zigzag)

Labor and employment roundup

  • Senate Republicans make noises about reining in runaway EEOC [Roger Clegg, Senate minority staff report, Human Resource Executive Online]
  • Yes, minimum wage increases hurt many low-skilled workers [NBER via Charles Hughes]
  • “Women earn less than men even when they set the pay” [Emma Jacobs, FT, via Tyler Cowen]
  • Just a typical fast food worker, except for happening to have a high-powered P.R. firm representing him [Diana Furchtgott-Roth, Economics21]
  • Aaargh: “Federal judge wants to bury summary judgment for many reasons, but especially because it harms employment-discrimination plaintiffs” [CL&P]
  • “Ideally, someone from Human Resources will join you to meet with the aggrieved employee and inform her that the tree is staying up.” (Well, not up this far into January, but you know.) [Evil Skippy at Work]
  • “But”, sic: “Vermont has some of the most progressive wage-and-hour laws in the country, but low-income workers are still struggling.” [Alana Semuels, National Journal]

Social media notes

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Best of Overlawyered — July 2014

Honesty in labeling: “It’s vinegar and peppers, for God’s sake.”

HotPepperLabel

A refreshingly candid label on Gringo Bandito sauce: “Hot Sauce really doesn’t have nutritional value. It’s vinegar and peppers, for God’s sake. What did you expect? Why are you even trying to determine the nutritional value of hot sauce? Just enjoy it!” [via Google Images and Hot Sauce Blog, which transcribes the whole “warning”] (& welcome Investor’s Business Daily readers)

Great moments in workers’ comp claims

California Insurance Commissioner Dave Jones doesn’t seem to appreciate the gutsiness of a Downey, Calif. woman’s actions, saying he finds it “shocking” that “a trusted financial institution manager would be a co-conspirator in a bank robbery and staged kidnapping, and then have the audacity to file a bogus workers’ comp claim for traumatic stress and believe she could get away with it.” [Insurance Journal, back in August but missed then; Matt Sutkoski, Matt of All Trades]

December 31 roundup

Lists of lists, if not indeed lists of lists of lists:

  • Lenore Skenazy picks worst school safety overreaction cases of the year [Reason] and worst nanny state cases [Huffington Post]
  • Radley Balko, “Horrifying civil liberties predictions for 2015”, and you won’t need to read far to get the joke [Washington Post]
  • Feds probe NY Speaker Sheldon Silver over pay from law firm — not his big personal injury firm, but an obscure firm that handles tax certiorari cases [New York Times; our earlier Silver coverage over the years]
  • “Doonesbury” Sunday strip gets filed 5-6 weeks before pub date, so if its topicality compares unfavorably to that of Beetle Bailey and Garfield, now you know why [Washington Post and Slate, with Garry Trudeau’s embarrassing excuses for letting papers run a strip taking the Rolling Stone/U. Va. fraternity assault story as true, weeks after its collapse; Jesse Walker assessment of the strip twelve years ago]
  • Jim Beck’s picks for worst pharmaceutical law cases of the year [Drug & Device Law]
  • “The Ten Most Significant Class Action Cases of 2014” [Andrew Trask]
  • Washington Post calls for steep cigarette tax hike in Maryland, makes no mention of smuggling/black market issue so visible in New York [my Cato post]