St. John’s University (SJU), a Catholic school in Queens, New York, has filed a federal lawsuit seeking to block the state Public Employees Relations Board (PERB) from overseeing disputes involving its faculty union, arguing that such regulation violates the school’s religious freedom rights.
Local outlet AMNY reported that the university suddenly decided in February to revoke recognition of its two long-standing chapters of the American Association of University Professors (AAUP), to which more than 1,100 faculty members at SJU belonged.
The union subsequently filed complaints with PERB arguing that SJU violated state labor law by withdrawing recognition of the union and refusing to negotiate for a new contract. According to AMNY, the school also “engaged in a pattern of illegal surveillance and intimidation of union members.”
SJU responded to the complaints at the beginning of June by taking PERB to court, asking for an injunction to protect the school from interference from the board based on its religious status.
“At St. John’s, ministry and mission are inseparable,” the suit reads, according to AMNY. “[PERB], however, seeks to subject St. John’s to a regime of mandatory collective bargaining that impermissibly entangles the government (and the faculty Union) in its internal governance of religion- and mission-related matters.”
In the suit, SJU argues that collective bargaining had increasingly begun infringing on the school’s internal governance. SJU cites rejected proposed changes to health and medical programs and a charge the union filed in October that sought additional bargaining information, which the university said interfered with its leadership. The union says the charge was intended to discover how SJU calculates its healthcare premiums.
For their part, the faculty say SJU is attempting to disperse the union in a show of “dangerous behavior.”
“It’s an affront to workers’ rights and Catholic values on every level,” faculty union president Sophie Bell stated, according to AMNY.
“We know we have state law on our side,” she later added. “It’s why we know that we’re going to win because their behavior is absolutely outrageous on a legal and educational front.”