On May 16, President Barack Obama’s nominees to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) went before the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, and the two nominees who were selected as recess appointees in 2012 failed to impress the committee’s ranking member, Senator Lamar Alexander.

Alexander (R-Tennessee) said he would oppose the nominations of Democrats Sharon Block and Richard Griffin because “they continued to decide cases after the federal appellate court unanimously decided they were unconstitutionally appointed.”

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The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) announced on March 12 it will ask the U.S. Supreme Court to review an appeals court decision that says the appointment of two Board members is invalid.

In consultation with the Justice Department, the NLRB said it intends to file a petition by the April 25 deadline for Supreme Court review.

On January 25, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled in Noel Canning v. NLRB that President Barack Obama acted unconstitutionally when he made three recess appointments to the Board on January 4, 2012.

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by Charles S. Plumb

Employers requiring employees to submit disputes to mandatory arbitration rather than filing a lawsuit got a boost from a November 26 U.S. Supreme Court ruling in an Oklahoma case.

In the case, two employees of Nitro-Lift, a provider of services to oil and gas well operators, left their jobs to work for a competitor. The two had signed confidentiality and noncompetition agreements that included a clause requiring the parties to submit disputes to mandatory arbitration.

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By Jacqueline R. Scott, David S. Fortney, and Cynthia Ozger-Pascu
Fortney & Scott, LLC

In a historical ruling, the U.S. Supreme Court has upheld the significant healthcare reform provisions in the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA), enacted by Congress in 2010 in a sharply divided vote along partisan political lines and subsequently challenged on constitutional grounds by 26 states and employer representatives. On June 28, the Court issued an extensive decision, which included — to the surprise of many Court watchers — a majority opinion authored by Chief Justice John Roberts and the four liberal justices, along with concurring opinions and dissents by other justices.

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By Jason Lacey
Foulston Siefkin LLP

The legal underpinnings of the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision on healthcare reform are complex, but the bottom line is very clear for employers: Nothing has changed. The law that went into effect March 23, 2010 (the Affordable Care Act, or ACA), and has been in effect ever since, remains wholly intact.

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The U.S. Supreme Court held the attention of the nation (and employers) on Thursday, June 28, when it released its highly anticipated decision on the healthcare reform law (the Affordable Care Act, or ACA) enacted in March 2010. In a decision that surprised many analysts, the Court upheld the law in a 5-4 opinion authored by Chief Justice John Roberts.

So what did the Court rule, and what does its decision mean for employers going forward?

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By Douglas R. Chamberlain
Sulloway & Hollis, P.L.L.C.

The U.S. Supreme Court’s historic decision on healthcare reform (also known as the Affordable Care Act, or ACA) will be dissected and argued about for many years to come. The Court essentially upheld all the key elements of the healthcare reform law — most notably the so-called “individual mandate,” which will require that individuals purchase health insurance or else pay a penalty (or “tax”). There are two surprising elements to the Court’s decision: read more…

By Jessica Webb-Ayer

The wait is over: The U.S. Supreme Court has decided that the massive healthcare reform law (also known as the Affordable Care Act, or ACA) enacted in March 2010 is constitutional. So what happened, and what does this mean for employers?

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By Dinita L. James

Arizona’s attempt to make criminals out of those who work or seek employment while unlawfully in the United States suffered a fatal blow in the U.S. Supreme Court today. The 5-3 decision, written by Justice Anthony Kennedy, held that Congress already has “decided it would be inappropriate to impose criminal penalties on aliens who seek or engage in unauthorized employment.” Thus, Section 5 of the 2010 Support Our Law Enforcement and Safe Neighborhoods Act (more commonly known as SB 1070), the only provision dealing directly with the employment of undocumented aliens, will never go into effect.

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By Nancy Williams

Pharmaceutical representatives who persuade physicians to prescribe specific drugs don’t make any actual sales. They can’t because the products they promote can be sold legally only through a doctor’s prescription to an individual patient. Yet for years, it has been a common industry practice to categorize such employees as outside sales representatives under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) and thus exempt from federal overtime pay requirements.

A lawsuit by pharmaceutical reps challenged the practice, raising the specter of huge potential overtime pay liability for the industry. Today that concern evaporated with the U.S. Supreme Court’s 5-4 ruling that the historical classification of pharmaceutical representatives as outside sales reps is correct under the FLSA.

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