Dabbs v. Anne Arundel County – Property Rights
U.S. Supreme Court – Petition for Certiorari
This case concerned the issue of whether legislatively-proscribed monetary exactions (impact fees) are subject to scrutiny unconstitutional conditions doctrine set out in Koontz v. St. Johns River Water Management District, Dolan v. City of Tigard, and Nollan v. California Coastal Commission. The NFIB Legal Center’s brief argued that fees that have no apparent relationship to actual public impacts arising from proposed development are simply a mechanism by which the County forces developers to bear public burdens that, in fairness, ought to be borne by the public as a whole.
Duffy v. CBS Corporation – Legal Reform
Maryland Court of Appeals
This case concerns Maryland’s 20-year statute of repose for improvements to real property and the statute’s application in asbestos cases. In 1991, the legislature amended the 1970 statute to include an exemption to allow claims against manufacturers in asbestos-related litigation. The intermediate appellate court held that pursuant to the July 1970 act, any asbestos-related claim relating to an improvement to real property would have to accrue (i.e., the disease would need to be discovered) by July 1990 – 20 years after enactment – or the cause of action would be extinguished. The NFIB Legal Center’s brief argued that the statute must be upheld.
Hall v. DIRECTV – Employment (Wage and Hour/FLSA/joint employer liability)
U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit – request for en banc review
Plaintiffs, satellite television technicians, alleged that DIRECTV through agreements with various service providers, jointly employed Plaintiffs, and therefore were jointly and severally liable for any FLSA violations. In applying the FLSA joint employer test, the panel found that the alleged joint employer defendants operated a fissured employment scheme, and that DIRECTV was the principal—and, in many cases, only—client of the lower-level subcontractors. Moreover, DIRECTV had the authority to direct, control, and supervise nearly every aspect of plaintiffs’ day-to-day job duties. In requesting review by the en banc court, the NFIB Legal Center argued that the panel erroneously applied a joint employer test that relied too heavily on the economic dependence of workers.
United Food and Commercial Workers Union v. Wal-Mart – Property Rights
Maryland Court of Appeals
NFIB Small Business Legal Center filed in this case arguing that businesses maintain a common law right to bring trespass and nuisance claims in state court against union agitators when they illegally enter private commercial property, or otherwise interfere with business operations. The union argues that such lawsuits are preempted by the National Labor Relations Act; however, the Legal Center argues that this not only contravenes principles of federalism, but would also create serious problems for business owners who will otherwise be forced to shut-down operations during union invasions or to resort to self-help measures to expel trespassers. Further, this brief argued that federal preemption would effectively take away the common law right to exclude third parties from private property and would therein create a problem under the Takings Clause of the Fifth Amendment.
CNN v. NLRB – Labor & Employment Law
U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit
In this case CNN appeals a decision of the National Labor Relations Board finding it to be a joint employer along with another independent business with whom the company works. NFIB Small Business Legal Center filed in support, arguing that NLRB had diverted from a thirty-year precedent in concluding that a joint employment relationship may exist based on indirect control, including contract authority to reimburse overall labor costs, routine supervision, and additional factors.
Banner Healthcare v. NLRB – Labor
U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit
The D.C. Circuit is being asked to determine whether an NLRA violation occurs when an employer asks employees to refrain from discussing ongoing internal investigations. Here the Board found that the employer violated the NLRA by asking an employee who was the subject of an internal investigation to refrain from discussing the matter while the employer conducted the investigation. The 2-1 decision is another in a recent trend of decisions requiring nearly all private-sector employers to consider carefully how they interact with their employees, regardless of whether those employees are represented by a union. Member Brian Hayes dissented.
Chesson v. Montgomery Mutual Insur. Co. – Legal Reform
Maryland Court of Appeals
This case involves the strength of the Frye standard in Maryland and will shape the admissibility of scientific evidence in Maryland’s courts. The plaintiffs’ expert concocted a highly speculative approach to identifying mold-related disease. The trial court allowed the testimony and the appellate court reversed.
Dixon v. Ford Motor Co. – Legal Reform
Maryland Court of Appeals
NFIB joined a brief arguing for exclusion of plaintiffs’ expert testimony based upon the any exposure theory of asbestos causation.
EEOC v. Freeman – Employment and Background Check Practices
U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit
In 2013, the U.S. District Court in Maryland dismissed the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission’s (EEOC) case against Freeman Companies for what the commission alleged as discriminatory hiring practices related to Freeman’s use of criminal background checks and credit reports. The EEOC has appealed.
Georgia-Pacific v. Farrar – Asbestos Reform
Maryland Court of Appeals
The court will determine whether a manufacturer has a duty to warn family members of the dangers of take-home asbestos. In addition, the court will address the measure or standard for determining the sufficiency of evidence to establish a substantial contributing factor of mesothelioma
Malone Investments LLC v. Somerset County – Property Rights
Maryland Court of Appeals
We have asked Maryland’s highest court to take-up a case, which asks whether local government may—consistent with the Fifth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution—withhold access to public services, except on the condition that a business pay to cover disproportionate costs of a public works project. We maintain that the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent decision in Koontz v. St. John River Management District prohibits such extortionate conditions. Thus we argue that the Takings Clause imposes strict limits on how and when government may require individuals to pay to finance public works.
May v. Air & Liquid Systems – Legal Reform
Maryland Court of Appeals – 5/29/15
Maryland’s highest court will decide whether a manufacturer has a duty to warn with respect to asbestos-containing products manufactured, supplied, or placed in the stream of commerce by third-parties.
Young v. UPS – Employment
U.S. Supreme Court (originated in Maryland)
In this case, the employer denied a request for a work reassignment based on a collectively bargained agreement. NFIB argues that although the Pregnancy Discrimination Act (PDA) requires employers to treat women “affected by pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions” the same in all aspects of employment as other employees, it stops short of imposing an affirmative duty on employers to provide pregnancy-related workplace accommodations to the extent that they are not offered categorically to all other employees.
Zucker v. U.S. CPSC – Regulatory Reform
U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland
Mr. Zucker has iniaited this lawsuit asking a federal court for declaratory and injunctive relief against the U.S. Consumer Protection Safety Commission (US CPSC) because the agency is seeking to hold him personally liable for a 54 million dollar recall of a product that had previously been produced by a company that he had founded. The company has now dissolved, and US CPSC seeks to pierce the corporate veil to hold Zucker personally liable. NFIB Legal Center filed a motion to adopt the amicus brief of the Chamber of Commerce in this matter, urging the court to rule in Zucker’s favor.
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If you have a case that impacts small business, please contact us at: 1-800-552-NFIB as we are actively looking for opportunities to weigh in on important issues in this state. NFIB Small Business Legal Center is involved in many cases that impact this state and others; to see our complete list of Supreme Court cases click on Washington, DC on the interactive map.
