Buckeye Institute: Costly overturn of Wisconsin's Act 10 was judicial overreach

By Jon Styf
The Center Square

The overturning of Wisconsin’s Act 10 was judicial overreach and took power over Wisconsin’s budget away from the Legislature, a new amicus brief argues.

The Buckeye Institute argued that a Wisconsin circuit court’s decision to overturn Act 10 interrupts the balance between the legislative and judicial branches.

“The careful constitutional balance envisioned by the Framers of the U.S. Constitution is based on a crucial element—judicial deference to legislative policy decisions – especially those relating to government spending,” Jay R. Carson, senior litigator at The Buckeye Institute, said in a statement. “In practical terms, this means that for the opponents of Wisconsin’s Act 10, their remedy is found in the statehouse, not the courthouse.”

Signed into law in 2011 by then-Gov. Scott Walker, Act 10 limited most public sector union contract negotiations to salaries only and capped those salary increases to the rate of inflation.

The legislation was challenged and overturned in a ruling by Dane County Circuit Court Judge Jacob Frost in December.

The ruling said that the two classes of employees created by Act 10, “general” and “public safety,” violated equal protection guarantees, and that all public service workers should have the same rights to negotiate with employers about subjects beyond wages, such as health care and retirement benefits.

The Wisconsin Institute of Law and Liberty estimated that Act 10 has saved taxpayers in Wisconsin more than $17 billion in the decade-plus that it’s been a law, and that ending Act 10 could cost local governments nearly $500 million going forward.