When reading The College Voice article surrounding the recent realization of administrative bad faith or negligence regarding tenure track faculty contracts in recent years, I came across the name Jackson Lewis. This “union-busting” law firm raised questions for me about the priorities of our institution when it comes to its employees. After extensive research and speaking to members of our community, I have tried to build an understanding of Jackson Lewis and their relationship with Connecticut College.
Jackson Lewis is one of the oldest and largest law firms specializing in union avoidance. Jackson Lewis joins Littler Mendelson, and Ogletree, one of the largest global union avoidance behemoths in operation now. Anti-union firms like these “advise companies to treat unions like a ‘virus’ and to ‘inoculate’ employees with messaging about the purported consequences of organizing early and often.” The 4C’s, an activist organization made up of 4,000 higher education employees in Connecticut believes:
“Firms like Jackson Lewis seek to destroy unions across the United States and lower the standards for all workers. They empower large employers across our country to pay starvation wages to their workers. Their actions and their industry actively hurt community college and university students in CT and across the nation. They lead to the destruction of the middle class. They are the enemy of any person or organization committed to racial, gender and economic justice.”
Other colleges, universities, and individuals have raised concerns about the practices of the firm that align with the spirit of this stark claim. Professor John Logan, the Director of Labor and Employment Studies at San Francisco State University and a visiting scholar at the University of California-Berkeley Labor Center, spoke about his views in an interview following several higher education institutions hiring Jackson Lewis to combat union organizing among their faculty: “You don’t hire Jackson Lewis if you want an agreement with a union or you want to respect your employees right to unionize. You hire them for their hardball tactics.” He goes on to say, “The university will claim this is just a legal process and Jackson Lewis is well regarded, but it’s quite clear that most of the time when you hire Jackson Lewis, it’s to take a hard-line,” and Jackson Lewis isn’t the firm you hire if you have a budget in mind.
According to Prof. David Correia, an associate professor in the Department of American Studies at the University of New Mexico: “While universities like UNM continue to disinvest in the academic mission, publicly-funded union-busting gets a blank check.” Some claim that the firm engages in borderline, if not outright, illegal practices as part of its “hardball tactics” against employee rights. Federal officials had accused the firm of committing 120 labor law violations in their union-busting efforts including firing union supporters, illegally assisting decertification campaigns, sacking supervisors unwilling to carry out illegal activities, improperly withdrawing union recognition, and moving business to non-unionized locations in retaliation.
While this is all cause for concern about the firm as a whole, the question that is most relevant to our community is how Connecticut College works with Jackson Lewis and if their involvement with them runs counter to our values of shared governance and justice. To dive into this question I reached out to faculty, staff, and administrators. The faculty I corresponded with, Prof. Jafar and Prof. Rotremel, raised concerns about the College’s involvement with the firm given their history but knew minimal details about what the firm does for the school. The staff I reached out to, Cheryl Banker, also knew little about the relationship. The most fruitful information I gained was during my conversation with President Bergeron and the new VP of Human Resources, Reginald White. The key details that came out of these conversations round out the picture a bit. According to the President, the College hired Jackson Lewis about 15 years ago based on the advice of their insurance and it is financially feasible. This was before any of our current senior administrators worked for Connecticut College. The firm’s involvement with the College is hyper-focused, utilizing one attorney for employment law. The President was clear in saying that the firm deals with both employment and labor law and that the practices of union-busting were confined to the labor law section of the firm and not something that the College considered relevant given the scope of their work with them. For all legal matters that do not relate to employment law, the College uses a smaller firm from New Haven called Wiggin and Dana.
White described the relationship with Jackson Lewis as a specialized doctor to patient. Jackson Lewis was recommended to them to address a very specific area of focus, they built a trusting relationship with their attorney who now has a strong understanding of the history and needs of the College and addressing them. The attorney that the College works with acts as a consultant for any legal advice related to employees, including pay, benefits, health and safety, and the changes to sick leave that came with the pandemic. They also serve as a soundboard for changes in policy to be sure that the school is complying with changing rules and regulations around employment. This includes working on changes to the employee handbook and policies.
Originally founded in 1958 by Lou Jackson and Robert Lewis as a law firm in New York City, Jackson Lewis has expanded across the country as a goliath in employment and labor law. Currently, Best Law Firms rank Jackson Lewis highly in these areas, Tier 1 in “Employment Law- Management” and “Litigation- Labor and Employment” Best Law Firms, in addition to ranking Tier 2 in “Labor Law- Management.” Jackson Lewis states that its mission is to be “a preeminent workplace law firm dedicated to our clients and passionate about providing the highest quality, creative and effective representation of employers on the full range of employment and labor law matters.”
Jackson Lewis has built an enterprise over the past six decades and a reputation worthy of drawing big-name clients like ADP TotalSource, Anheuser-Busch Companies, Boehringer Ingelheim, Burger King, CVS/Caremark Corporation, Exxon Mobil Corporation, Hilton Hotels, IBM, Pfizer Inc, Target Corporation, and Toys ‘R Us, as well as an increasing number of higher education institutions in recent years. Their impressive clientele is indicative of a high-caliber firm that is not hired on a whim. The reason that this firm is so popular among large corporations appears to be its proficiency in moderating employee-employer relationships, particularly when it comes to fighting against union formation.
Regarding diversity, equity, and inclusion, Jackson Lewis is a mixed bag. While they have been accused of helping employers work around the Americans with Disabilities Act in the workplace, I was unable to find any tangible evidence to support this claim. The attorney that directly works with the College, Tanya Bovee, holds a certificate in diversity and inclusion from Cornell University and specializes in working with employers to develop diversity, equity, and inclusion-conscious policies. White confirmed that this is an area that Jackson Lewis is involved in with Connecticut College.
Jackson Lewis is a massive firm and after investigating it appears that their involvement with the College is relatively contained. Questions can be raised about the difference in the caliber of lawyers between employee relations and the rest of the legal concerns of the College, why the insurance company recommends these lawyers, and whether it is fair to hold the College morally culpable for the actions of sections of a firm that they do not have a direct connection with, but much of that is circumstantial, making it difficult to nail down clear answers.
