## Facts

- Three employee associations representing teachers, transportation employees, and educational support staff, along with two individual employees, challenged the Independence School District’s labor practices.
- The Missouri Constitution provides that “employees shall have the right to organize and to bargain collectively through representatives of their own choosing.”
- The school district had a longstanding practice of meeting with employee organizations to discuss terms of employment (including salary and working conditions) and memorializing understandings in documents such as memoranda of understanding.
- By 2002, memoranda were in effect with all three associations, and a formal discussion procedure existed with the teachers’ association.
- The school board adopted a new “collaborative team policy” without first meeting with the employee groups.
- The new policy altered significant employment terms (including grievances, payroll, discipline, and dismissal) and rescinded the existing discussion procedure.
- The associations alleged the district violated the state constitution by refusing to bargain collectively and by unilaterally rescinding agreements already in effect.
- The circuit court twice entered judgment for the district on a stipulated record; the Supreme Court of Missouri accepted the appeal and reviewed the merits.

## Issues

1. Whether the Missouri Constitution’s guarantee of the right “to organize and to bargain collectively” applies to public employees.
2. Whether a public employer that has negotiated agreements with employee groups may unilaterally impose new employment terms that contradict agreements then in effect.

## Decision

- The Supreme Court of Missouri reversed the circuit court and remanded.
- The court held that the constitutional right to organize and bargain collectively applies to public employees as well as private employees.
- The court held that the school district could not unilaterally rescind or contradict agreements it had entered with the employee associations.
- The court clarified that public employers must bargain in good faith but are not required to accept particular proposals or reach agreement on all terms.

## Legal Principles

- A state constitutional guarantee extending to “employees” applies according to its text; courts may not limit it by adding distinctions not expressed in the provision.
- Public employees have a constitutional right to organize and bargain collectively through chosen representatives, requiring public employers to meet and confer in good faith.
- The duty to bargain does not compel a public employer to agree to specific proposals.
- When a public employer voluntarily enters into labor agreements reached through collective bargaining, it may not later nullify them by unilateral action that contradicts their terms.

## Conclusion

The court held that Missouri’s constitutional collective-bargaining guarantee covers public employees and bars a public school district from unilaterally rescinding or overriding existing negotiated agreements, while confirming that the employer’s duty is to bargain in good faith rather than to accept union demands.


Independence-Nat'l Educ. Ass'n v. Independence Sch. Dist., 223 S.W.3d 131 (Mo. 2007)