Bethany LaSpina v. SEIU Pennsylvania State

PRECEDENTIAL

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE THIRD CIRCUIT

__________

No. 19-3484

__________

BETHANY LASPINA,

Appellant

v.

SEIU PENNSYLVANIA STATE COUNCIL; SEIU LOCAL

668; SEIU HEALTHCARE PA; SEIU LOCAL 32BJ; PENN-

SYLVANIA JOINT BOARD OF WORKERS UNITED;

LACKAWANNA COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARY SYSTEM;

SCRANTON PUBLIC LIBRARY

__________

On Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Middle District of Pennsylvania

(D.C. No. 3:18-cv-02018)

District Judge: Honorable Malachy E. Mannion

__________

Argued September 21, 2020

Before: KRAUSE, RESTREPO, and BIBAS, Circuit Judges

(Filed: January 15, 2021)

__________

Shannon Conway

Talcott J. Franklin

Talcott Franklin PC

1920 McKinney Avenue, 7th Floor

Dallas, TX 75201

Jonathan F. Mitchell [ARGUED]

Mitchell Law PLLC

111 Congress Avenue, Suite 400

Austin, Texas 78701

Edmond R. Shinn

Law Offices of Edmond R. Shinn

7032 Lafayette Avenue

Fort Washington, PA 19034

Walter S. Zimolong III

Zimolong LLC

P.O. Box 552

Villanova, PA 19085

Counsel for Appellant

Lauren M. Hoye

Willig Williams & Davidson

1845 Walnut Street, 24th Floor

Philadelphia, PA 19103

Scott A. Kronland [ARGUED]

P. Casey Pitts

Altshuler Berzon LLP

177 Post Street, Suite 300

San Francisco, California 94108

Counsel for Appellee SEIU Local 668

J. Timothy Hinton, Jr.

Haggerty Hinton & Cosgrove LLP

1401 Monroe Avenue, Suite 2

Dunmore, PA 18509

Counsel for Appellee Scranton Public Library

_______________

OPINION OF THE COURT

_______________

RESTREPO, Circuit Judge.

2

When Bethany LaSpina began working for the Scranton

Public Library, all Library employees were exclusively repre-

sented in collective bargaining by Local 668 of the Service Em-

ployees International Union. But no employee had to join the

Union. An employee could join (and pay full membership

dues) or decline to join (and pay a lesser nonmember “fair-

share fee”), at the employee’s discretion. LaSpina joined the

Union.

Then came Janus v. AFSCME Council 31, 138 S. Ct. 2448

(2018). In Janus, the Supreme Court held that compelling non-

members to pay fair-share fees violates their First Amendment

associational rights. Id. at 2486. In the wake of Janus, LaSpina

resigned from the Union and sued, seeking various monetary,

injunctive, and declaratory relief, including a refund of the por-

tion of the dues she paid the Union equal to the nonmembers’

fair-share fees, as well as a refund of membership dues de-

ducted from her paycheck after she resigned.

In a thorough and well-reasoned opinion, the District Court

concluded that each of LaSpina’s claims failed to present a jus-

ticiable case or controversy as required by Article III. We will

affirm.

LaSpina had no standing to seek a refund of any portion of

the Union dues she made prior to Janus because she cannot tie

the payment of those dues to the Union’s unconstitutional de-

duction of fair-share fees from nonmembers. In addition, if

LaSpina is due a refund of certain monies that were deducted

from her wages after she resigned, the claim is not a federal

one; rather, it is, if anything, a state court claim for conversion

or trespass to chattels. Finally, LaSpina’s claim that the Union

may not collect any dues from an employee until that employee

knowingly and freely waives their constitutional right to resign

from Union membership and withhold payments to the Union

is moot as LaSpina no longer is a Union member.

3

I. BACKGROUND

A. The structure of agency shops

The labor laws in the United States had long permitted pub-

lic employers and unions to establish “agency shops.” In an

agency shop, “one union is allowed to exclusively represent an

entity’s employees on the condition that the union represent all

the entity’s employees,” even those who decline to join. See

Diamond v. Pa. State Educ. Ass’n, 972 F.3d 262, 265-66 (3d

Cir. 2020).

The option for public employees to decline to join a union

introduced the issue of “free riders.” Employees could decline

to join the union (and therefore avoid paying union dues) while

still accruing the benefits of representation (say, increased bar-

gaining power in salary negotiations). To address that prob-

lem, Congress and various state legislatures allowed unions

and employers who established an agency shop to bargain for

an “agency fee” provision in their collective-bargaining agree-

ments. If a collective-bargaining agreement contained an

agency fee provision, employees who declined to join the un-

ion nevertheless were required to pay the union a fee.

A Pennsylvania law had authorized this practice as a “fair

share fee.” 71 Pa. Stat. and Cons. Stat. § 575(b). Pursuant to

that practice, employees who declined to join the union did not

need to pay full union membership dues, only some lesser

amount equal to what the union spent on collective-bargaining

activities. Id. § 575(a). The fair-share fee could not cover the

union’s lobbying or other political activity.

For over forty years, public-sector agency shops and at-

tendant fair-share fees were authorized by the Supreme Court’s

decision in Abood v. Detroit Board of Education, 431 U.S. 209

(1977). In Abood, the Supreme Court agreed that First Amend-

ment associational freedoms “protected [nonmembers] from

having to subsidize the union’s political activities ‘unrelated to

its duties as exclusive bargaining representative.’” Hartnett v.

Pa. State Educ. Ass’n, 963 F.3d 301, 304 (3d Cir. 2020)

4

(quoting Abood, 431 U.S. at 234). It held, however, that a bal-

ance of interests permitted state governments to require non-

members to pay a fee equal to union activities that were “ger-

mane to [the union’s] duties as collective-bargaining repre-

sentative.” Abood, 431 U.S. at 235.

In Janus, the Supreme Court “overruled” Abood and held

that governments forcing nonmembers to pay fair-share fees

violates the nonmembers’ freedom of association, even if the

fees went to collective bargaining activities alone. 138 S. Ct.

at 2486. Specifically, the Court held that the “procedure” by

which “[s]tates and public-sector unions . . . extract agency fees

from nonconsenting employees . . . violates the First Amend-

ment.” Id. Accordingly, “[n]either an agency fee nor any other

payment to the union may be deducted from a nonmember’s

wages, nor may any other attempt be made to collect such a

payment, unless the employee affirmatively consents to pay.”

Id.

A previous panel of this Court declined to comment on the

constitutionality of Pennsylvania’s agency fee statute on justi-

ciability grounds. See Hartnett, 963 F.3d at 308-09. A later

panel, however, concluded that under Janus, “Pennsylvania’s

public sector agency shop law was no longer constitutional.”

Diamond, 972 F.3d at 268.

B. LaSpina begins employment at the Lackawanna

County Library System, and joins Local 668

LaSpina began working for the Lackawanna County Li-

brary System in 2015, has been employed by it since, and cur-

rently works at the Scranton Public Library. When LaSpina

began at the Scranton Public Library, it was an agency shop,

exclusively represented in collective bargaining by SEIU Lo-

cal 668. Because the Library was an agency shop, LaSpina

was permitted either to join the Union (and pay full member-

ship dues) or to decline to join (and pay a lesser fair-share fee).

LaSpina joined the Union.

According to LaSpina, however, her decision to join the

Union as a member was involuntary. LaSpina pleads in her

5

complaint that her decision to join was “caused by a union and

employer that induced her to believe that she had no choice but

to join as a condition of her employment.” App. 89. Had

LaSpina known that she had a right to refuse membership, she

says, she “would never have joined.” App. 88.

To support her claim that her decision to join the Union was

induced, LaSpina pleads, first, that she “enrolled and remained

in the union because she was instructed to fill out a union-

membership form at her job orientation, and she was never in-

formed nor made aware of her right to refuse union member-

ship and pay a reduced amount in fair share fees.” App. 88

(internal quotation marks omitted). Second, LaSpina identifies

a November 2016 email exchange she had with the Library’s

human resources officer. In the opening email, LaSpina told

the human resources officer that she had “some questions re-

garding the union and pension part of my pay stub.” App. 109.

LaSpina’s questions (and a comment that can be rephrased as

a question) were these:

• “Is it necessary to be part of the union to qualify for the

pension?”

• “What exactly are the pros and cons of union member-

ship?”

• “[W]ould [it] be possible to retain the pension without

the union membership in order to have more money in

my paycheck[?]”

App. 109. The officer replied, as shown below, as follows:

“The union dues are mandatory by law.” App. 89, 109.

6

C. LaSpina resigns from Local 668 after the Supreme

Court issues Janus

After the Supreme Court decided Janus, the Union aban-

doned its agency-fee setup. The day the Court issued its deci-

sion, Steve Catanese, president of SEIU Local 668, wrote to

Jack Finnerty of the Scranton Public Library “that the Supreme

Court has ruled in Janus” and has “held public-sector employ-

ers may no longer deduct agency fees from non-consenting em-

ployees.” Supp. App. 69. Catanese’s letter instructed Finnerty

to, “effective immediately, please discontinue fair-share fee

deductions.” Id. (emphasis in original). Catanese also wrote

that Janus concerned the First Amendment rights of nonmem-

bers, and so “[t]he Court’s decision has no effect on union

membership dues nor our bargained-for provisions of remitting

dues to the Union.” Id.

Following that instruction, the Library stopped deducting

fair-share fees from nonmember employees and has not de-

ducted any such fees since. App. 9. Now, pursuant to Janus

and with direction from Union leadership, public employees

represented by the Union can either join the Union and pay

membership dues or decline to join and pay nothing, and the

employer is obliged to honor the employee’s request either

way.

Two months after Janus, LaSpina resigned from the Union.

On August 20, 2018, LaSpina mailed a letter to SEIU Local

668 and to her employer’s human resources department that

stated: “I am immediately terminating my membership in the

union and all its affiliates and revoking any previous dues au-

thorization, check off, or continuing membership form that I

may have signed.” App. 110.

After LaSpina sent her resignation letter, the Library, for

approximately two months, continued to deduct membership

fees from LaSpina’s paycheck. On October 26, 2018, a griev-

ance coordinator for the Union wrote to a Library human re-

sources officer notifying the officer that LaSpina “has submit-

ted a request to withdraw from the Union on August 21, 2018,”

7

and that the Library must “discontinue the payroll deduction

for this employee effective immediately.” Supp. App. 62. The

Union directed the Library to refund LaSpina the membership

dues that were deducted from her pay after her resignation, and

LaSpina’s November 2018 paycheck included a refund of

$55.18. App. 9.

On December 3, 2018, the Union advised LaSpina that her

resignation from the Union was processed and her status had

changed to nonmember as of August 21, 2018. Supp. App. 65.

LaSpina also was advised that “[t]he money that was deducted

from your pay for dues after August 21, 2018 will be returned

to you (if it has not been already) in your paycheck.” Id. On

December 13, the Union issued LaSpina a check for $11.81 for

dues deducted for the period of August 21 through August 31,

2018. After the Library received the Union’s October 2018

letter, it did not deduct any more dues from LaSpina’s pay.

App. 9. LaSpina apparently has not cashed the check sent to

her by the Union. Appellant Br. 9, 19.

D. Relying on Janus, LaSpina sues

On October 18, 2018, LaSpina sued. In the operative com-

plaint, LaSpina pleaded three counts. First, LaSpina sought a

refund of the compulsory portion of the membership dues she

made prior to Janus. Second, LaSpina sought a refund of the

membership dues that were diverted from her wages after she

submitted her union-resignation letter and demanded the Union

cease deducting membership dues, as well as an injunction to

prevent the union and her employer from diverting her wages

in the future. Finally, LaSpina sought classwide injunctive re-

lief on behalf of all public employees who are paying some

form of dues to the Union but who have not submitted a waiver

of their constitutional rights under Janus. The District Court

dismissed each claim for lack of an Article III case or contro-

versy.

The District Court had jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1331

and § 1343(a). Whether or not the case suffers from any justi-

ciability problem, we have jurisdiction under § 1291. We

8

review the District Court’s factual findings for clear error and

its legal conclusions de novo. Freedom from Religion Found.

Inc. v. New Kensington Arnold Sch. Dist., 832 F.3d 469, 475

n.4 (3d Cir. 2016).

II. DISCUSSION

A. LaSpina has no standing to pursue a refund of pre-Ja-

nus membership dues

LaSpina first challenges the District Court’s conclusion that

she has no standing to seek a refund of the compulsory portion

of the membership dues she paid to the Union prior to the Su-

preme Court’s issuance of Janus. The elements LaSpina must

satisfy to establish Article III standing are familiar. LaSpina

must show injury in fact, causation, and redressability. Spokeo,

Inc. v. Robins, 136 S. Ct. 1540, 1547 (2016). In doing so, the

burden rests on LaSpina, “as the party invoking federal juris-

diction,” to “clearly . . . allege facts demonstrating” her stand-

ing to sue. Id. (quoting Warth v. Seldin, 422 U.S. 490, 518

(1975)); see also Hartnett, 963 F.3d at 305.

This case primarily concerns the second element—whether

LaSpina’s injury “is fairly traceable to the challenged conduct”

of the Union. See Spokeo, 136 S. Ct. at 1547. We have previ-

ously explained that the traceability element is “akin to ‘but

for’ causation in tort.” Finkelman v. Nat’l Football League,

810 F.3d 187, 193-94 (3d Cir. 2016) (quoting Edmonson v.

Lincoln Nat’l Life Ins. Co., 725 F.3d 406, 418 (3d Cir. 2013)).

Employing the “but for” framework, we ask, had the Union’s

conduct that LaSpina challenges not occurred, would she have

suffered injury? If she would have, then the challenged con-

duct did not actually cause LaSpina’s injury; if not, then it did.

Analyzing the traceability in this way demands that we de-

fine precisely LaSpina’s claimed injury, the conduct of the Un-

ion she challenges, and the link between the two. Cf. Finkel-

man, 810 F.3d at 197 (observing that “[t]he choice among al-

ternative definitions of the injury may control the determina-

tion of causation” and therefore recommending “examin[ing]

9

the allegations in the complaint from a number of different an-

gles to see if [plaintiff’s] purported injury can be framed in a

way that satisfies Article III”) (first alteration in original). A

direct causal relationship between alleged injury and chal-

lenged conduct, of course, will satisfy the traceability element.

See Mielo v. Steak ’n Shake Operations, Inc., 897 F.3d 467,

481 (3d Cir. 2018). So too will an indirect one, “provided that

there is a fairly traceable connection between the alleged injury

in fact and the alleged conduct of the defendant.” Id.

To start, LaSpina does not advance the paradigmatic Janus

injury. Unlike the plaintiff in Janus, LaSpina was a member

of the Union and paid full membership dues, not a nonmember

who paid compulsory fair-share fees. Janus, 138 S. Ct. at

2462. Janus holds that nonmembers compelled to pay fees to

a union they declined to join suffered First Amendment injury.

Id. at 2486; see Hartnett, 963 F.3d at 305. It is less clear

whether a union member who paid membership dues suffered

any constitutional injury at all.

LaSpina’s conception of her injury is difficult to isolate.

Part of the reason, it seems, is that LaSpina seeks to represent

not just herself but a class of similarly situated employees. As

such, she must claim an injury shared by the rest of the pur-

ported class. LaSpina contends that “the ‘injury in fact’ that

[she] and the putative class members have suffered is that they

were forced to pay money to [the Union] whether they joined

the union or not.” Appellant Br. 14. This, however, describes

at least two distinct injuries. LaSpina the individual did not

suffer injury because she was “forced to pay money to [the Un-

ion] whether [she] joined the union or not.” Id. (emphasis

omitted). LaSpina joined the Union, and any injury she might

have suffered arose out of that reality. An injury that a plaintiff

could have suffered had she made a different decision some-

time in the past would not be “actual”; it would be “conjectural

or hypothetical.” See Mielo, 897 F.3d at 478 (quoting Spokeo,

136 S. Ct. at 1548). In such a case, there would be no injury in

fact to support Article III standing.

10

LaSpina clarifies her alleged individual injury elsewhere.

She contends she was injured because she was “forced to pay

money to the [Union] as a condition of her employment.” App.

94 (emphasis added). That alleged injury is consistent with

LaSpina’s proposed relief—a refund only of “the compulsory

portion of her union-membership dues, i.e., the amount equal

to the fair-share fees that would have been imposed had she

declined union membership.” Appellant Rep. Br. 2; see also

App. 101 (demanding a refund “to every class member the

money that they were compelled to pay to the union as a con-

dition of their employment”) (emphasis added).

By LaSpina’s reckoning, then, the membership dues she

paid the Union included a compulsory and non-compulsory

amount. The compulsory amount equaled the amount charged

to those who declined membership and paid a fair-share fee.

LaSpina contends she was injured because she, like nonmem-

bers, had to pay the Union at least the amount charged as fair-

share fees.

With her injury clearly defined, we move to its cause.

LaSpina claims her injury was caused by the Library’s uncon-

stitutional enforcement of the Library as an agency shop. Ap-

pellant Br. 13. Importantly, LaSpina identifies Janus as the

source of that constitutional injury. See App. 90-94. But Janus

does not concern the constitutionality of agency shops, as such.

Janus holds that compelling nonmembers to pay the union a

fee violates the First Amendment. Janus, 138 S. Ct. at 2486.

LaSpina cannot satisfy causation. Take the plaintiff from

Janus. He was employed in an agency shop but declined to

join the union. Id. at 2461. He alleged he was injured because

he was compelled to subsidize a union he had declined to join.

Id. at 2462 (“The amended complaint claims that all ‘nonmem-

ber fee deductions are coerced political speech’ and that ‘the

First Amendment forbids coercing any money from the non-

members.’”). The Supreme Court agreed, concluding that he

“clearly” had standing. Id.

11

The same cannot be said of LaSpina. Like the plaintiff in

Janus, LaSpina was employed in an agency shop. So she

claims she was injured just as he was because, like the non-

members, she was compelled to pay the Union an amount equal

to the amount charged to nonmembers as a fair-share fee. But,

unlike the plaintiff in Janus, LaSpina joined the Union and paid

membership dues. That breaks the causal chain. Had it not

been for the Union’s First Amendment violation, that is, had it

not been for the Union “compelling [nonmembers] to subsidize

private speech on matters of substantial public concern,” id.,

LaSpina still would have had to pay as a component of her un-

ion membership dues an amount equal to the amount charged

to nonmembers as a fair-share fee. Thus, the Union’s conduct

was not the “but for” cause of LaSpina’s alleged injury, result-

ing in her lacking standing to pursue this claim.

LaSpina’s theory of causation suffers from two defects.

First, LaSpina misunderstands what Janus demands. The core

of Janus concerns not the constitutionality of agency shops, as

such, but the constitutionality of compulsory agency fees. Ja-

nus, 138 S. Ct. at 2459-60 (compelling nonmembers “to subsi-

dize a union . . . violates the[ir] free speech rights”). And any

injury predicated on Janus must stem from that core holding.

Second, LaSpina misunderstands causation’s “but for”

framework. At the first step of the analysis, a court must iso-

late and change one and only one variable. In assessing

whether the defendant’s particular conduct caused the plain-

tiff’s injury, the variable to isolate and change is the conduct

of the defendant the plaintiff challenges. In this case, that var-

iable is the Union’s extraction of compulsory fair-share fees

from nonmembers. But as shown, even if the Union did not

extract those fees, LaSpina still would have suffered the pre-

cise injury she alleges she did.

To address this deficiency in her theory of standing,

LaSpina pleads that, had the Union not violated the First

Amendment by charging nonmembers fair-share fees, she

would not have joined the Union and, therefore, never have

paid the Union any dues. App. 88 (“Ms. LaSpina would never

12

have joined the union had she known that she had a right to

refuse union membership.”).

It is true that we do not require the plaintiff to allege that

the defendant’s conduct directly caused her injury. See Mielo,

897 F.3d at 481. Especially at the pleading stage, where the

“burden of establishing causation . . . is less stringent,” id.,

standing may be satisfied even if the plaintiff alleges an indi-

rect (or multistep) causal relationship between the defendant’s

conduct and her injury. Id. But the plaintiff must still clearly

allege facts showing a “fairly traceable connection” between

her injury and the conduct of the defendant she challenges. Id.

Here, LaSpina’s theory of standing requires us to change

two variables—the Union’s extraction of fair-share fees and

her decision to join the Union when she began employment.

That in itself is not fatal to her establishing standing. What is

fatal to LaSpina’s standing is that she asks us to change those

two variables without explaining how the second (her joining

the Union) links to the first (the Union’s collection of fair-share

fees from nonmembers). Moreover, even if we could deduce

an indirect causal relationship between those two variables and

her injury, the second variable (her joining the Union) primar-

ily is a function of the conduct of the Library’s human re-

sources officer, further stretching and weakening the causal

chain. See id.

LaSpina joined the Union and paid Union membership

dues. She cannot connect those events to the Union’s alleged

misconduct. Her claimed injury of economic loss occurred not

because of the Union’s actions toward nonmembers but be-

cause of her decision to join the Union. That decision and the

injury she claims happened as a result were not caused by the

conduct of the Union she challenges. Thus, there is no but-for

causation, and, as a result, she does not have standing to press

this claim. 1

1

Because LaSpina frames her alleged injury as her being com-

pelled to pay an amount of money to the Union whether she

13

B. LaSpina has failed to plead a federal cause of action for

a refund of erroneously deducted post-Janus member-

ship dues

LaSpina next seeks a refund of membership dues errone-

ously deducted from her paycheck after she resigned from the

Union. LaSpina argues that the Union’s “refusal to promptly

honor” her resignation and cease deducting union dues “vio-

lated the Speech Clause and the Supreme Court’s ruling in Ja-

nus.” App. 94. The deduction of membership dues without

authorization in this context may be an injury. It is just not a

constitutional one. And certainly Janus compels no such re-

sult.

Janus does conclude that public-sector unions cannot col-

lect “an agency fee []or any other payment . . . from a nonmem-

ber’s wages” unless the employee “clearly and affirmatively

consent[s] before any money is taken.” Janus, 138 S. Ct. at

2486 (emphasis added). Here, LaSpina presumptively became

a “nonmember” of the Union when she mailed her resignation

letter on August 20, 2018. See App. 110. In that letter, she

gave clear and affirmative dissent. Id. (“I no longer wish to

pay dues or fees to the union[,] . . . and [I am] revoking any

previous dues authorization, check off, or continuing member-

ship form that I may have signed.”). Despite those instructions,

for a period of approximately two months, the Union continued

to deduct union dues from LaSpina while she was, in a strict

sense, a nonmember.

joined or not, we need not consider her separate allegations that

she was “induced” to join the Union and that, “[h]ad [she] been

informed of her right to decline union membership and pay

‘fair share fees’, she would have chosen that option.” App. 88-

89. A federal court appears to be a particularly inappropriate

forum for a dues-paying union member to press such a claim.

LaSpina seems to regret her decision to join the Union, but

whether she was “induced” to do so involves intricate issues of

state contract and labor law, issues better left to the state courts

or an appropriate agency.

14

But Janus’s allusion to “any other payment . . . from a non-

member[]” must be read in context. In the topic sentence of

the paragraph that includes that holding, the Court made clear

it was primarily demarcating the constitutional rights of non-

members currently or previously employed in agency shop ar-

rangements. See Janus, 138 S. Ct. at 2486 (holding that “[t]his

procedure,” that is, the procedure by which “[s]tates and pub-

lic-sector unions . . . extract agency fees from nonconsenting

employees,” “violates the First Amendment”) (emphases

added). Until Janus gave LaSpina reason to resign from the

Union, LaSpina was a dues-paying member. She was never

compelled to pay the Union agency fees.

The Janus Court’s language that no “other payment” may

be taken from a nonmember without consent should also be

read as the Court’s attempt to encapsulate the differing termi-

nology used by the twenty-odd states that had permitted agency

shop arrangements before Janus invalidated them. The pri-

mary legal effect of Janus was to invalidate the Illinois state

law that permitted unions to collect “agency fees” from non-

members, see id. at 2460-61, but the Court’s reasoning neces-

sarily extended to all “States,” id. at 2486, some of which, like

Pennsylvania, called them “fair-share fees,” Diamond, 972

F.3d at 268 (holding that, “under Janus I, Pennsylvania’s pub-

lic sector agency shop law,” which compelled nonmembers to

pay “fair-share fees,” “was no longer constitutional”).

Janus does not condone punishing unions for their attempt

to implement a new constitutional regime after the old one had

been in place for over forty years. That old regime supported

the statutory schemes of nearly half the states, underpinning

thousands of collective bargaining agreements involving mil-

lions of employees. See Janus, 138 S. Ct. at 2499 (Kagan, J.,

dissenting). Indeed, even the Janus Court recognized that its

ruling would impose “transition costs” on the parties that had

come to rely on the previous regime and had built statutory

schemes around it. See id. at 2485.

Here, the record evidence suggests that the Union immedi-

ately sought to comply with Janus’s new constitutional rule.

15

The day Janus was decided, the president of SEIU Local 668

informed the Scranton Public Library that the “Supreme Court

has ruled in Janus . . . . [and] has held [that] public-sector em-

ployers may no longer deduct agency fees from non-consent-

ing employees.” Supp. App. 69. The president directed the

Library to “immediately” cease requesting or deducting fair-

share fees from nonmember employees. Given the enormity

of the task faced by public-sector unions in the wake of Janus,

and the lack of any direction from the Supreme Court that the

period in which union members transitioned to nonmembers

could give rise to new constitutional violations, we decline to

find any First Amendment violation under Janus for an em-

ployer’s or union’s failure to promptly process a member’s res-

ignation notice and terminate the associated dues deductions. 2

2

Because we conclude that LaSpina’s Count II fails to plead a

federal constitutional claim, we need not decide whether that

claim is now moot. After LaSpina filed her Complaint, the

Union attempted to refund LaSpina the membership dues de-

ducted from her paycheck after she submitted her resignation

letter. To do so, the Union appears to have remitted part of the

sum (about $55) to LaSpina through her paycheck and the bal-

ance (about $12) by mailed check. LaSpina claims, and we

must accept as true, that she refuses to accept and has not yet

cashed that check. See, e.g., Appellant Br. 23. In Campbell-

Ewald v. Gomez, 577 U.S. 153 (2016), the defendant filed an

offer of judgment under Rule 68 in an attempt to settle the

plaintiff’s individual claim. Id. at 667. After the plaintiff al-

lowed the Rule 68 offer to lapse, the defendant moved to dis-

miss under Rule 12(b)(1), contending the unaccepted offer

mooted the case. Id. at 668. The Court held “an unaccepted

offer to satisfy [a] named plaintiff’s individual claim [is not]

sufficient to render a case moot when the complaint seeks relief

on behalf of the plaintiff and a class of persons similarly situ-

ated.” Id. at 666. It further stated that “in accord with Rule 68

of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure . . . an unaccepted set-

tlement offer has no force.” Id. The Court declined to con-

sider, however, “whether the result would be different if a de-

fendant deposits the full amount of the plaintiff’s individual

claim in an account payable to the plaintiff, and the court then

enters judgment for the plaintiff in that amount.” Id. at 672.

16

C. LaSpina’s claim that Janus demands the Union obtain

First Amendment waivers from all employees is now

moot

LaSpina finally seeks to enjoin the Union from taking

money from her paycheck or the paycheck of other Union em-

ployees until all employees, pursuant to Janus, “waive[] [their]

constitutional right to withhold money from the union.” App.

95. The District Court concluded that LaSpina lacked standing

to assert this Count against the Union. App. 38-39 (“[P]laintiff

lacks standing to proceed with her claim in Count 3 against

Local 668 and [Scranton Public Library] . . . . since plaintiff is

not suffering and will not suffer in the future any injury due to

defendants’ alleged conduct.”). Although the District Court’s

bottom line was correct, it identified the wrong justiciability

doctrine. Whether LaSpina had standing to pursue that claim

when she filed her complaint is a close question, but the claim

undoubtedly is moot now.

A claim is moot if it no longer presents a “live” controversy

or the parties no longer have a personal stake in the claim’s

resolution. Hartnett, 963 F.3d at 305. The vitality of the con-

troversy and the parties’ personal stakes in it must exist not just

at the outset of the litigation, but throughout its duration.

Chafin v. Chafin, 568 U.S. 165, 171-72 (2013). Therefore, “if

developments occurring during the course of adjudication

eliminate a plaintiff’s personal stake in the outcome of a suit,

then a federal court must dismiss the case as moot.” Rosetti v.

Shalala, 12 F.3d 1216, 1224 (3d Cir. 1993).

LaSpina no longer has a personal stake in the resolution of

this claim. At filing, LaSpina sought (1) an order requiring the

Union to “immediately honor and enforce” an employee’s

membership resignation and withdraw of financial support; (2)

a declaration that the Union is violating the Constitution by de-

ducting membership or other fees from employees who have

Taken together, and assuming Campbell-Ewald applies, these

holdings suggest that LaSpina’s refusal to cash the check may

be sufficient to defeat mootness.

17

not waived their rights under Janus; and (3) a permanent in-

junction preventing the Union from deducting membership

dues or other fees from employees until those employees pro-

vide consent pursuant to Janus. App. 102-03. It is undisputed

that the Union has processed LaSpina’s resignation, Supp.

App. 67, and has ceased collecting any dues or fees, App. 85.

Thus, there is no lingering membership resignation for the Dis-

trict Court to enforce or involuntary payments for it to halt.

LaSpina insists her individual claim is not moot because the

Union’s or Library’s decision to halt deducting her member-

ship dues “is a textbook example of ‘voluntary cessation,’”

which “cannot moot a plaintiff’s claim for declaratory and in-

junctive relief.” Appellant Br. 25 (citations omitted). It is true

that the Union or Library halted deductions only after LaSpina

sought relief from the courts. Nevertheless, these facts present

a strong case for mootness notwithstanding the voluntary ces-

sation of the offending conduct.

Until Janus, the Union was permitted to collect fair-share

fees from nonmembers. And until LaSpina submitted her res-

ignation, the Union was permitted to collect membership dues

from her. Once the Supreme Court issued Janus, the Union

conceded that the compulsory collection of fees from nonmem-

bers violates the First Amendment and immediately instructed

the Library to cease their collection. Supp. App. 69. LaSpina

concedes that the Union no longer extracts any fees from her,

App. 85, and we see no reasonable likelihood that the unions

will try to collect any fees from nonmembers again. See Hart-

nett, 963 F.3d at 307.

LaSpina’s citation to Knox v. SEIU Local 1000, 567 U.S.

298 (2012), is easily distinguished. In that case, a California

branch of the SEIU charged nonmembers a special assessment

for work supporting the union’s political objectives. Id. at 303-

04. A group of nonunion employees who paid the special as-

sessment brought a class action against the union alleging First

Amendment violations. Id. at 305-06. After the Supreme

Court granted certiorari, the union offered to satisfy the

18

plaintiffs’ claims, but it continued to insist that its imposition

of the assessment was legal. Id. at 307.

In finding that the plaintiffs’ claims were not moot, the

Court observed that the “voluntary cessation of challenged

conduct does not ordinarily render a case moot because a dis-

missal for mootness would permit a resumption of the chal-

lenged conduct as soon as the case is dismissed.” Id. The

Court reasoned that resumption was particularly likely because

the union continued to defend the constitutionality of the chal-

lenged conduct. As a result, the Court thought it “not clear why

the union would necessarily refrain from collecting similar fees

in the future.” Id. That worry is not applicable here. Here, the

Union stopped collecting fair-share fees the day Janus was de-

cided and never has attempted to collect any such fees from

LaSpina.

While LaSpina’s individual claim is moot, we also must ex-

amine whether her classwide claims survive because, in certain

circumstances, “class claims can breathe life into an otherwise

moot case” and permit an individual plaintiff “to continue

seeking class certification.” Gayle v. Warden Monmouth Cnty.

Corr. Inst., 838 F.3d 297, 305 (3d Cir. 2016) (internal citations

and quotations omitted). For example, when a plaintiff files a

motion to certify a class when his individual claim still is live,

the mooting of that claim while the motion is pending permits

the court to decide the certification motion. Id. at 305. In that

case, the plaintiff remains able to vigorously press the class’s

claims. Id. at 305-06.

No such circumstance is present here. LaSpina has not yet

moved for class certification and maintains no personal stake

in the resolution of this claim. The lack of personal stake in

the resolution of the claim makes LaSpina a particularly inap-

propriate class representative. See id. at 306 (“[T]he critical

question is whether a plaintiff had a live claim at the time the

operative motion to certify was filed.”); see also U.S. Parole

Comm’n v. Geraghty, 445 U.S. 388, 397, 403-04 (1980). Be-

cause LaSpina’s individual claim is moot and she has not filed

for class certification, the class claims do not survive either.

19

D. The District Court need not grant leave to LaSpina to

file a Third Amended Complaint

Finally, the District Court should not feel compelled to

grant LaSpina leave to amend her Second Amended Complaint

should she seek to do so. Generally, the district courts should

grant leave to amend “freely . . . when justice so requires.” Fed.

R. Civ. P. 15(a)(2). That principle is particularly potent in civil

rights cases. Mullin v. Balicki, 875 F.3d 140, 151 (3d Cir.

2017). But even in civil rights cases, leave to amend need not

be granted if “amendment would be futile or inequitable.”

Vorchheimer v. Phila. Owners Ass’n, 903 F.3d 100, 113 (3d

Cir. 2018). Here, LaSpina already has amended her complaint

twice and, when pressed at oral argument, failed to suggest

what she might add were the District Court to grant leave to

amend it again. Thus, amendment would be futile.

III. CONCLUSION

For the foregoing reasons, we will affirm the District Court.

20