Judgment day nears on pension cuts

On Wednesday, March 11, the state Supreme Court will hear arguments from the We Are One Illinois union coalition and from the state on whether the court should uphold a lower court’s ruling that a law cutting the pension benefits of employees and retirees in SERS, SURS and TRS is unconstitutional.

The hearing is the culmination of a 15-month legal battle, one that followed a multi-year grassroots lobbying effort by active and retired public employees to preserve the modest pensions they’ve earned and depend on for retirement security.

When pension-cutting legislation (SB 1 – Public Act 98-599) eventually squeaked through the General Assembly in 2013, AFSCME and its partners in the We Are One Illinois union coalition acted immediately to challenge the new law in court. The coalition first requested, and was granted, a restraining order and preliminary injunction to prevent the law from going into effect.

The case against the law was bolstered in July when a bipartisan majority of the Supreme Court, in a separate case on retiree health care benefits, indicated support for the “plain language” of the state Constitution’s pension protection clause, which holds that retirement benefits for public employees cannot be “diminished or impaired.”

In the wake of that decision, the Sangamon County Circuit Court acted with relative dispatch to declare SB 1 “null and void.”

The state appealed that decision directly to the Supreme Court, arguing that its “police powers” allow it to override the Constitution’s language in order to address the fiscal woes confronting Illinois. Briefs have already been filed in the case and on March 11 each party will have the opportunity to present its case before the Supreme Court’s seven justices.

The Supreme Court is expected to issue a ruling in the case later this spring. Visit the Council 31 website and Facebook page for updates after the hearing and beyond.