Court overturns mall limits on union picketing - Bob Egelko, San Francisco Chronicle
The case arose from protests by Carpenters Union members at Arden Fair in Sacramento in 1999 and at Capitola Mall in Santa Cruz in 2000, both involving the use of nonunion contractors. Police arrested union members who distributed leaflets and picketed at the malls without asking for permission.
The union complained to the National Labor Relations Board, which ruled in 2005 that the malls could not ban protests focused on a shopping center or individual stores, but upheld the operators' bans on picket signs, on picketing on sidewalks in the mall and on demonstrations during the holiday season. On Monday, the appeals court struck down all those restrictions.