Does HB 818, which says NC city and county employees can engage in political activities off duty, secretly change NC's right-to-work laws or end NC's prohibition on collective bargaining by public employees?

Plain-English summary

Senator Roy Cooper, then chairing the Senate Judiciary H Committee, asked the AG to assess whether House Bill 818 would change NC's existing right-to-work laws or repeal NC's longstanding prohibition on collective bargaining by public employees. The concern was triggered by a familiar drafting feature: a generic clause stating "all State laws and all local laws and ordinances that are in conflict with this section are repealed." Generic repealers are catnip for litigation, and Senator Cooper wanted to know whether this one would do the legislative equivalent of an unrelated demolition. Chief Counsel John R. McArthur answered no.

The substantive scope of HB 818 was narrow. The bill amended G.S. §§ 153A-99 and 160A-169, the two statutes that regulate political activities by city and county employees. The amendments made clear that these employees were not restricted from engaging in political activities while off duty. The political activities those statutes address are specifically itemized: affiliating with civic organizations of a partisan or political nature, attending political meetings, advocating and supporting the principles or policies of civic or political organizations, and supporting partisan or nonpartisan candidates. The sections are explicitly limited to those political activities. They do not reach union membership, collective bargaining, wages, terms and conditions of employment, or other matters that are typically the subjects of labor law.

NC's right-to-work law (G.S. §§ 95-78 to 95-84) operates in a separate area. It provides generally that no person shall be required to be (or required not to be) a member of a union as a condition of employment. NC's prohibition on collective bargaining by public employees (G.S. §§ 95-97 through 95-98.1) is also in a separate area. It prohibits law enforcement and fire prevention employees from becoming members of, or affiliating with, organizations that have as one of their purposes collective bargaining over grievances, labor disputes, wages, hours, or working conditions. It bars promotion of such labor organizations. It bans labor agreements between units of government and labor unions. It prohibits strikes by public employees.

The AG's reasoning followed plainly: the right-to-work law and the collective-bargaining ban do not regulate political activities by city and county employees. The off-duty political-activity statutes do not regulate union membership or bargaining. The two statutory frameworks do not overlap in subject matter. So the bill's "all conflicting laws are repealed" clause does not reach over and touch the right-to-work law or the collective-bargaining ban, because there is no conflict to resolve.

The opinion's value is straightforward. It defuses what might otherwise be a litigation hook: any future plaintiff trying to argue that HB 818 implicitly repealed a piece of NC labor law would face the AG's contemporaneous reading rejecting that argument. Legislative history this clean is a useful guard against unintended consequences from generic repealers.

Currency note

This opinion was issued in 1993. Subsequent statutory amendments, court decisions, or later AG opinions may have changed the analysis. Treat this page as historical context, not current legal advice. Verify current law before relying on any specific rule, deadline, or remedy mentioned here.

NC's right-to-work law, the public-employee collective-bargaining bar, and the off-duty political-activity statutes have all been amended in the decades since 1993. The basic structural separation between political-activity regulation and labor-relations regulation has remained, but specific statutory text differs. Anyone with a current question about NC public-employee political activity or labor law should consult the current Chapter 95 provisions, the current Chapter 153A and 160A political-activity statutes, and counsel familiar with NC public-employment law.

Common questions

Q: Why is the "all conflicting laws repealed" clause in legislation at all?
A: Because the legislature sometimes does not know exactly which existing laws a new statute will conflict with, especially when the new statute touches a complex area. The generic clause is a safety net. It works fine when the new statute is narrowly drawn and the conflict-resolution is obvious. It becomes a problem when someone later argues that the clause sweeps unrelated statutes into the repeal pile.

Q: How can an AG opinion neutralize a future litigation argument about the repealer?
A: It can't formally bind a court, but it serves as contemporaneous legislative-process evidence about the bill's intended scope. A future court asked to decide whether HB 818 repealed the right-to-work law could look to the AG's 1993 reading as evidence that no one in the legislative process thought the bill reached that far. AG opinions are persuasive authority, and a contemporaneous one carries some interpretive weight.

Q: What exactly are NC public-safety employees prohibited from doing under G.S. § 95-97?
A: They are prohibited from becoming members of, or affiliating with, organizations that have collective bargaining as one of their purposes (specifically bargaining over grievances, labor disputes, wages, salary, rates of pay, hours of employment, or working conditions). They are also prohibited from promoting labor organizations, from being party to labor agreements between units of government and labor unions, and from striking. The prohibition has been the subject of significant federal litigation since the statute was enacted, but the 1993 opinion takes the prohibition as it stood and reads HB 818 against it.

Q: Did HB 818 actually enact something new for city and county employees?
A: It clarified that off-duty political activities (affiliating with civic organizations, attending meetings, advocating for candidates) are not restricted. The amendment likely had a clarifying purpose, given that the political-activity statutes had been read in various ways by various local jurisdictions. The bill made the rule explicit.

Q: What about a city or county employee in a law-enforcement role? Could they engage in off-duty political activity?
A: HB 818's amendments to §§ 153A-99 and 160A-169 are about political activities, not union activities. The right-to-work law and the collective-bargaining ban (which separately address public-safety employees) operate independently. Off-duty political activity for a city or county law-enforcement employee is governed by the political-activity statutes; union and collective-bargaining issues are governed by the labor statutes. The two domains do not bleed into each other.

Q: Could a court read the bill more broadly than the AG?
A: It is possible, especially in a future case where the policy stakes push for a different result. But the bill's text is explicitly narrow (it amends only the political-activity statutes), and the right-to-work and collective-bargaining statutes are explicitly outside that subject area. A court would have to strain to find conflict between two non-overlapping regulatory frameworks. The AG's reading is the natural one.

Background and statutory framework

NC's regulation of public-employee political activity grew up alongside its right-to-work and collective-bargaining laws but in a different statutory neighborhood. The political-activity statutes (G.S. §§ 153A-99 for counties and 160A-169 for cities) sit in the local-government code. They balance the public interest in nonpartisan administration of government against the individual right of public employees to participate in the political process during their personal time.

The right-to-work law (G.S. §§ 95-78 to 95-84) sits in the labor and employment code. It addresses the relationship between employees and labor organizations in any employment setting (public or private), focused on the union-membership-as-condition-of-employment question.

The public-employee collective-bargaining bar (G.S. §§ 95-97 through 95-98.1) also sits in the labor code. It addresses what public employees (especially law enforcement and fire prevention employees) may not do collectively with respect to bargaining, labor agreements, and strikes.

The three frameworks are doctrinally distinct, even though they all touch on what public employees can do outside their direct job duties. The 1993 opinion is one of the cleaner statements of that separation in NC AG practice.

Citations

• N.C.G.S. § 95-78 (right-to-work law; no person required to be or not be union member as condition of employment)
• N.C.G.S. § 95-84 (right-to-work law provisions)
• N.C.G.S. § 95-97 (prohibition on collective bargaining membership by NC law enforcement and fire prevention employees)
• N.C.G.S. § 95-98 (prohibition on labor agreements between units of government and labor unions)
• N.C.G.S. § 95-98.1 (prohibition on strikes by public employees)
• N.C.G.S. § 153A-99 (county employee political activity)
• N.C.G.S. § 153A-99(a) (specific political activities the statute addresses: affiliating with civic organizations of a partisan or political nature, attending political meetings, advocating and supporting principles or policies, supporting partisan or nonpartisan candidates)
• N.C.G.S. § 160A-169 (city employee political activity)
• N.C.G.S. § 160A-169(a) (same enumerated political activities as for county employees)

Source

• Landing page: https://ncdoj.gov/opinions/house-bill-818/

Original opinion text

June 23, 1993

Senator Roy Cooper Chairman, Senate Judiciary H Committee

Re: Advisory Opinion, House Bill 818

Dear Senator Cooper:

You have asked our advice on whether House Bill 818, attached, would change North Carolina's existing right to work laws or abolish the existing state prohibition on collective bargaining by public employees. As explained below, our opinion is that it does not.

House Bill 818 amends N.C.G.S. §153A-99 and §160A-169, which regulate political activities for city and county employees. The amendments make clear that city and county employees are not restricted from engaging in political activities while off duty. Part of the amendment provides that "[a]ll State laws and all local laws and ordinances that are in conflict with this section are repealed." We understand that it is this provision which raises the question whether the bill affects existing right to work and public employee collective bargaining statutes.

The political activities as described in N.C.G.S. §§153A-99, 160A-169 concern "affiliating with civic organizations of a partisan or political nature, …attending political meetings, or advocating and supporting the principles or policies of civic or political organizations, or supporting partisan or nonpartisan candidates." N.C.G.S. §§153A-99(a), 160A-169(a). By their terms, the sections are limited to political activities and do not concern union membership, collective bargaining, wages, terms and conditions of employment or other matters that are generally considered to be subjects of collective bargaining.

The North Carolina right to work law, N.C.G.S. §§95-78 to 95-84, provides generally that no person shall be required either to be a member of a union or not be a member of a union as a condition of employment or continuation of employment. The existing state prohibition on collective bargaining by public employees prohibits law enforcement and fire prevention employees from becoming a member of or affiliating with any organization which has as one of its purposes collective bargaining with respect to "grievances, labor disputes, wages or salary, rates of pay, hours of employment, or the conditions of work of such employees." N.C.G.S. §95-97. The law also prohibits such employees from promoting labor organizations, id., labor agreements between units of government and labor unions, N.C.G.S. §95-98, and strikes by public employees, N.C.G.S. §95-98.1.

The provisions of the right to work law and prohibition on public employee collective bargaining do not attempt to regulate political activities by city and county employees. We find no conflict between N.C.G.S. §§153A-99, 160A-169, which concerns only political activities, and existing right to work laws and collective bargaining prohibition for public employees, which do not concern political activities by public employees. It is our opinion, therefore, that House Bill 818 would have no effect on either the State's right to work laws or its prohibition on collective bargaining by public employees.

Should you need anything further, please advise.

John R. McArthur Chief Counsel