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6 Lab. Law. 97 (1990)
Past, Present, and Future in Wrongful Termination Law

handle is hein.journals/lablaw6 and id is 121 raw text is: Past, Present, and Future in Wrongful Termination Law Joseph R. Grodin* Hastings College of Law University of California San Francisco, California I. Introduction Before discussing recent developments in wrongful termination law, I hope you will tolerate a bit of personal historical musing by someone who began his legal career thirty-five years ago when being a labor lawyer meant understanding such things as the fine distinc- tion the NLRB and the courts made between a rule prohibiting union solicitation during working time and working hours, and when a federal court could say without fear of contradiction that an em- ployer could dismiss an employee for any reason or no reason at all, so long as the reason wasn't union membership or activity. (Remem- ber the E.G. Budd' case that's in all the labor law casebooks?) I have been privileged, since then, to witness the growth and variations in the labor and employment field from a variety of perspectives-as an advocate, teacher, arbitrator, administrative agency member, and state court judge. I have observed at close range the gradual but ineluctable transition of our legal system away from the character- istically American model in which the role of the state is simply to establish a structure within which collective bargaining may occur, toward the characteristically European model, in which the role of the state is to provide certain basic protections to employees; in short, from process to values. Nostalgia aside, I don't know that these changes are cause for either lamentation or rejoicing. I doubt that they move us perceptibly closer to either perdition or utopia. They need to be viewed with perspective, as reflections of fundamental changes in our social structure, and in our expectations regarding the relationship be- tween a worker and his job. As a young union lawyer, I dreamed that one day all workers would be represented by democratic and effective unions of their own choosing, and I grieve over the loss of that dream. At the same time, I welcome what appears to be a de- *This paper is based on a presentation made on August 9, 1989, to the ABA Section of Labor and Employment Law. 1. Edward G. Budd Mfg. Co. v. NLRB, 138 F.2d 86 (3d Cir. 1943).

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