Right to Work Blog

Hotair.com looks at the latest strike by SEIU (Service Employees International Union) members — against their own union!

“A new national survey of 1,000 likely voters . . . shows strong opposition to . . . [the Card Check Forced Unionism Bill from voters] who sent Barack Obama to the White House. . . .”

Key findings of the poll include:

• 73% of Obama voters are opposed to the . . . [Card Check Bill].

• 86% of Obama voters believe that a worker’s vote should be kept private in a union organizing election.

• 81% of Obama voters believe that secret ballot elections are the best way to protect the individual rights of workers.

. . .

• 68% of Obama voters believe the binding arbitration provisions in . . . [the Card Check Bill] are risky and unwise.

• 61% of Obama voters would be less likely to vote for a Member of Congress who voted to take away the secret ballot from workers.

The findings reinforce why Big Labor’s top priority is losing momentum. Even while he announced several labor-friendly initiatives at the White House last Friday, with prominent labor leaders in attendance, President Obama did not mention . . . [the Card Check Bill]. This lack of recognition speaks volumes about the growing unpopularity of the legislation and its negative impact on worker privacy and job creation.

Those aren’t our words (though the thought has crossed our minds) but the words of Malcolm Harris, the boss of the Union of Union Representatives which represents 210 employees of the Service Employees International Union (SEIU).

The group is picketing the SEIU brass, accusing them of “union busting and anti-worker policies,” according to the Philadelphia Inquirer. (This also begs the question, if you work at the Union of Union Representatives, would you be represented by the union of Union of Union Representatives?)

Deroy Murdock hits another grand slam for workers with his latest column, pointing out that:

While union bosses disdain secret ballots at America’s workplaces, they typically require them for internal elections.

The International Brotherhood of Teamsters’ 2006 constitution invokes secret ballots 29 times. “All voting shall be by secret ballot,” it mandates for picking top officers including General President, Hoffa’s title.

In choosing convention delegates, the Service Employees International Union’s 2008 constitution says, “arrangements may be made at the option of the Local Executive Board for nomination and secret ballot election.”

“The election of Local Union Executive Officers shall take place by secret ballot during May and June,” states the United Auto Workers’ 2006 constitution.

Big Labor’s hostility to secret ballots violates planetary benchmarks. The Geneva-based, U.N.-affiliated International Labor Office sets global labor standards. Its 2006 guidebook, “Freedom of Association,” states: “The existence of legislation which is designed to promote democratic principles within trade union organizations is acceptable. Secret and direct voting is certainly a democratic process and cannot be criticized as such.”
Regarding strike votes, ILO also praises conditions “with the workers enjoying the safeguard of a secret ballot.”

While American labor pushes workers’ rights below U.N.-guidelines — as F. Vincent Vernuccio recently noted in the Washington Times — Mexico’s Supreme Court in 2008 unanimously endorsed secret ballots in union-representation elections. Mexico’s National Association of Democratic Lawyers calls secret ballots “an essential element for respecting workers’ rights and for the democratization of unions and the country itself.”

It appears that three big retailers are expected to support an alternative Card Check Scam proposal, according to The Wall Street Journal:

Costco Wholesale Corp., Starbucks Corp. and Whole Foods Market Inc. are supporting the alternative proposal, according to someone familiar with the effort. Ray Krupin, a management labor lawyer in Washington said the most likely compromise would allow employees to unionize if 70% of them sign union-authorization cards, as opposed to 50% as currently proposed in the Employee Free Choice Act.
. . .
It’s unclear whether the proposal addresses a thorny section of the bill that would have a government arbitrator draw up a contract if unions and companies can’t agree to terms within 120 days.
. . .
The anticipated proposal was condemned by some business groups. “These huge companies are selling out hundreds of thousands of small ones under the guise of making some phony and misguided compromise with Big Labor,” said Mark Mix, president of the National Right to Work Committee, which has been campaigning against the bill. “We believe we have this draconian bill defeated outright, so these actions may well lead to the bill’s passage.”

Perhaps these companies would like to know that you will be taking your business elsewhere.

Cesar Conda at the Corner looks back to 1989 and the landmark consent decree between the Justice Department and the Teamsters union regarding mob-related criminal activity that was prevalent within the union. As we approach the 20th anniversary of the agreement, Conda encourages readers to “review the media’s coverage of the March 1989 settlement between the Teamsters and the Justice Department, and the subsequent coverage of the Teamsters’ first secret ballot presidential election in 1991. The secret-ballot reform was widely hailed by labor experts and editorial pages as a major breakthrough in the labor movement that would make the nation’s largest union more democratic and accountable to its rank and file members. At that time, Dennis Rivera, the head of the New York health-care workers union and the current chairman of the SEIU’s health-care task force, even suggested that federal labor law be changed to require secret-ballot elections of every labor leader in the country.”

About the only people who will benefit from enactment of the Card Check Scam Bill are union bosses, according to Michael Barone:

Card check would give coercive union organizers the chance to impose on large swaths of the private-sector economy the burdens the UAW imposed on the Detroit automakers. It would set up tollgates to channel the money of consumers as well as taxpayers to the Democratic Party. You can see how that would be good for union leaders and Democrats. But good for America?

Stuart Taylor of the National Journal sees the Card Check Forced Unionism Bill as bad for employers and employees alike.

The following quote by Teamster General President Jimmy Hoffa is one for the record books:

Since when is the secret ballot a basic tenet of democracy?

Take it with a grain of salt, but some Big Labor activists appear to be nervous about “Democrat defections” on the Card Check Forced Unionism Bill. The liberal Huffington Post quotes a union lobbyist as saying:

“There are no guarantees that this thing can get past cloture,” said the official. And it’s not because of Republican opposition, he added. “You’ve got Pryor and Lincoln who might not support it. There is Baucus, Landrieu, and even Bayh. And then there is Nelson of Nebraska.”

Apparently, even newly appointed Democrat Senator Michael Bennet (D-CO) is undecided too.

We have to keep the pressure on.