Big Labor's Shameless Power Grab

by Reed Larson

FOR RELEASE: October 5, 2001

In the aftermath of the recent terrorist attacks on New York and Washington DC, the American people should not have to worry about certain members of Congress attempting to sneak through controversial legislation behind their backs.

For most of the country, this is a time of mourning, reflection, prayer and renewed determination.

But Ted Kennedy, Hillary Clinton, and Big Labor see it as a golden opportunity.

Just two short days after the attacks, Senator Ted Kennedy rammed a controversial bill to forcibly unionize local and state Public Safety officers through his Senate Health Education Labor and Pensions Committee without even a recorded vote. This was a shameless act, meant to use our current national crisis for cover.

This bill, deceptively named the "Public Safety Employer-Employee Cooperation Act," would in fact override state and local statutes to hand over every public safety officer in the country to Big Labor by federal fiat.

In fact, union officials have described this bill as "the largest expansion of labor (union) power considered by Congress in decades."

This is hardly a bill to be slipped through Congress without debate.

But that didn't stop Big Labor –- and Ted Kennedy was just getting warmed up.

In a near-empty Senate Chamber just days after sneaking the bill out of Committee, Ted Kennedy attempted to sneak this bill out of the full Senate by unanimous consent, again, without so much as a vote.

Fortunately, at least one Senator objected to Ted Kennedy's maneuver thus stopping his shameless union boss power grab.

Then came one of the lowest moments I have ever witnessed in Washington D.C. As the Senate debated the Department of Defense Appropriations bill, Kennedy tried to attach this bill as an amendment. I don't know if this underhanded tactic will succeed, but I do know this—his actions today are truly obscene.

To brazenly hold up the entire Defense bill for a political payback to Big Labor should not be tolerated in this time of national crisis. Americans must speak up now.

You see, these tactics are not new. The union bosses have shown in the past that they are not above using national crises and even war to further their agenda. After all, union officials actually used the second World War to advance their agenda of forced unionism. They did so at the risk of damaging the war effort by holding vital bills for ransom and threatening work slowdowns until their demands were met.

At a time when Americans everywhere were rallying together and sacrificing, Big Labor was taking advantage of the situation for their own gain -– and gain they did.

Using wartime strikes as leverage, Big Labor had the power to virtually get anything they wanted. Strikes in 1942 alone totaled nearly 4,300, a 71 percent increase from 1940!

These wartime extortions forced the federal government to hand over millions of workers to compulsory unionism.

The free-reigning National War Labor Board (NWLB) was created and had almost unlimited power to issue "directive orders" without Congress or Presidential approval. During the war, virtually the entire U.S. economy became subject to the NWLB and Big Labor.

These shameless acts helped the labor union movement gain steam from 20% representation in 1941 to over 60% within two years time, virtually crippling the economy with relentless and shameless strikes under the shadow of war.

It looks as if Organized Labor is trying to make history repeat itself here.

This bill that Organized Labor and its allies in Congress are attempting to ram through is dangerous. Federally imposed monopoly bargaining would strip public-safety officers and employees of their freedom and would soak state and local taxpayers for hundreds of millions of dollars annually in increased costs. It would also leave Americans open to strikes and work stoppages that have accompanied forced unionism wherever it has gone.

The majority of states have resisted Big Labor and currently don't force public service officers to join a union just to get or keep a job.

The new war we are all about to fight against terrorism is unlike any we have fought, mostly because attacks are likely to come on our own soil. The country must be prepared for this possibility and take steps to ensure that our emergency services are at their peak. Forced unionism of our police and firefighters does nothing but harm to this cause.

America's Public Safety workers truly are our nation's bravest and finest. When we are in danger, they risk their lives to come to our aid, as we all saw in their heroic rescue attempts at the World Trade Center.

Now it is time that we come to their aid and stop Ted Kennedy from handing them over to Big Labor control.