Dear Editor:
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I would like to respond to your article in the Gallatin North Missourian on May 6 entitled "Protecting Workers Right to a Secret Ballot."
Unions did not create the system of card checking the National Labor Relations Act of 1935 did. The system dictates that the National Labor Relations Board counts the cards and reports the results. If there is any question they must then conduct a secret ballot election. Free elections are already built into the current law and always have been.
I’m afraid your objections to the Federal bi-partisan, Employee Free Choice Act, SB 560 has little to do with any feigned concern on your part to "protect workers rights" and more to do with your inherent discrimination against hard working American’s legal right to form or join a union.
The problem with the "secret ballot" is first, it’s not secret, the employer knows who is pro-union and who is not.
The second problem is not the secret ballot election itself, but the lengthy one-sided campaign preceding it. The employer has unlimited access to the employee and unlimited resources to intimidate and coerce employees. Unions have severely limited access. Anti-union managers can campaign with every worker, throughout the workplace, and around the clock. Pro-union employees can campaign only on break time. Management can require employees to attend "captive audience" anti-union meetings. Pro-union workers can be forced to attend, but denied the opportunity to speak out.
The Economic Policy Institute reports that in the 70 years of the National Labor Relations Act, there were only 42 documented cases of fraud or coercion by unions in the submittal of authorization cards. By contrast, there were 29,000 documented cases of intimidation or coercion by employers in 2007 alone. The Federal, bi-partisan, Employee Free Choice Act protects employees from retaliation and intimidation from employers, who have much more leverage on an employee than a union does. The employer can fire, promote, demote or reassign workers. They can also threaten to close a shop if it goes union.
For more than 70 years, the nation’s labor laws have proclaimed a working American’s right to join a union is a fundamental freedom, just like the right to free speech or worship. Indeed the freedom to form unions and bargain with employers stems from other basic American rights <197> freedom of association and petitioning for the redress of grievances.
It would be nice if we didn’t need unions to bargain for employees with huge multi-national corporations, but we’ve tried it without unions and it didn’t work out so well for working men, women or children. Some employers cannot be trusted to treat their employees fairly with respect and dignity.
If history has taught us anything it’s that belonging to a union is the best way to insure an employee’s "civil liberties." Because of unions we have a minimum wage, the eight hour day and, the 40 hour week. If not for unions setting wage standards, non-union workers today would be working for third world wages.
What does SB 560 do?
First, the Employee Free Choice Act restores the working American’s right to make their own decisions about whether to form and join unions.
This short-circuits the current management-dominated election process where companies can coerce employees not to support the union.
Second, the Employee Free Choice Act provides real penalties for companies that break the law during organizing campaigns. Third, the Employee Free Choice Act makes sure that employers and employees negotiate a first contract in a timely manner.
As one of your constituents, Representative Guernsey, and a union member for 40 years, I resent your resorting to union bashing. I am very disappointed with you and the rest of the Missouri legislature for proposing HR 1362, an arrogant, divisive blatantly partisan, anti-union piece of legislation. If you were truly interested in "protecting workers rights" you would be supporting the Employee Free Choice Act, a bill that has bi-partisan support in congress.
It’s time our elected representatives start representing working Americans instead of the anti-union multi-national corporations that fund your campaigns.
Paul Caven