Bills Deny Secret Ballot Vote On Union Representation

Congress is considering legislation, perversely named the "Employee Free Choice Act," that would deny working Americans the right to a secret ballot vote on union representation.

This blatantly pro-union bill is being pushed by organized labor because the working people of America have demonstrated that they reject unionism when they have access to a secret ballot.

The union's answer to this problem is to replace secret ballot elections with so called "card check" certifications. Card check union certifications are an insult and injustice to working Americans.

Under a card check certification the union is certified as the monopoly representative of all the employees when a bare majority (fifty percent plus one) sign a union authorization card.

The terrible injustice of card check union certifications is clearly demonstrated by the AFL-CIO’s own research. An AFL-CIO research study on NLRB elections found that when 60 to 75 percent of employees signed cards the union still only won 49 percent of elections.

Research by Kate Bronfenbrenner, a very pro union professor at Cornell University, found that if 70 percent of the employees signed authorization cards the union still only had a 62 percent chance of winning a secret ballot vote.

And, research by Julius Getman, Stephen Goldberg and Jeanne Herman, three labor law professors, found that 28 percent of those who signed union authorization cards opposed the union when they had a secret ballot vote.

Clearly a bare majority of employees signing union authorization cards isn’t an accurate indication of support for a union.

But union organizers want card checks because they are an open invitation to use fraud, deception and intimidation to get workers to sign authorization cards who would never vote for a union if they had access to a secret ballot.

This legislation was introduced in both houses of Congress on March 10, 2009. In the House, H.R. 1409 authored by California Congressman George Miller has 222 cosponsors and in the Senate, S. 560 authored by Massachusetts Senator Ted Kennedy has 39 cosponsors.

There has been some speculation as to where action may occur first. This legislation has become so controversial, some House members don't want to vote on it until it has been approved by the Senate.

The only possibility of stopping this blatant Union Boss power grab is a filibuster in the U.S. Senate.

It must be made absolutely clear that it is not sufficient for a U.S. Senator to say that they oppose the bill and will vote against it when it reaches the Senate Floor but that they will vote in favor of cloture on a filibuster against the bill.

The Union Bosses have bought enough votes in the Senate to get a majority. The only hope of stopping this dangerous bill is a filibuster. If a U.S. Senator opposes the EFCA and doesn’t want it to become law, they must vote against cloture.

Contacts with U.S. Senators are urgently needed to block this legislation. To facilitate these contacts, the Public Service Research Council has prepared letters opposing S. 560 in MSWord documents that you can easily alter and personalize. There are two different letters, one to Senators who are cosponsors and the other to those who are not.

Click here to check to see if your U.S. Senators are cosponsors of the bill. These letters are tailored to whether your Senators are cosponsors of the bill.

http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/z?c111:S.560:

Click here to find the contact information for your U.S. Senators.

Click here to download a Word document of a letter to Senators who are cosponsors and click here to download one for those who are not.

When you check on your U.S. Senators' contact information, you will notice that most of them include a "web form" contact. You cut and paste from the above letters to easily use these web form contact pages

Please let the the Public Service Research Council to let us know that you have taken action by clicking here. Your financial support is needed to expand our opposition to this legislation. When you let us know that you took action, please pledge a generous contribution.

Please tell others about these bills and urge them to join you in opposing them.

Updated March 11, 2009