Specter Leaning Towards Opposing Employee Free Choice?
As faithful readers already know, GOP Senator Arlen Specter has emerged as a key target in labor’s efforts to get the Employee Free Choice Act passed.
But Specter has now weighed in on the issue in a way that may give some labor folks pause. The Senator told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette that he is “well aware of the tradition of secret ballot on political elections and the difficulties of binding arbitration on the conducting of a business so I’m hearing people on all sides.”
This is potentially problematic for the pro-EFCA side. That’s because Specter seems to be treating somewhat seriously the anti-EFCA camp’s claim that the measure is undemocratic because of the secret ballot provision. This, despite the fact that the measure doesn’t forbid a secret ballot. Rather, it allows workers who want to join a union to choose not to hold one and to join based on a majority signing cards declaring their preference.
Specter also seems to be suggesting that he takes a dim view of the provision in the bill that forces arbitration in 120 days if talks break down.
Yes, Specter says he’s “hearing people on all sides.” But these quotes can’t be encouraging to the pro-EFCA camp.
Separately, today’s Washington Times breathlessly claims an “exclusive,” reporting that the AFL-CIO has privately promised to back Specter for reelection in 2010 if he backs EFCA. But we reported it here last week.
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Without rehashing the merits of EFCA here, can we please stop pretending that the Act somehow preserves the secret ballot in union elections? As a management side labor lawyer, I disagree with all of the EFCA proponents’ arguments, but at least those who say that “card check is still democratic,” or that “there won’t be significant coercion by organizers” are arguing in the real world. Greg (who is by no means alone on this) says that EFCA “doesn’t forbid a secret ballot. Rather, it allows workers who want to join a union to choose not to hold one and to join based on a majority signing cards declaring their preference.” Well yes, it’s true that a majority — as determined by a non-secret ballot election! — can “choose” not to have a secret ballot election (and proced straight to automatic unionization). I have read enough of Greg here and at TPM toknow that he can see right through such circular logic — please don’t insult our intelligence by persisting in the claim that this isn’t the end of the secret ballot union election.
And to pre-empt one other matter: as others sometimes note, the law will technically still permit a union to file an election petition (i.e., a request that the NLRB hold a secret ballot election as is done currently) rather than simply submitting the majority of cards they have gathered under the EFCA process. But the whole rationale for EFCA is the claim that such elections are “unfair” because the employer uses the weeks between the petition and the election to coerce and intimidate workers into voting no on the union. Why then, having won a generational victory in the ability to bypass this “broken” process, would any union with majority support not simply use card check to be automatically certified? It would be crazy and even highly hypocitical for a union to turn around and subject the workforce to the supposedly evil secret ballot process — and anyone who knows anything about it on either side will tell you it simply will not happen if EFCA passes in its current form. Most honest proponents of the law will admit that and call it progress.
See what the threat of a primary challenge does? All of these politicians stand for nothing other than to stay employed/elected. McCain was threatened with a primary challenge down in Arizona and all of a sudden he became Obama’s biggest critic.
And once the primary challenge is defeated/or off the table they’ll veer sharp left and hope everybody forgets that they stand for nothing except saying whatever is necessary at the time to stay elected.
Dems are no better as the red cross torture leak memo shows that they didn’t want to speak up politically in 2006 because they thought it would be used against them for that election cycle.
The sentence construction of the quote seems to pad the landing for support rather than telegraphy final judgment in opposition.
King
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Funny I don’t follow, since in point of fact the union members CAN still elect to have a secret election. The truth is the only difference will be who controls whether they have one or not. Right now management gets to mandate a secret ballot ON SITE and allegations of intimidation by management rarely if ever get investigated and or prosecuted. In the meantime the workers who are laid off for supporting unionization have no recourse. The truth also is just like a worker can report management for intimidation they can also report union organizers. The problem for business is THEY want to have the power in all of this, not the workers. Funny how no business owner has ever asked to have a secret ballot mandated to decertify a union though. Any thoughts on that?
The notion that EFCA still maintains secret ballots is a little like trusting the fox to guard the henhouse. For a video explanation of how this works in the real world, check out this video at http://www.TheTruthAboutEFCA.com
On the subject of binding arbitration, does this mean that now Specter is going to come out against the clauses in contracts that give corporations the right to appoint an arbitrator in any disagreement? I wonder what King has to say about them. The record shows that the appointed arbitrators are blatantly biased against workers. Furthermore, when on occasion an arbitrator just has to side with the employee, for some reason they never get selected to be an arbitrator again. I would take King and Jacobson a bit more seriously if they came out against those contract clauses.
@ sgwhiteinfla
Let me try to walk you through it: the whole debate over EFCA is whether the best way to determine the majority’s freely chosen decision on unionization is through a secret ballot election or the card check process. To say that secret ballot elections are preserved under EFCA is disingenuous — to do so, Greg (and you) must say that (a) secret ballot elections theoretically could still be requested by unions (notwithstanding their multi-million dollar lobbying campaign to the effect that such elections are frauds and that card check is a fine method of determining the employees’ choice, but that’s another point); and (b) the only time employees are deprived of a secret ballot election is when a majority of employees sign cards saying “we want the union” (i.e., indicate their desire for unionization through a non-secret ballot process). As anyone can see, this is entirely circular; it tells employees, “you have a right to this process, unless we don’t use this process to determine that you don’t have that right.”
The fact is that EFCA eliminates the secret ballot election in all but name — they will never occur under EFCA, period. Try this: you have a right to elect your city councilman by secret ballot election, but a new rule says if any challenger presents signatures of registered voters totaling over 50% of the district, he or she is automatically seated without the need for an election. Has your right to a secret ballot election been preserved? As a practical matter this example is, if anything, much more likely to lead to at least some elections (since there is a set deadline), whereas under EFCA a union will simply engage in card signing until a majority of cards are signed.
As I said before, there are many arguments I am not addressing here. You can tell me why you think card signing is a superior process to secret ballot elections, or that employer bad acts require this measure even if it isn’t the best, etc — just don’t tell me EFCA won’t elminate secret ballot elections because it patently will.
Finally, you are correct that employers presently have the right to choose to accept cards as proof of majority status or request an NLRB-run election. While that does seem to give the union and the company the power to cooperatively deprive employees of an election, the Board has largely fixed that problem by allowing a decert election petition to be filed within 90 days after such a voluntary recognition. As for the method of decertification, it is only by election currently — if card signing was so great you’d think unions would want to allow employees to decertify them that way too. (Shockingly, it’s not in the act as proposed).
@ Texas Aggie
There are two very different kinds of arbitration involved. EFCA provides that an arbitrator will decide what the parties’s agreement is — actually set the contract terms like wages and benefits for a two year period — if they haven’t reached an agreement within about 120 days after the union gets in. This is known as interest arbitration, and it is arguably a far more radical departure from the foundations of our labor and contract law than anything to do with card check.
What you’re referring to is dispute arbitration, which can be between any two parties, but in the employment context usually refers to and employee/employer agreement to arbitrate employment disputes or and union/company agreement to arbitrate the resolution of grievances brought under the parties collective bargaining agreement. In my experience, arbitrations between individual employees and companies are slightly biased in the companies’ favor, while labor arbitrations are slightly biased in the unions’ favor.
I am really not strongly for or against either type of dispute arbitration, so long as the two parties agreed that this would be how they resolved the issues at stake. I’m not sure why you should take me any more or less seriously based on what I think about dispute arbitration, but there you have it. Interest arbitration, on the other hand, is pernicious at best and possibly unconstitutional as proposed in EFCA. For one thing, EFCA provides no guidance at all (in its current form) upon which arbitrators can rely to set these contract terms. The NLRA has always said that unions can strike to get concessions from companies, but it has never allowed for the parties to be subjected to terms they don’t agree to; terms that could bankrupt the company and put everyone out of work. It really has the potential to be a huge fiasco, so I’m against it.
According to the HR Policy Association(a business group) there have been 42 citations against unions for intimidation in the 78 years of the act, and 29,303 citations in 2007 against employers. This shows where the real intimidation is. These facts came from a review of NLRB cases by the HR policy Association.
I’m focused on Specter’s re-election.
The EFCA vote is important but too esoteric. It won’t matter to the electorate in the Pennsylvania primary 14 months from now.
Politically speaking, it doesn’t make sense for Specter to jump ship and become a Democrat or Independent now. He is better off biding his time and hoping the economy shows substantial signs of recovery by this time next year.
If it does, his Republican foes (i.e. Pat Toomey) will have lost their biggest argument against his re-election.
If he loses the GOP primary, he will still have time to pull a Lieberman and get in the race as an Independent.
Specter will not be able to run as an Independent if he loses the Republican primary. Pennsylvania has a “sore loser” law, which prevents someone who lost in a party primary from running as an Independent in the general election
Ridiculous. The CofC are such shifty BS-smiths. Specter is a real smart guy, and he’s not a moral leper like most of his teammates. It’s so disappointing to hear him buying their line of ****. I can’t believe their audacity and shamelessness. This is about protecting the sanctity of the “secret ballot?” This insulting proposition rests on either of 2 faulty premises 1) it assumes that union organizers have the power to coerce someone who would not truly vote union into signing a union authorization card, 2) it assumes that workers are not stand-up characters, and that substantial numbers of them will falsely express union support. Either way, in order to buy their line, you have to believe insulting things about union organizers or about workers in general.
Here’s a plain fact of law and fairness: if 50% +1 of the workers in a given bargaining unit want a union, and they have said so by signing union authorization cards, THEY SHOULD HAVE A UNION. They shouldn’t have to wait for a “magnanimous” employer to voluntarily recognize, and shouldnt have to wait months for an election to be conducted, because the employer will be coercing workers to back out of their union support in the meantime.
Thanks for the education Bamacky. I was unaware of that. It certainly changes the strategy.
Brookland20002:
Business owners should have the right to run their business as they see fit and they should be able to run them without unions if they so desire. You would not want a union in your business if you were the owner, I guarantee. Unions eventually destroy small businesses and have no purpose other than to collect union dues and line their own pockets.
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