Card Check Confusion in Texarkana
Arkansas State AFL-CIO head Alan Hughes misses the mark not once, not twice, but thrice in today's Texarkana Gazette.
First, Hughes asserts that the "Employee Free Choice Act" or Card Check bill wouldn't undermine the secret ballot. He says:
"Show me where it says the secret ballot is taken away. It's not in the bill."
Members of Congress have recently come under fire for not reading bills on which they are voting, so perhaps it's fair to level the same criticism against individuals who don't read bills for which they are advocating. Section II of EFCA states very clearly that once union organizers have persuaded more than 50 percent of workers to sign a card, the National Labor Relations Board "shall not direct an election, but shall certify the union..." In other words, it would be illegal for the Board to hold a secret ballot election regardless of how many workers wanted one.
Hughes then tries to rebut the obvious fact that making workers sign cards in public, instead of voting in private, means that others will know whether or not an individual worker supports the union. He says:
"The only people who will see the employee's decision is the organizer as he or she puts the cards into an envelope…"
Right. That's been our point all along. Someone else besides the individual worker will know. In this case, a union organizer — putting workers who don't support the union at risk of harassment and intimidation until they agree to check the "yes" box on the card.
Finally, Hughes says that signature cards would be "hand[ed] in to the Department of Labor." While those not immersed in the world of organized labor might assume that the U.S. Department of Labor deals with union certification, it is, of course, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) that handles such issues. So is this why union membership has been trending downward?
Perhaps that last one was a bit of a cheap shot; Hughes could have simply misspoke. But the larger picture is that advocates of EFCA have been, and will continue to, pump out misinformation about the bill. EFCA is on hold at least until Congress comes back after the recess. But this is no time to let up in educating the public about this job-killing legislation.
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