If you’re out and about over the Independence Day holiday — attending a Fourth of July parade, perhaps — and you spot a member of Congress, be sure to let him or her know why the Employee Free Choice Act will harm employers, employees and the right NOT to be unionized.

Here’s an NAM-produced video about EFCA, including the voices of workers who think EFCA is a bad, bad idea.

Thanks to the NAM’s Matt Preiss and James Skelly for producing the video.

We took note last week of Vice President Joe Biden’s remarks to the political and legislative conference of the Communications Workers of America, checking to see what he had to say about the Employee Free Choice Act. (Transcript.)

Amid the expected exhortation, one phrase jumped out when the Vice President attacked union opponents generally and the Bush-era National Labor Relations Board specifically for being biased against union organizers.

You know, the National Labor Relations Act says we should “encourage” – paraphrase – “encourage” unions, not mandate them, encourage them. Why? It’s good for the economy. It’s gotten lopsided, folks.

The guys who were supposed to be wearing striped shirts have been wearing black shirts the last eight years. We don’t have referees out there doing it the right way. We’re switching out the shirts, because we’re switching out the people wearing the shirts.

Black shirts? Black shirts? That’s the term used to describe the Italian paramilitary squads and bully boys who helped Mussolini’s rise to power after WWI. (Oswald Mosely’s fascists in England were also known by the term.) If you call someone a “black shirt” you’re calling him a fascist.

We chalked the use of the term up to rhetorical haste, a confusion of black hats — bad guys — and striped shirts — referees. True, you would think someone with vast foreign policy experience would be sensitive to a term like black shirt. Still, a mistake.

But the Vice President has used the term in other speeches to union groups. It’s obviously part of his stump union speech. At some point he or his speech writer said, “Yeah, black shirts. That’s good. Put that in.”

From Vice President Biden’s remarks to the 2009 Legislative Conference Of The American Federation Of State, County And Municipal Employees, May 12, 2009:

There has been a steady drumbeat. The guys wearing striped shirts were wearing black shirts, not striped shirts as referees. They’ve done anything administratively, legislatively and creatively for someone who wants to join a union to join a union.

Black shirts AND drumbeats.

Closer to 60 votes for the Employee Free Choice Act?  Well, yes, by definition, but …

Seth Borden at EFCA Report reaches a conclusion that we tend to share:

Expect a renewed wave of enthusiasm by the bill’s supporters in the days to come.  Still, once Franken is seated as the second Senator from Minnesota, EFCA in its current form faces an uphill battle.   Many of the 60 votes possibly controlled by the Democrats have openly questioned the bill’s current provisions – Sens. Lincoln, Feinstein, and Bennet to name but a few.  Senator Arlen Specter (D-PA), whose recent famous party switch put the Democrats this close to the prospect of cloture on any given measure, has consistently criticized EFCA as currently drafted. 

With lots of links, including more speculation about Specter’s position and Sen. Tom Harkin’s “compromise.”

President Obama has announced his intention to nominate George Cohen for a role that not too many folks outside of Washington have ever heard of: the Director of Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service. So what’s the big deal? Why is this post important?

Well, if the misleadingly named Employee Free Choice Act becomes the law of the land, the Mr. Cohen will be the one that oversees the agency charged with forcing government contracts on newly unionized private employers.

You may think that’s outrageous, but I refer you to read the details of the legislation:

S.560
Section 3
`(2) If after the expiration of the 90-day period beginning on the date on which bargaining is commenced, or such additional period as the parties may agree upon, the parties have failed to reach an agreement, either party may notify the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service of the existence of a dispute and request mediation. Whenever such a request is received, it shall be the duty of the Service promptly to put itself in communication with the parties and to use its best efforts, by mediation and conciliation, to bring them to agreement.

`(3) If after the expiration of the 30-day period beginning on the date on which the request for mediation is made under paragraph (2), or such additional period as the parties may agree upon, the Service is not able to bring the parties to agreement by conciliation, the Service shall refer the dispute to an arbitration board established in accordance with such regulations as may be prescribed by the Service. The arbitration panel shall render a decision settling the dispute and such decision shall be binding upon the parties for a period of 2 years, unless amended during such period by written consent of the parties.’.

Yikes. George Cohen, a person you may have never heard of before today may become the person that oversees the system that determines how you can you manage your own workforce.

The Washington Post ran a piece today that focused on an interview with Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis. Of course, the most controversial labor issue was brought up: the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA).

The Secretary asserts that in “many cases, in many cases, workers have been disadvantaged.” She claims, “They’ve been intimidated, they’ve been harassed, and we have case after case after case that we can look at.”

She then makes an argument popular with organized labor, describing “barriers” that have been put in place “over the past few years”. Well, what precisely? Why wasn’t the Secretary pressed for specifics? One can only assume that she is referring to decisions of the National Labor Relations Board. The President has already nominated two individuals to the board who will significantly change the dynamics of the board for years to come.

If there are legitimate violations of the National Labor Relations Act, then let’s have the NLRB rule on them. If there are other barriers, let’s have the NLRB review them. Otherwise, let’s talk facts: Workers who wish to become union members are able to do so. Last year alone unions saw membership increase by 400,000, unions won 67% of the secret ballot elections and these elections took place 95% of the time within 56 days.

From page 78 of the manager’s amendment, concerning state revolving loan funds for small- and medium-sized manufacturers.

(F) COMPLIANCE WITH WAGE RATE REQUIREMENTS.-Each recipient of a loan shall undertake and agree to incorporate or cause to be incorporated into all contracts for construction, alteration or repair, which are paid for in whole or in part with funds obtained pursuant to such loan, a requirement that all laborers and mechanics employed by contractors and subcontractors performing construction, alteration or repair shall be paid wages at rates not less than those determined by the Secretary of Labor, in accordance with subchapter IV of chapter 31 of title 40, United States Code (known as the ‘Davis-Bacon Act’), to be prevailing for the corresponding classes of laborers and mechanics employed on projects of a character similar to the contract work in the same locality in which the work is to be performed.

The Secretary of Labor shall have, with respect to the labor standards specified in this subparagraph, the authority and functions set forth in Reorganization Plan Numbered 14 of 1950 (15 F.R. 3176; 64 Stat. 1267) and section 3145 of title 40, United States Code.

So that’s one of organized labor’s rewards in the bill, the spreading of above-market wage rates to smaller manufacturers.

(UPDATE) (11:30 a.m.): Ivan Osorio at the Competitive Enterprise Institute adds:

Davis-Bacon-like provisions of this sort also make it more difficult for non-union companies to compete for bids. This results in higher costs, which are paid for by taxpayers.

With their share of the private sector work force declining to around 8 percent, unions need such alliances with environmentalists to gain political goods like this. Expect to see more of this.

Not seeing any coverage of Vice President Joe Biden’s remarks to the Communications Workers of America on Wednesday, we transcribed his remarks related to the Employee Free Choice Act.

The quotable parts:

You know, the National Labor Relations Act says we should “encourage” – paraphrase – “encourage” unions, not mandate them, encourage them. Why? It’s good for the economy. It’s gotten lopsided, folks.

The guys who were supposed to be wearing striped shirts have been wearing black shirts the last eight years. We don’t have referees out there doing it the right way. We’re switching out the shirts, because we’re switching out the people wearing the shirts.

Black shirts? As in Italian fascists? We assume that’s just a slip, a hasty conflation of black hats and striped shirts, but man…

And:

So if we were just able to get a fora [sic] in which we could debate this honestly and straight-forwardly, without all the baggage, without all the hyperbole, this is something I believe right-thinking, decent Americans, Democrat and Republican, if they hear it out, would be supportive of.

No hyperbole, but the Vice President believes “right-thinking, decent Americans” would support the Employee Free Choice Act. Elsewhere, he suggests that “the good guys in the business community” understand the need for card check, and it’s the “business elites” who oppose it. Isn’t there a possibility employers might oppose the EFCA as a matter of principle? Apparently not.

The Vice President’s premise is that the system is stacked against unions that are trying to organize workplaces. But unions won more than two-thirds of the representation elections in the first half of 2008. How is that stacked against them?

Here are the transcribed remarks from the Vice President’s appearance yesterday at the joint convention/legislative-political conference of the CWA.

Keith Smith below notes Sen. Tom Harkin’s remarks to the Communications Workers of America, it’s annual legislative and political conference in Washington. We were curious as to what Vice President Biden and Labor Secretary Hilda Solis had to say to the union members, as well.

We don’t find a transcript online, but the video of the Vice President’s remarks is posted at the CWA’s website here. In introductions the union president, Larry Cohen, hails Vice President Biden’s “perfect voting record” during his 36 years in the U.S. Senate.

“I can tell you personally, he’s working actively to help us get 60 votes to put the Employee Free Choice Act on the floor of the U.S. Senate,” Cohen avers.

We don’t find Secretary Solis’ remarks anywhere; the DOL speech section includes nothing new since April 28.

As for the Vice President, we wonder who the lucky winner was:

You Can Meet Vice President Biden

June 11, 2009

Vice President Joe Biden will address CWAers at the joint convention/legislative-political conference on June 24, and one lucky CWA member will be chosen to join the escort committee to make him feel right at home. Click here for your chance to meet Joe Biden.

The only requirements are that you are a CWA member and that you are an active contributor to CWA-COPE. If you are not currently contributing to CWA-COPE, you can sign up right here to become eligible.

Pay to play!

Yesterday at the Communications Workers of America’s joint convention/legislative-political conference Vice President Joe Biden and Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) spoke in strong support of the jobs-killing Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA.)

Sen. Harkin tried to persuade the crowd that EFCA is still “alive and kicking” despite his admissions that unless the bill is significantly changed it doesn’t have the necessary votes to get passed in the Senate.

But how significantly will it be changed?

The Senator said that any new version of the EFCA would have to be based on a set of parameters:
• Allowing for majority sign-up (that’s union speak for card check)
• Require unionized workers to receive a first contract by a date certain
• And added penalties against employers for labor law violations

Well folks, that’s still EFCA!

The Senator said that if he is unsuccessful with a “compromise” version of the bill, he will still ask to have the current EFCA legislation brought to Senator floor for a cloture vote. Why?

…so workers will know who your friends are.

Well now it’s clear that the real intent of the legislation isn’t labor law reform, it’s politics.

Or is it Ministry of Plenty?

From Olympia Business Watch, the blog of the Association of Washington Business, “Oregon becomes first state to pass union ‘gag rule’ bill“:

Oregon became the first state in the nation to pass the national AFL-CIO’s model “Worker Freedom Act,” the gag rule bill known in Washington the last several sessions as the “Worker Privacy Act.”  It purports to rebalance federal labor law in unions’ favor by restricting employers’ ability to effectively communicate with employees about labor issues during organizing and bargaining campaigns.  The Oregonian reports here, with statehouse coverage here….[snip]

If the measure is signed, expect a court fight.  One of the reasons it took national unions so long to find a state willing to pass the bill is its extremely dubious legality. Especially in light of the U.S. Supreme Court broadly striking down a similar California measure aimed at employer speech about unions, these proposals have been viewed as attempting to take away rights that employers clearly enjoy under federal labor law — something states are pre-empted from doing.

The bill is SB 519. It’s the latest in a series of anti-jobs, anti-employer measures the state’s leaders have embraced. As the Albany Democrat-Herald’s editor describes it:

The job situation in Oregon keeps going downhill, and the majority in the legislature keeps making things worse. How? By making life tougher for employers and refusing to encourage things that might generate more private-sector jobs, such as the BLM timber management plan.

Also, among other things, it has voted to raise taxes and fees, and it is poised to approve a field burning ban that will harm the grass-seed segment of Oregon agriculture.

In order to expand the state health service, the legislature will tax providers in a way that increases costs for all. It also has voted to punish employers if they insist on communicating with workers on labor issues.

Oregon now has the highest increase since last year in the welfare case load, the Wall Street Journal reports. That distinction goes along with Oregon’s second place, behind Michigan, in the rate of unemployment.

Just wondering if this is the change that Oregon voters last fall had in mind. (hh)

Oregon’s unemployment rate in May was 12.4 percent, the highest unemployment level in the state since November 1982. (November, 1982? Why, that was the month your correspondent moved out of Oregon to look for a job.)