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Handful of Senators Deny Employee Free Choice—For Now |
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The battle for the Employee Free Choice Act moves to the 2008 election after a handful of obstructionist senators have blocked a vote on the bill. On a vote of 51-48, the Senate voted for cloture, that is, shutting off debate. Sixty votes were needed to invoke cloture and end the debate and move to a vote on the bill. So even though a majority of the Senate voted for cloture, a small group of Republicans denied workers a free choice to join a union.
But the momentum for this bill is growing. The grassroots movement behind this legislation is bigger and more exciting than anyone believed last year. Working families across the country mounted a massive campaign to win passage of the bill. Sixteen governors and nearly 1,300 state and local elected officials expressed support for the legislation in all 50 states. Seven presidential candidates also backed the bill.
Working families held more than 100 rallies last week across the country demanding that Congress restore the fundamental freedom to join a union and bargain for a better life. More than 4,500 workers and elected officials rallied on Capitol Hill June 19 to urge support for the legislation. Middle-class Americans generated 50,000 telephone calls to the Senate, 156,000 faxes and e-mail messages and 220,000 postcards, including 120,000 delivered to the Senate last week.
Even though the cloture vote fell short, this vote is a step forward because it is the first time in a generation that a majority of the U.S. Senate has voted for workers’ rights. Click here to see how your senators voted.
The Employee Free Choice Act (S.1041), would have leveled the playing field in the workplace by allowing workers to decide to join a union without employer interference and require arbitration if a timely agreement is not reached on a first contract.
AFL-CIO President John Sweeney says:
…the Senate vote shows the ground has shifted. The status quo of our broken system is unacceptable. Those who continue to support our broken system will find themselves on the wrong side of history. And that battle engages now, as we move into the 2008 elections, when working people will elect more senators and a president who will champion their concerns and fight for their futures.
The obstruction of this bill is just one in a series of Republican actions to stall needed legislation. The Center for American Progress recently reported that Senate conservatives have tied up 239 bills passed by the U.S. House of Representatives, by “objecting to just about every major piece of legislation that [Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.)] has tried to bring up.”
Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.), who sponsored the bill, along with 46 others, said during the debate this morning the issue of workers being free to join a union is not just an economic issue but also a moral and civil rights issue. He cited the strong support for the bill from religious leaders and the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights.
Reid called on his colleagues to support cloture because the bill will be good for both workers and employers.
Today for far too many Americans, that New Deal has become a raw deal. It’s time to give working families a square deal. A square deal that honors workers and their families by giving them a real chance for a better life.
During the debate, Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) said the long delays between the time an election is held and the time the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) acts makes the whole process “dysfunctional.”
The NLRB takes so long to act that the election becomes moot—it no longer matters any more. When you look at what the NLRB does, it is totally ineffective.
Presidential candidate Sen. Joe Biden (D-Del.). said:
Let there be no mistake about it. The union movement and the middle class are under attack. As the power of labor declined, the economic power of corporate America skyrocketed. It’s time it changed.
It used to be that we had a grand bargain that as labor increased productivity and as industry benefited, they benefited. That basic compact has been broken.
Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) said the time for this bill has come and supporters will not give up because the country wants and needs this legislation:
In (the) 2006 (election), the middle class spoke up. They understand they have not shared in the wealth that’s been produced.
It’s clear the majority of the American people want this legislation. A majority of the House wants it. A majority of the Senate wants it. And we will keep coming back year after year.
12 Comments
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I think the labor movement has to face the reality that once again
we suffered a significant loss on a critical piece of legislation.
Rather than trying to paint a bright picture about how we won a majority of the vote in the US Senate for the Employee Free Choice Act,I think the AFL-CIO should strenuously and vociferously place the blame for our defeat where it belongs–with all but one of the Republican Senators,and with George W Bush.The only Republican.It is pathetic that we won only one Republican Senator,Spector,who voted with us.
I find it very ironic that five minutes after we suffered this crushing defeat,a substantial majority of Democratic Senators gave Bush a major victory by voting for cloture on the convuluted,unintelligible,inadequate immigration legislation.
I urge the AFL-CIO to publicly go after every Republican Senator up for reelection next year.They are stooges for the anti union corporations in America that are eager to destroy the organized labor movement,and voters in their states ought to know about it.
Ed Fire,Retired President
IUE-CWA
Today The Senate did not listen to the mayority of Americans
we lost n the free vote and they past the immigration bill this is slap in the face and shows how big bussiness and corpotations really run America for now, I hope you remeber this votes on the coming elcetions.
for legal Imigration and for Unions
I think the AFL-CIO should call and sponsor a march on DC on this important issues
Is the time to do so the middle class is loosing big time
It’s very interesting to me that when the tables were turned and the Republicans were in charge, they could and did do anything they wanted - and usually “in the spirit of compromise,” the Democrats went along.
Now the tables have turned, but nothing’s changed. Apparently the Senate Democrats find it difficult to wield legislative power as the Republicans did.
Every Senator needs to get wise. Workers and Unions need to be treated with respect. Oh, and somebody should tell these people that “the right to work” doesn’t mean you CAN’T have a union.
There is power in the Union.
It is more than proper to blame the anti-worker Repiglican scum that stopped Free Choice in its tracks. And they’re laughing at us as we speak!
Why? I’ll tell you.
Back when Bill “Cat-killer” Frist ran the Senate, every time the Democrats got a notion to stand on their hind legs and filibuster, he’d politely inform them that he’d eliminate the filibuster if they even dared try. As a consequence, the Senate Democrats, terrified to a point of soiling themselves, would always stand down and accede to the wishes of the majority.
Fast forward to today: what that cloture vote meant was that the Republcans effectively filibustered the Free Choice Act. That’s right! The Repigs FILIBUSTERED the Free Choice Act. Let that sink in.
It is in right and proper to blame the sleazy corporate lick-spittle Republicans who killed the hope of working people, who took that hope out in a dark alley and stomped its guts out. Sure. Absolutely.
But we fail ourselves and our country if we do not hold the gutless, spineless wimps in the Senate Democratic leadership responsible, as well.
Where was Harry Reid? Why couldn’t he threaten to take away the filibuster if the Republicans didn’t let it pass on “an up or down vote?” Why is Harry afraid to play the same kind of hard-nosed politics that the Repigs used to such great effect on him? Could it be that this issue wasn’t THAT important to Harry Reid? Could it be a simple matter of political courage?
In the end, could it be a rotten piece of cynical political theatre, in which Harry comes back to Labor and whines “We tried, but the MINORITY wouldn’t let us?” and then marches merrily along, confident that he’ll have Labor’s support forever more?
“Trying” is no longer acceptable. Only success is acceptable. It’s time the Senate Democrats were made to understand that.
We’ve got to hold their feet to the fire, and more importantly to lay the blame where the blame is deserved instead of slagging off the entire Congress, which is exactly what the GOP wants us to do.
The working people will see our day and soon. We are rapidly gaining representation in Congress although many do not support the will of the American people. The Republicans and some Democrats are digging their own grave as we will see at the next election. Now the Bush Administration wants illegal trucks along with illegal immigration to run OUR country and to Heck with the American people.
I think we should make the Republicans continue their filibuster and block all their pet legislation until they end their filibuster of the Employee Free Choice Act. Keep them tied-up talkinglike we did on the civil rights legislation of the 1960’s.
While non-passage of the Employee Free Choice Act was pretty much expected by the big unions, the rest of America that isn’t in an union won’t be satisfied with a loss. We’re tired of executives getting outrageous bonuses for off-shoring jobs. And sick of seeing foreign car manufacturers destroy American owned factories that are unionized.
We want enforcement of the laws that make our country great. As our President says, “we are a nation of laws and we must enforce those laws.”
Shame on the big unions for advocating for an all or nothing bill. Card check would certainly eliminate government bureaucracy and streamline the National Labor Relations Board, but what America really needs is penalties for breaking the National Labor Relations Act. Then small unions could have a shot to organize without having to rely on the big warchests of the AFL-CIO.
So who lost when this bill failed? Not big business and not big unions. The non-union workers and the industries that can’t compete against third-world countries with even worse labor rights than our own. Big unions and the Union Busting industry won by keeping the status quo. And the NAM-bies helped kill American owned industry.
Reform is badly needed before we have no manufacturing capability at all!
The Democrates are a sad bunch of juggelers pretending to be for the middleclass and the majority vote from NOV. elections. As with the war bill they stick a carrot out so as to lead the public on like they are trying , but the fine print of their details are not so representative of the working public. When it dosen’t pass they turn and just give the other side whether it be the administration or the republican side of the isle, what they want. Cindy Sheehan was right and now they have proven their true colors again. However one might be inclined to have empathy for imigrant workers and their plight to find a better way of life. The failure to get this bill thru to protect struggleing US workers and then give in to an immigraton bill just adds insult and creates instability for the US worker and forced resentment towards imigrants who could become a further threat to american workers, since they have less reason to struggle for what the US worker has fought hard to achieve. They come from such poverty, they just want work and companys want profit. A terrible delema faces the workes of Delphi as the work groups are torn apart and those with less senority are offered better packages if they vote yes for a new deal which undermines the older workers packages. Who knows what the package is for the new entering worker. The democrates have sold out to the corporations owners to militarize the world, for oil control, which will be at much of the working mans loss and cost. The pressure that needs to be applied to turn things around, needs to make some headway before the 08 elections. Too many assaults have happened to numerous sects and groups in our country, all of whom are in for a big surprize if they think the democrates are going to save them, if there is a huge turn over again in the election, if it is an honest one. And then only if they have not sold out to higher powers. Truley time for some changes in our country and a true voice with ability to represent the working men and women of this country. Assaults on the worker and no further protections given, letting in poor immigrants with out laws to protect, will undermine the workers further. Stop the war and oil contracts, truley bring (not redeploy or keep troops in near by countries) our troops home. Not slow escalation, cut funding bring em home, fix our working mans problems here at home, not by stealing others natural resources, and instlllin puppet goverments. Time for a new representative party in Washinton, if they feel the threat of loss they will be forced to do something meaningful. Elections are to far away and to much will belost as we have ben seeing. No more lies to the people and respect for our elections. All the calls and marches on Washington are not getting the job done, time for some innovative action.
How dose it make any sence that if they were for the labor act that failed, yet. Uhh? turn and pass the immigration bill. What has the immigration bill given away to undermine this freedom to unionise bill from gaining any power. Start donating to a 3rd party now, while they can gain some momentum. If nothing else it will begin to send a message to our representatives, they may be in for some SHOCK and AH in the future. They need to see the people tend to do something and take our country back. And our country and votes do not mean Iraq oil theft or more lies to attack Iran like Sadam . It means taking care of home and leaving those people and there countries alone , which is why they attacked us is cause we will not get out of their lands and trying to meddle in their lives and be friends with their dictators. From the begining it has been, even BinLaudin said get out adn leave us alone, quit being friends with dictators your goverment is hipocrits. WE do not own their oil, have no right to just take it cause the democrates and republicans say they have to give us their oil contracts befor we leave to go home. Time for new parties and leadership in Washington. How many more lies and betrayal will it take for the people to see they are turning us into slaves with no benifits and ceos walk with millions adn factory workers walk with next to nothing but poor buy out packages that they feel they have to take as it is better than nothing. No media help either. Donate to a 3rd political party now. Stop playing along with their games only to be betrayed and they blame the other party or Bush. They are all working for the corporations and war efforts, wake up people. They are not cutting us any favors nor do they intend to, beware of any tid bits they try to throw out to bait. No more Lies to the people and stop beating around the Bush. No more , NO MORE. NO MORE!
I am in the midst of my second attempt to “organize” a union here inside Carterpillar, Inc–with Gray Interplant Systems, Inc.. Last year we just missed joing UAW Local 974 by 15 votes (151-136; 57 “no-shows). Last year, Cat was going all out, 7 days a week–and we had 344 eligible voters. This year, Cat is cutting back and we have WAY fewer workers who are actually GIS (many are with temp services like Sedona and Manpower). Yet, when we turned in enough cards for 325 people–GIS is telling the NLRB arbitrator that they have MORE employees this year. The NLRB arbitrator will not tell us how many employees GIS is claiming to have; and they’re not making them turn in a list–so we can check their names. We had to withdraw the petition once and were suppose to re-file it this week: but haven’t. This law would eliminate this problem. Check out our website at http://www.thewildernessvoice.net.
Ray