by James Parks, Mar 27, 2008

Instead of protecting the rights of workers to join unions and bargain for a better life, a Republican-dominated National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) in recent years took away the rights of millions of workers to be represented by unions, made it harder to form unions through majority sign-up, limited the ability of illegally fired workers to recover back pay and allowed employers to discriminate against union supporters in the hiring process.

In recent months, our allies on Capitol Hill joined our campaign for a fair NLRB that does its job to protect workers’ freedom to join a union. Last November, workers across the country protested the ongoing assault on worker rights by the Bush-appointed NLRB, saying until a pro-worker labor board is appointed, the agency should be “closed for renovations.”

Now, it seems, workers have successfully stalled, if not derailed, the NLRB’s assault on workers’ rights until a new president can appoint new board members.

And the other side is grudgingly admitting it. Just check out what the management magazine, Workforce Management, is saying. In an article titled “NLRB Hobbles Along as Seats Remain Unfilled,” the pro-management publication says: 

The overall pace of work is sure to slow, and more difficult cases will be put off while the board awaits its full complement.   

Bush has renominated former NLRB Chairman Robert Battista, the point man in the administration’s war on workers, to lead the board for two more years.  Battista, whose five-year term expired in December, constantly voted against workers and their unions and in favor of management rights during his tenure.  Battista told a House-Senate joint hearing in December he doesn’t believe the primary purpose of the National Labor Relations Act is to promote collective bargaining 

Bush also nominated management attorney Gerard Morales and former NLRB member Dennis Walsh, who twice has served on the board beginning with a recess appointment in December 2000. Walsh represented unions while working for a law firm from 1989 to 1994. Currently, Wilma Liebman and Peter Schaumber are the only members of the board.

Top Senate Democrats say the Battista-led NLRB systematically worked to overhaul federal labor law enacted to protect workers’ collective bargaining rights and waged an unprecedented war against long-established workers’ rights. 

Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.), chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, blasted Battista’s renomination, saying:

It’s unbelievable that President Bush would renominate Mr. Battista to the board, after he led the most anti-worker, anti-labor, anti-union board in its history. America’s hard-working men and women deserve a board that will uphold their rights, not undermine them. With these nominations, the administration has again demonstrated its hostility to fairness and justice in the workplace.

Until real changes are made at the NLRB, workers will keep up the pressure to nominate a pro-worker board. During the November rally in Washington, D.C., Mine Workers President Cecil Roberts laid it on the line when he proposed a new way to spell “NLRB.” (Click here to watch the video.) 

I say take the “L” out, because it’s not labor’s board. It’s Bush’s board. It’s Cheney’s board. It’s the Chamber of Commerce’s board. It’s the Right to Work board. It’s the National Association of Manufacturers’ board. It sure as hell ain’t the labor board.

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