Secret Ballot Watch

It makes sense that businesses and a majority of the American people might not be in favor of changing union organizing rules to strip away a worker’s right to a secret ballot election. But what does it say about the Employee Free Choice Act when a former union organizer – someone whose job it was to grow union membership – thinks this policy is an affront to employees?

“As a former union organizer who never lost an election, but organized the old fashioned way with hard work, this is a joke.

“Anyone familiar with an organizing campaign not only knows the pressure co-workers can put on employees in and out of the workplace to get them to sign cards, but also realizes that all employees who sign cards in public will not vote for the union in private.

“This Employee Free Choice Act sounds good in name only, but will only allow strong arm tactics to prevail instead of an objective vote.”

Wayne Pankratz, “What happened to quality representation?,” Wisconsin Rapids Tribune, 11.28.2009

Workers do not need policies that merely sound good – particularly when they hide a scheme aimed at taking away their workplace rights. Moreover, with 10.2 percent unemployment, the American people do not need an agenda that will cause further damage to our troubled economy. Perhaps EFCA supporters should follow the advice of one who organized unions and put this bad idea to bed.

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