Secret Ballot Watch

Despite the fact that momentum seems to be waning for the anti-worker card check plan, editorial boards all around the country continue to speak up on behalf of worker rights, and specifically the right to a secret ballot. Last month, Secret Ballot Watch highlighted the fact that special interest groups are having a hard time justifying their plan to deny workers the right to a secret ballot. For years, they have argued that a card check is necessary because union membership is dropping. Never mind the fact that overall unionization has ticked upward over the last two years.

Now, The Signal in California’s Santa Clarita Valley has offered compelling evidence of exactly why the card check scheme isn’t needed. Describing a unionization effort in 1999 at a local hospital, The Signal’s editorial page pointed out that— 

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“… Anybody could try to influence them prior to the election, but when they cast their vote, the decision was theirs alone. Nobody was looking over their shoulders when they marked their ballots, and nobody could judge them after the fact.

“It was secret and sacrosanct, just like your vote on Nov. 4. You can say you voted one way or the other, but you're the only one who really knows.

“‘Card check’ would strip workers of that basic right. It would allow a union official to enter a workplace and persuade employees to sign a card authorizing the union to represent them. …”

Editorial, “'Card check' would stifle recovery,” The Signal, 02.09.09

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The fundamental issue at stake is worker rights. The right to vote on whether to join a union. The right to vote on a first contract, rather than having it dictated by a board of federal bureaucrats. And the right to be protected equally from intimidation, pressure, or coercion on either side of unionization drive. No matter how they try to spin it, card check supporters just can’t rationalize taking away these rights from 105 million Americans.

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