VOLUME 46, NUMBER 11
www.nrtwc.org
November 2000
Congress Loads Up Big Labor Pork Barrel
Boom Times For Union Officials’ Favorite Federal Bureaucracies
It is still unknown as this Newsletter
goes to press whether Big Labor
Democrat politicians will assume control
of Congress next year.
However, this fall it seemed to proRight to Work Capitol Hill observers as if
the takeover had already happened.
Led by GOP leaders who claim to be
pro-Right to Work, Congress is now
ironing out the details of a Fiscal Year
(FY) ’01 budget with a five billion dollar
increase for the main federal agencies
helping Big Labor force workers to pay
union dues.
According to a study by the National
Institute for Labor Relations Research,
Big Labor already gets more than a
billion dollars in taxpayer-funded grants
and contracts each year. Now federal
subsidies for forced unionism will get
even larger.
Pro-Forced Unionism NLRB,
Labor, Education Departments
All Get Taxpayer-Funded Gifts
Bill Clinton’s radically pro-forced
unionism National Labor Relations Board
(NLRB), slated for a 30% cut by GOP
leaders five years ago when its budget
was $176 million, will receive a $11
million increase, from $205 million to
$216 million.
The Department of Labor, whose
pattern of selectively “investigating”
firms that are resisting Big Labor
demands for forced unionism was
recently exposed by Congress’s General
AP / DOUG MILLS
“Now, it seems, the sky is the limit.”
— Big Labor U.S. Rep. David
Obey (D-Wisc.), speaking of
Fiscal 2001 spending bills.
Washington Times, October 10
Disregarding the Supreme Court, the
Clinton NLRB ruled that workers may
be fired for refusing to pay for union
bosses’ political activities. Now the
GOP Congress is poised to hand the
NLRB an $11 million budget hike.
Accounting Office, will see its
discretionary budget rise from $11.2
billion to at least $11.5 billion.
The Department of Education, created
by then-President Jimmy Carter at
teacher union bosses’ behest in 1979, will
get the most lavish increase of all.
Federal taxpayer funding for the
Education Department’s discretionary
budget will jump by $4.7 billion, a
whopping 13% hike from FY ’00.
In FY ’95, the last budget enacted
See Zealots next page
Next Month: Post Election Roundup
Next month’s issue of your National
Right to Work NEWSLETTER will
contain detailed reports on how
advocates of employee freedom fared in
this month’s presidential, congressional,
gubernatorial and state-legislative
elections.
The December issue will also lay
out the National Right to Work
Committee’s overall strategy for
defeating Big Labor efforts to expand
its coercive powers and for protecting
more employees and small businesses
from compulsory unionism in 2001.
No matter how the elections turn out,
it’s clear that pro-Right to Work Americans
will have their hands full next year.
Be sure to keep a lookout for your
next NEWSLETTER so you will know
what Committee members can expect
in the upcoming sessions of Congress
and the state legislatures.
Big Labor Zealots Control NLRB
under Democrat majority leaders,
Education’s discretionary budget was just
$27.4 billion.
“It’s as if Dick Gephardt and Tom
Daschle had secretly become House
speaker and Senate majority leader some
time ago,” noted National Right to Work
Committee President Reed Larson.
(He was referring to the union-label
Democratic politicians from Missouri and
South Dakota who are actually the
congressional minority leaders, at least
until January, if not thereafter.)
Snubbing Supreme Court,
NLRB Backs Forced Dues
For Union Organizing
The Clinton NLRB, whose budget has
grown by 23% (while consumer prices
rose by 13%) under GOP congressional
stewardship, may be more intensely
biased in favor of Organized Labor
special privileges than any of its
predecessors.
Two of the three NLRB seats currently
occupied (there are two vacancies) are
held by union-label career bureaucrat
John Truesdale and ex-union lawyer
Wilma Leibman.
“Balancing” these two appointees is
Republican Peter Hurtgen, who once
styled himself as a Right to Work
supporter.
In office, however, Mr. Hurtgen has
often teamed up with Mr. Truesdale and
Ms. Leibman to produce radical,
precedent-smashing decisions that
intensify union bosses’ federally-granted
forced-unionism powers.
Characteristic are the 1999 Meijer and
Eggleston decisions, stating that union
nonmembers who aren’t protected by a
state Right to Work law may be fired for
refusal to pay for union organizing and
many political activities.
Claiming their “expertise” entitled
them to flout U.S. Supreme Court
decisions, Mr. Truesdale, Ms. Leibman,
and Mr. Hurtgen effectively reversed key
portions of the high court’s Ellis and Beck
decisions
limiting
forced-dues
assessments.
Unless these NLRB power grabs are
reversed in National Right to Work Legal
Defense Foundation federal court cases,
they may gut the significant employee
protections secured by Foundation
attorneys through the Ellis and Beck
precedents.
The Clinton Labor Department has
with equal zeal directed its taxpayerfunded budget into efforts that benefit
Big Labor.
To take just one recent example, an
exhaustive study issued August 31 by the
General Accounting Office (GAO) laid
out an evident pattern of selective, proforced unionism enforcement at the
Labor Department.
According to the GAO, employers
experiencing so-called “labor unrest,”
which is consistently the result of
resisting demands for forced unionism,
are 6.5 times more likely to be inspected
by the Labor Department’s occupationalsafety arm.
The Occupational Safety & Health
Administration’s inspection rate of
companies experiencing “labor unrest”
has nearly doubled during the Clinton
Administration, while the inspection rate
for other companies has actually declined
slightly.
Furthermore, an OSHA official quoted
in the report openly applauded union
bosses for becoming “more aware of the
role of regulatory agencies . . . as a
bargaining tool during contract
negotiations.”
Teacher Union Bosses’
Pet Federal Agency Gets
Double-Digit Budget Hike
Since its establishment, the
Department of Education has worked fist
in glove with union bosses on many
endeavors.
Hundreds of millions of dollars in this
bureaucracy’s FY ’01 budget will go to
special “projects,” which often benefit
Big Labor.
For example, radical National
Education Association and other teacher
union bosses helped stage-manage a
nationwide Department of Education
teleconference supposedly intended to
better “involve” parents in public
education.
Another multi-million-dollar grant went
to the so-called “Center for Employment
Training,” which is run by the building
trades department of the AFL-CIO.
The CET’s avowed purpose is to
corral construction industry trainees into
union-only businesses.
According to poll after poll,
Americans oppose compulsory unionism
by a more than three-to-one margin.
AP / MIKE FISHER
Continued from page 1
A nationwide Department of Education
teleconference was stage-managed by
teacher union czar Bob Chase.
Cutting Big Labor Pork
Could Be a Winning Issue
These citizens would certainly have
supported efforts to cut spending on
wasteful government programs that help
union bosses force workers to pay union
dues as a job condition, if GOP leaders
had announced that was their intention
and stuck to it.
Instead, House Speaker Dennis
Hastert (R-Ill.) and Senate Majority
Leader Trent Lott (R-Miss.) have
repeatedly caved in to Clinton
Administration demands for more lavish
taxpayer subsidies for forced unionism.
Though the extremely disappointing
FY ’01 budget makes it clear that Right
to Work forces will face an uphill battle
to cut Big Labor pork-barrel spending no
matter which party controls Congress
next year, this battle must be fought, said
Reed Larson.
“Right to Work members and
supporters deserve commendation for
putting the issue of taxpayer subsidies for
compulsory unionism on the table,” he
pointed out.
“We must keep increasing the pressure
on Congress to roll back these harmful
subsidies.
“Too many Americans’ freedom to do
their jobs without being forced to pay
union dues is at stake for the Committee
to throw in the towel.
“Instead, I urge every Committee
member to keep increasing the heat on
his representative and senators, as well as
Dennis Hastert and Trent Lott, to stop the
misuse of their tax dollars by bureaucrats
and union bosses to corral workers into
unions.”
National Right to Work Newsletter – November 2000
2
GOP Leaders Blanch, Protect NLRB Empire
Jettison Measure That Would Have Shielded Small-Firm Employees
Bill Was Designed to Lift
NLRB Boot Off Backs
Of Small Firms’ Employees
H.R.1620 would have removed firms
with interstate revenues of $50,000 (the
current, 41-year-old threshold) to
$275,000 from NLRB jurisdiction,
preventing the agency from ordering
employees to accept union bosses as their
“exclusive” bargaining agents.
It would also have raised the
minimum number of employees needed
to authorize NLRB meddling in labormanagement relations to 15.
Under current law, nearly one out of
every three NLRB cases involves
businesses with 15 or fewer employees.
Take for example the recent ordeal of
Randall Borman.
The NLRB’s suffocating jurisdiction
nearly forced this Evansville, Ind.,
employer of four laborers out of business.
Mr. Borman lost $5000 in legal
expenses and another $2500 in forgone
revenue fighting three so-called “unfair
labor practice” charges, none of which
stood up.
“For a business of our size, this was a
catastrophic cost for fending off baseless
charges,” said Mr. Borman, who argues
that the real goal of the NLRB complaint
was to foist an unwanted union on his
employees.
Under NLRB Rules, Small Firms
Can’t Recoup Costs Incurred
Fending Off Frivolous Charges
H.R.1620 and its Senate companion,
S.2676, were sponsored by Rep. Ernest
JACKIE CRICKEY INSETS: AP PHOTO / RON THOMAS
When Congress adjourned this fall
after failing to hold a vote on the
National Labor Relations Board
Jurisdictional Thresholds Act (H.R.1620),
Big Labor won a significant victory
without having to fire a shot.
Feeling pressure from Right to Work
supporters to rein in the pro-forced
unionism bureaucrats at the National
Labor Relations Board (NLRB), GOP
congressional leaders had promised this
summer to bring H.R.1620 to the House
and Senate floors.
H.R.1620 would have cut the number
of firms under this powerful federal
agency’s jurisdiction by nearly a third.
Speaker Hastert (inset left) and
Majority Leader Lott (inset right) let
Big Labor Sen. Arlen Specter decide
there would be no vote on legislation to
protect millions of employees from the
NLRB’s forced-unionism fanatics.
Istook (R-Okla.) and Sen. Tim
Hutchinson (R-Ark.).
This bill would allow small firms and
employees who fall under the new
thresholds to respond to complaints in
state court, where under many state laws
they would be compensated for expenses
if charges proved baseless.
Moreover, noted National Right to
Work Committee Vice President John
Tate, although state courts are sometimes
biased toward Big Labor, the NLRB’s
bias is pervasive, and has gotten ever
worse under Clinton appointees.
However, Bill Clinton and his
appointees were not the primary obstacles
to H.R.1620’s enactment.
In fact, Clinton-appointed NLRB
Chairman John Truesdale announced,
apparently for tactical reasons, that he did
not oppose enactment of this bill.
Heartening Right to Work supporters,
GOP leaders vowed in June that the NLRB
thresholds legislation would be considered
during the debate over the vast Labor,
Health and Human Services, and Education
Departments FY ’01 appropriations bill.
But just a few months later, when Big
Labor GOP Sen. Arlen Specter (Pa.),
moved to prevent the Istook-Hutchinson
measure from being attached to the
Labor/HHS/Education appropriations
bill, GOP leaders immediately surrendered without a peep.
“Not only did the House and Senate
GOP leaders decide they didn’t want to
fight. They chose not even to field a
team,” said Mr. Tate.
Battle Was Winnable,
And Roll-Call Vote Itself
Would Have Hurt Union Brass
“The fact is, the NLRB thresholds bill
might well have passed had it come up
for a vote,” said Mr. Tate.
“Even many Big Labor politicians don’t
wish to have to explain to constituents why
federal taxpayers should support NLRB
efforts to promote union monopoly among
‘Mom ’n Pop’ businesses.
“But even if union lobbyists had
succeeded in defeating H.R.1620 in
conference committee or on the House or
Senate floors, just holding a roll-call vote
would have put intense heat on the union
bosses’ puppet politicians.
“By standing up to Mr. Specter, GOP
leaders would have forced union lackeys
like Democrat Sen. Tom Harkin, who
hails from Right to Work Iowa, to side
with Clinton NLRB zealots against small
businesses and employees who resist
forced unionism.
“But now it appears that independent
employers and employees can’t look to
the leaders of either party for relief.
“House Speaker Dennis Hastert [RIll.] and Senate Majority Leader Trent
Lott [R-Miss.] have missed a major
opportunity.
“And what really boggles the mind is
that they missed it because one GOP
senator from Pennsylvania is even more
eager to please power-hungry union
bosses than the Clinton Administration
and its political appointees.”
National Right to Work Newsletter – November 2000
3
FBI Probes United Autoworkers Union Corruption
Angry Workers Sue Local, International Brass For $550 Million
Acting in response to relentless
prodding by outraged rank-and-file
autoworkers, the FBI and the U.S. Labor
Department are currently investigating
charges of corruption and nepotism
against Detroit-area United Autoworkers
(UAW) union officials.
Meanwhile, more than 130 UAW”represented” workers have joined a civil
class-action suit that alleges a 1997 UAWordered strike against GM’s truck plants
in Pontiac, Mich., was prolonged because
union bosses demanded bogus “overtime”
pay for themselves and jobs for relatives
as a condition for ending the strike.
The suit, filed against UAW Local
594, the international UAW and GM,
claims that the Pontiac plants’ nearly
6000 employees lost a total of $50
million in wages and benefits while being
kept out on strike to secure UAW bosses’
illegal strike demands.
In addition to $50 million in
compensatory damages, the suit seeks
$500 million in punitive damages from
the UAW hierarchy.
A separate lawsuit filed by two
autoworkers September 18 charges that
UAW Local 594 officials in Pontiac
embezzled at least half-a-million dollars
to settle a sexual harassment suit against
the local’s former president and to pay his
legal bills.
nationwide are sharing information for a
wide-ranging federal probe.
“The inspector general told me they
want [UAW international President]
Stephen Yokich and his lieutenants,” Ms.
Meyer told The Detroit Free Press.
Indeed, one of the apparently
unqualified UAW-boss relatives who was
hired immediately after the 1997 Pontiac
strike was settled was Jason Beardsley,
son of James Beardsley, Mr. Yokich’s
administrative assistant.
Another apparently unqualified hire
was David Shoemaker, son of
international UAW Vice President
Richard Shoemaker.
The younger Shoemaker needed to
work at a truck plant for a year to qualify
for the $75,000 a year job with the
international UAW that he currently holds.
Furthermore, ex-Local 594 boss
Donny Douglas, the convicted sexual
harasser and alleged embezzler charged
in the second lawsuit, now has a highpaying job with the international and
reports directly to Richard Shoemaker.
Charges in Lawsuits
May Represent Only
‘Tip of the Iceberg’
Mr. Yokich and Mr. Shoemaker are
only the latest in the series of
international union czars, including exLaborers don Arthur Coia, ex-Teamster
chief Ron Carey, and current AFL-CIO
second-in-command Richard Trumka,
who have been implicated in criminal
activities in recent years.
In most cases, federal labor law is the
“silent partner” in Big Labor
lawbreaking, charged Mark Mix, senior
vice president of the National Right to
Work Committee.
“Federal law authorizes the firing of
workers who seek to protest union
corruption by withholding their dues.
“Is it any surprise, then, that union
corruption is pandemic?”
More than 40 years ago, noted laborrelations scholar Sylvester Petro foresaw
that union corruption would be a growing
problem as long as federal law and state
laws promote forced unionism:
“It is as absurd to expect good clean
unionism in conditions of extensive
compulsory unionism, as it would be to
expect good government in a society where
the divine right of kings or dictatorship of
the proletariat was the central political
principle,” wrote Mr. Petro.
“It’s long past time for congressional
leaders to side with the union‘represented’ workers whose hard-earned
money is stolen time and time again by
moving forward forced-dues repeal
legislation,” said Mr. Mix.
As soon as the new Congress
convenes next year, he concluded, both
House and Senate leaders should bring
the National Right to Work Act, which
would repeal federally-imposed forced
union dues, up for votes in their
respective chambers.
The class-action lawsuit specifically
charges that a “bargaining” team of UAW
bosses divvied up roughly $200,000 in
phony overtime payments to which GM
ultimately acquiesced in order to end the
1997 truck-plant strike.
Meanwhile, rank-and-file workers in
Pontiac lost $10,000 to $20,000 a piece
in pay because of the strike.
According to Pontiac workers who
have been interviewed by federal agents,
the lawsuits’ allegations represent just the
“tip of the iceberg” in a large-scale
investigation of the international UAW
hierarchy.
Kalamazoo, Mich., resident Pat
Meyer, the widow of one UAW”represented” worker and the mother of
two others and a spokeswoman for the
plaintiffs, has said that workers
As noted labor-relations scholar
Sylvester Petro, himself once a union
organizer, wrote more than 40 years
ago, “It is . . . absurd to expect good
clean unionism in conditions of
extensive compulsory unionism. . . .”
Clean Unionism and
Compulsory Unionism Are
Fundamentally at Odds
National Right to Work Newsletter – November 2000
4
Massive New York Bust Nabs 11 Union Bosses
The Manhattan District Attorney’s indictment of 11 union
bosses along with 27 contractors and reputed mobsters in
connection with bribery, bid-rigging, and other racketeering
schemes made national headlines in September.
But this was only one of several multi-million-dollar
scandals to roil Big Labor this fall.
An ongoing lawsuit in Michigan charges that autoworkers
union bosses kept workers on strike for over two months in
1997, costing the workers $50 million in lost pay and benefits,
to win illegal payoffs for union staff and jobs for their
relatives.
For details, see the opposite page.
What follows are brief summaries of the Manhattan
indictments and other recent news items (full texts available
upon request) about union autocrats’ abuse of the monopoly
power and forced dues they are granted under federal and state
laws.
All but one of these items were originally compiled by the
National Legal and Policy Center (www.nlpc.org) of McLean,
Va.
Together, they show that the late Sen. John McClellan’s (DArk.) 1965 dictum: “Compulsory unionism and corruption go
hand in hand,” is even truer now than when he formulated it.
Bribery, Bid-Rigging, and More
September 7, 2000 — N.Y. Times, Post, Daily News
Eleven union bosses, including carpenters union kingpin
Michael Forde, a high-profile supporter of Hillary Clinton, are
indicted in connection with bribery, bid-rigging, and other
racketeering schemes that allegedly siphoned millions from
construction projects over the past two years.
D.A. Robert Morgenthau says that the racketeering diverted
millions to the Luchese Crime Family and its partners, corrupt
union officials, and crooked contractors.
Among the victims Mr. Morgenthau cites are union“represented” workers who were frozen out of good jobs by
corrupt union bosses and honest contractors who refused to
collude with the Mob in order to win bids.
Guilty Pleas in $2 Million Heist
September 14 — Media Release
The Waterfront Comm’n of New York Harbor (WCNYH)
announces that two New Jersey local officials of the
International Longshoremen’s Association (ILA/AFL-CIO)
have pleaded guilty to a criminal conspiracy to steal an
interstate shipment of goods.
Evidence obtained by WCNYH detectives implicated Local
1588 Secretary-Treasurer Nicholas Romano and foreman Carl
Bilancione in the June 1995 theft of two containers of perfume
valued at $2 million from the Global Terminal in Bayonne, N.J.
Both union bosses are allegedly associates of the Genovese
Crime Family. The WCNYH says more arrests are
anticipated.
California Union Boss Embezzled $120,000
September 16 — Washington Post
Darrell Shelton, who resigned as California’s top organizer
for the Bridge, Structural & Ornamental Ironworkers union
(BSOIW/AFL-CIO) September 14, becomes the third BSOIW
boss in 18 months to plead guilty to embezzlement.
Mr. Shelton admits that he routinely used union treasury
funds, consisting mostly of workers’ forced union dues, to
cover his and others’ personal expenses.
Mr. Shelton’s illegal forced-dues expenditures included
$3995 for a January 1997 golf outing in Palm Springs, Calif.,
attended by international BSOIW czar Jake West.
Mr. Shelton also spent $1000 in union treasury funds on a
dinner for Mr. West, his friends, and several women. Mr.
Shelton faces up to 21 months in prison.
Beating Intended to ‘Send a Message’
September 26 — Boston Herald
As part of an ongoing probe of Teamster extortion and
violence in the New England film industry, federal
investigators are now looking into allegations that Boston
local czar George Cashman okayed the August beating of a
female truck driver.
A Boston Police report alleges that Teamster boss Jimmy
Flynn, a reputed mobster and Cashman lieutenant, ordered
driver Susan Christy to quit her job on the set of a
forthcoming movie.
Mr. Flynn reportedly demanded that Ms. Christy quit so
that Flynn crony Robert Martini, a convicted felon, could take
over her concession contract this summer. When she refused,
Mr. Flynn allegedly ordered Mr. Martini to murder her.
However, Mr. Cashman reportedly learned of the plan and
vetoed it, telling, Mr. Flynn that killing Ms. Christy would put
“too much scrutiny” on Teamster officials. Instead, Mr.
Cashman allegedly agreed to have another union henchman
beat up Ms. Christy to “send [her] a message.”
Union-Boss 'Family' Stole $200,000
September 28 — U.S. District Court Release
Victor Garcia Sr., ex-president of a New Jersey hospital union
local affiliated with the American Federation of State, County &
Municipal Employees, and his son Victor Jr., ex-assistant
executive director for the union's pension fund, are found guilty
of conspiring to embezzle $200,000 from the fund.
Victor Sr. is also found guilty of conspiring to receive roughly
$200,000 in cash kickbacks from a government contractor.
Scam Drains Union Pension Funds
October 5,6 — Rocky Mountain News (Denver)
At least nine union officials representing five union pension
funds were treated to lavish hunting and fishing trips by a
Portland, Ore.-based financier whose firm has been charged
with pension fraud and was seized by federal authorities
September 21.
Up to $56 million in pension funds belonging to Colorado
workers “represented” by Sheet Metal Workers Local 9 in
Denver and the Eighth District Electrical Workers in Aurora
was entrusted to Capital Consultants LLC, now in
receivership.
Three Colorado Electrical Workers union officials were
Capital Consultants salesman Dean Kirkland’s guests on an
August 1996 salmon-fishing trip in Alaska.
Union officials later accompanied Mr. Kirkland to Alaska
for a big-game hunting trip.
National Right to Work Newsletter – November 2000
5
Pay Big Labor to Cross the Potomac?
October 15, 2000 Op-Ed by Mark Mix
Journal
THE (Fairfax, Va.)
Imagine you’re buying a new home. You reach an
Glendening proposal is clearly not in their interest either.
agreement with your contractor to get the house built for x
Today, just one in four construction workers in the Free
amount of dollars, to be completed by such and such a date.
State has a union official acting as his “exclusive” bargaining
Now imagine that, just when you’re ready to sign the
agent.
contract, the builder says that in order to guarantee the house
Big Labor has failed to convince most Maryland
will be completed on schedule, you have to pay not x, but x
construction workers that they would benefit from a union. Mr.
plus 20% or more.
Glendening would penalize them for making what he thinks is
Pay up, or else. That’s exactly how Democratic Maryland
the “wrong” choice.
Gov. Parris Glendening and organized labor are now shaking
Mr. Glendening and his appointees claim that selling out
down Maryland, Virginia and federal
employees’ freedom is necessary to
taxpayers for the Woodrow Wilson
protect taxpayers from cost overruns
Bridge replacement project.
due to strikes.
The 39-year-old, six-lane Wilson
That excuse won’t wash.
Bridge carries the Washington Beltway
PLAs, implemented by union-label
and I-95 South across the Potomac
politicians like Mr. Glendening in states
River just south of Alexandria [Va.].
and cities throughout the country, have
Most transportation experts agree a
compiled a long record of cost overruns
larger bridge is necessary to reduce
as a result of Big Labor featherbedding
traffic delays.
and strikes called in violation of
But after hammering out a plan
contract clauses.
earlier this year with Congress and
Take the Boston Central Artery
Republican Virginia Gov. Jim Gilmore
Project. Operating under a PLA, the
to finance a $2 billion project, Mr.
“Big Dig” was projected to cost $2.5
Glendening is now openly considering
billion.
adoption of a special-interest
It’s now far behind schedule and
construction contract that would inflate
over budget by more than $10 billion.
taxpayers’ cost by at least $400 million.
The bill, naturally, is being covered by
Not coincidentally, the Glendening
federal and state taxpayers, not
Senior Vice President Mark Mix
proposal would also line the pockets of
organized labor.
union bosses who supported his election campaigns with
As for the “no-strike” PLA provision Mr. Glendening is
millions of dollars in compulsory union dues and “fees”
touting, the PLA negotiated for the San Francisco airport had a
beyond what they are now collecting.
similar clause. Nonetheless, last year carpenters, electricians,
Because the Potomac falls under Maryland’s jurisdiction,
plumbers and painters’ union bosses ordered employees out on
Mr. Glendening claims he has authority to sign a so-called
strike, delaying the project and significantly increasing its
Project Labor Agreement (PLA) that stipulates all construction
price tag.
be done under rules set by union bosses.
Clearly, Mr. Glendening’s real aim here is to pay back
To participate, non-union firms would have to hire
union officials who provided massive support for his two
unionized staff or, at a minimum, force their non-union
gubernatorial races, regardless of the harmful consequences
workers to contribute to union pension funds from which they
for employees and taxpayers.
can’t reasonably expect to get any return.
But Mr. Gilmore may succeed in using the power of the
“Union-only” PLAs have been shown to jack up taxpayer
purse string to stop this scheme, if Congress backs him up.
costs for public works by 20% or more.
On September 6, Mr. Gilmore publicly stated that Virginia
But PLAs are worse than wasteful. They unjustly mandate
“does not intend to increase its $200 million commitment” for
discrimination against employees simply because they have
the Wilson Bridge replacement.
chosen not to join a union.
The GOP majority leadership in Congress should step
As countless opinion polls over the years have shown, the
forward now and announce it also will not approve any
vast majority of Americans oppose government policies that
increase in federal taxpayers’ commitment for the project if
impose union affiliation as a condition of employment.
Mr. Glendening implements a PLA.
PLAs are especially offensive to the citizens of Virginia,
Once Maryland taxpayers know they alone will be
which, like 20 other states, has a right-to-work law that
responsible for $400 million or more in extra costs under a
protects employees’ freedom to get and hold a job without
Wilson Bridge replacement PLA, Mr. Glendening will be
being forced to bankroll a union.
forced to back down.
Acting in accord with the views of his constituents, Mr.
And you and I won’t have to pay Big Labor extortion
Gilmore is publicly and vehemently opposing any PLA for the
money so we can keep crossing the Potomac River!
Wilson Bridge replacement project.
Mark Mix is senior vice president of the Springfield, Va.Marylanders don’t have a right-to-work law yet, but the
based National Right to Work Committee.
National Right to Work Newsletter – November 2000
6
Business PACs Bankroll Big Labor Candidates
Pro-Forced Unionism, High-Tax Agenda Advanced as a Result
“Many business PAC officers misuse
their members’ money to promote an
agenda that their members oppose,”
charged Stan Greer, news director for the
National Right to Work Committee.
“Many politicians who back forced
unionism, high taxes, and regulatory straight
jackets are in office today as a result.”
Of course, business owners and
managers are part of the broad coalition
that makes up the Right to Work
movement, which also includes
employees, other community leaders, and
everyone else who pays taxes.
In the 21 states with Right to Work
laws, businesses benefit from lower
construction and shipping costs,
consumers benefit from lower prices, and
workers enjoy higher purchasing power.
At the same time, businesses, consumers
and employees across the U.S. are harmed,
directly or indirectly, by the federal laborlaw provisions that now authorize payment
of forced union dues as a job condition for
eight million private employees.
Charles Robb and Ben Nelson:
Friends of Business?
Ironically, business PAC contributions
have helped put in power most of the
senators and House members who are
perpetuating and seeking to expand the
anti-business, anti-worker system of
harmed when forced unionism distorts
labor markets and bankrolls Tax &
Spend, regulation-happy legislators and
governors,” noted Mr. Greer.
Committee’s Sole Purpose:
Oppose Forced Unionism
Although the vast majority of business
PAC directors are well aware of forced
unionism’s dangers, they often feel great
pressure to back pro-forced unionism
politicians to gain “access,” or trade away
the Right to Work as a chit to win shortterm tax or regulatory relief.
Unlike business groups, the National
Right to Work Committee has no
objective other than promoting voluntary
unionism.
That’s why financially supporting the
Committee is one of the very best ways
that businesses of all sizes can protect
their interests and those of their
employees.
“Business PACs can be helpful to the
Right to Work cause when they stand up
and fight for the values and long-term
interests of their freedom-loving
members,” said Mr. Greer.
“But the latest FEC reports on
business PAC contributions in this year’s
campaigns are a classic illustration of the
importance of independent, single-issue
lobbying groups like the National Right
to Work Committee.
“The Committee remains the only
reliable counterbalance to Big Labor’s
political juggernaut.”
Sen. Charles Robb (left) and Senate
aspirant Ben Nelson both support the
business-bashing Pushbutton Strike
AP
Compulsory Unionism
Harms Workers, Employers
forced unionism.
Two of the biggest recipients of
business PAC contributions among this
year ’s U.S. Senate candidates are
embattled union-label Virginia incumbent
Charles Robb (D) and former Nebraska
Gov. Ben Nelson (D), an avowed
proponent of forced union dues.
At press time, Sen. Robb’s and Mr.
Nelson’s races against pro-Right to Work
opponents are too close to call.
As of September 30, business PACs
had poured $868,197 into Mr. Robb’s reelection campaign and $382,797 into Mr.
Nelson’s bid for Nebraska’s open Senate
seat.
In 1996, Mr. Robb joined with
Massachusetts Sen. Ted Kennedy (D) to
filibuster to death the National Right to
Work Act, which would have repealed
federally-imposed forced dues.
In 1992 and 1994, Mr. Robb voted for
Mr. Kennedy’s Pushbutton Strike Bill.
If it had been enacted, this scheme
would have made striking and shutting
down a business as easy as pushing a
button for union barons, and quickly added
hundreds of thousands of employees to Big
Labor’s rolls of forced dues-payers.
For his part, Mr. Nelson has already
defiantly admitted to Right to Work
supporters that, if he is elected to the
Senate, he will also vote against the
National Right to Work Act and for the
Pushbutton Strike Bill.
“Whether or not union bosses wield
monopoly control over a particular
business’s employees, the business is
AP / STEPHEN S. BOITANS
Last month, the Federal Election
Commission (FEC) issued reports
detailing the business, trade association,
ideological, and Organized Labor PAC
contributions received by U.S. Senate and
House candidates between Jan 1, 1999
and September 30, 2000.
The reports confirmed that, once again
this year, Washington, D.C.-based
business and trade association PACs
poured tens of millions of dollars into the
campaigns of politicians who have
unsavory records of support for
compulsory unionism.
A number of the top beneficiaries of
Inside-the-Beltway business PAC
largesse faced pro-Right to Work
opponents in closely contested races that,
as this month’s Newsletter went to press
in late October, were still up in the air.
Bill. Together, the two raked in over
$1.2 million from business PACs for
this year’s campaigns.
National Right to Work Newsletter – November 2000
7
Compulsory Unionism Fuels Urban Crisis
Union-Boss Strongholds Saw Population Flee During the Nineties
Even as the national economy
experienced a much-ballyhooed boom for
most of the nineties, many major cities in
states that don’t have Right to Work laws
shielding employees from federallyimposed forced union dues endured
substantial population losses.
U.S. Census bureau data released late
last month showed that as a group even
mature and “Frost Belt” cities in Right to
Work states, such as Atlanta, Ga.,
Nashville, Tenn., Omaha, Neb., and
Sioux Falls, S.D., succeeded in
maintaining or expanding their
population over the past decade.
But nine of the 10 cities (100,000 or
more population) suffering the worst
losses lack Right to Work protections.
St. Louis, Mo., Washington, D.C.,
Baltimore, Md., Philadelphia, Pa.,
Buffalo, N.Y., Cincinnati, Ohio,
Milwaukee, Wisc., and Oakland, Calif.,
saw their combined populations decline
by more than 600,000 between 1990 and
1999!
Among cities in Right to Work states,
only Norfolk, Va., hit hard by the postCold War military cutbacks, endured a
percentage loss of a similar magnitude.
Forced Unionism’s Impact:
‘Reducing Pay of the Most
Productive Workers’
“Declining job bases, half-empty
schools, and the failure of countless
urban grocery stores, drug stores, etc., are
largely the result of pro-forced unionism
federal labor policy,” said National Right
to Work Committee Senior Vice President
Mark Mix.
By legally empowering union officials
10 Worst Population-Loss Cites*
(Cities in non-Right to Work states are in black)
Cities
1990–1999 % Loss
St. Louis, Mo. . . . . . . . . . –15.8% .
Washington, D.C.** . . . . –14.5% .
Baltimore, Md. . . . . . . . . –14.0% .
Norfolk, Va. . . . . . . . . . . . –13.5% .
Philadelphia, Pa. . . . . . . . –10.6% .
Buffalo, N.Y. . . . . . . . . . . – 9.9% .
Cincinnati, Ohio . . . . . . . – 9.2% .
Pittsburgh, Pa. . . . . . . . . – 9.0% .
Milwaukee, Wisc. . . . . . . – 8.9% .
Oakland, Calif. . . . . . . . . . – 8.7% .
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1990–1999 Actual Population Change
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – 62,725
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . –103,333
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – 87,900
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – 35,375
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . –167,976
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – 32,312
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – 33,639
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – 33,257
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – 55,000
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . – 34,676
U.S. Census Bureau data show that, of
the 10 American cities (100,000 or
more population) suffering the worst
percentage losses in population during
the nineties, nine lack Right to Work
protections for employees.
to act as the “exclusive” (monopoly)
bargaining agents for 10 million workers
in all 50 states, federal labor law actively
discourages workers’ efforts to improve
their productivity.
That’s because, as Richard Rothstein
of the Economic Policy Institute, an
AFL-CIO-funded “think tank,” has
admitted, union boss-negotiated
contracts’ typical result is “reducing pay
of the most productive workers.”
The harm done by federal labor law is
far worse in non-Right to Work states,
where highly productive workers lack the
freedom to fight back against union
bosses who discriminate against them by
withholding their union dues.
Over time, businesses suffer from
slower productivity growth as they lose
market share to more efficient
competitors.
Many businesses ultimately flee to
Right to Work states. That’s why a net
total of more than five million Americans
moved from non-Right to Work states to
Right to Work states during the nineties.
November 2000
Written and Distributed by:
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* U.S. cities listed suffered the worst percentage losses of the 224 with 100,000 people or more as of July
1, 1999. Source: Census Bureau data analyzed by Paul Overberg, USA TODAY
** Washington, D.C., which is not part of a state, has no Right to Work law.
NATIONAL RIGHT TO WORK NEWSLETTER
National Right To Work Committee
8001 Braddock Road
Springfield, Va. 22160
Fax: (703) 321-7143
E-mail: [email protected]
www.nrtwc.org
Reed Larson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . President
Mark Mix. . . . . . . . Senior Vice President
Stephen Goodrick. . . . . . . Vice President
John Tate . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Vice President
Matthew Leen . . . . . . . . . . Vice President
Stanley Greer . . . . . . . . Newsletter Editor
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Contact the Membership Department by dialing
1-800-325-RTWC (7892) or (703) 321-9820 if you
wish to:
• Report address changes or corrections
• Receive the NEWSLETTER or request, renew,
or cancel Committee membership
• Obtain more information
Because of NRTWC’s tax-exempt status under IRC Sec. 501
(C)(4) and its state and federal legislative activities,
contributions are not tax deductible as charitable contributions
(IRC § 170) or as business deductions (IRC § 162(e)(1)).
© 2000 by the National Right to Work Committee. Permission
to reprint individual articles granted. Credit requested.
National Right to Work Law
Needed to Alleviate
Decline of Large Cities
“Pro-forced dues federal labor policy
is sabotaging efforts to get many of
America’s once-great cities back on their
feet,” said Mr. Mix.
“When the federal labor-law
provisions that authorize firing
employees for refusal to pay union dues
are repealed, cities like St. Louis and
Baltimore will have a much better chance
to rebuild their economies.
“It’s time for Congress to repair the
harm it has done by passing the National
Right to Work Act.”
Mr. Mix said that he expected the
National Right to Work Act, introduced
in the just-concluded Congress by Rep.
Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.) and the late Sen.
Paul Coverdell (R-Ga.), to be
reintroduced soon after the 107th
Congress convenes in January.
He urged Right to Work members to
redouble their efforts to secure roll-call
votes on this legislation next year.