[Marxism] The death of EFCA

[Louis Proyect <lnp3@xxxxxxxxx>]

http://www.counterpunch.com/macaray05222009.html
Democrats Betray Labor
Card Check is Pronouced Dead

By DAVID MACARAY

Earlier this week it was acknowledged by labor officials and Democratic 
insiders that the EFCA (Employee Free Choice Act), as presently written, 
wasn’t going to pass.  While the bill may be reintroduced in a different 
form, the crucial “card check” component has been pronounced dead. 
Although labor wonks across the country were disappointed by the news, 
most weren’t surprised by it.

Despite all the hoopla and anticipation, skeptics had predicted long ago 
that this ambitious bill, which would have provided working people with 
far greater access to labor unions, had virtually no chance of passing. 
  Why?  Because it was too explicitly “pro-labor.”

Big Business and the Democratic Party (despite its lip service) simply 
couldn’t allow legislation this progressive to become law.  Not for 
nothing has Taft-Hartley remained on the books for 62 years.

Let’s clarify what the EFCA was and wasn’t.  First, it wasn’t the 
draconian, anti-democratic measure it was portrayed to be by its 
Republican opponents and back-pedaling Democrats (e.g., Senator Diane 
Feinstein of California) who, while schmoozing with organized labor, 
were looking to bail.

There was nothing “anti-democratic” about it.  Clearly, it was “public,” 
rather than “secret,” but how is that anti-democratic?  Legislators use 
nay and yea votes on the floor of Congress hundreds of times a year, and 
a show of hands is used everywhere—from city councils to school boards 
to company boards of directors.  How is card check “anti-democratic”?

If you want an example of “anti-democratic,” just consider the system 
that exists today—a system that allows a group of workers who actually 
want to join a union to be nonetheless prevented from doing so by a 
combination of stalling tactics and company propaganda.

You say you want to join a labor union?  Fine, you have that legal 
right.  What that means, precisely, is that you have the legal right to 
“want” to join.  But the company can make you wait months and months 
before you vote, and has the authority to force you to attend hours of 
mandatory “fright seminars.”

Management has the right to barrage you with anti-union propaganda. 
They have the de facto right to threaten you, intimidate you, offer you 
bribes and promises, and spread false or slanderous information.  And 
while those tactics are more or less legal (if you think they’re not, 
try fighting them in court), what isn’t legal is allowing you to simply 
sign a card saying you want to join.  Now how topsy-turvy is that?

Second, instead of depicting the EFCA as some sort of wildly “radical” 
measure, let’s put it in perspective.  What the EFCA would have given 
American workers is what they already have in Europe and Canada.  Yes, 
they have this arrangement in Canada—our calm, stolid, unimaginative, 
boring neighbor to the north.  We’re speaking here of Canada, people, 
not Albania.

Accordingly, as anti-labor as some members of Canada’s conservative 
party are, they would, frankly, be taken aback, if not staggered, by the 
suggestion that Canadian workers not be allowed to freely choose whether 
or not to belong to a union.  While Canadian conservatives may regard 
unions as detrimental (and harbor the conceit that they themselves 
wouldn’t join one if given the opportunity), they don’t interfere with 
workers who choose to join.  If only our country were as egalitarian.

How ironic is it—given our fetish for personal liberty—that it’s harder 
for an American to become a union member than for a foreigner to become 
a U.S. citizen?

And third, let’s not pretend that this debate had anything to do with 
the freedom of choice, or adherence to the Bill of Rights, or any other 
noble-sounding issue.  Opposition to the EFCA was no more about a 
worker’s constitutional “right to choose” than it was about George 
Washington’s powdered wig.

Let’s be clear:  This whole anti-EFCA drive was designed to keep the 
unions out.  Everything else is smoke.  The U.S. Chamber of Commerce 
didn’t spend tens of millions of dollars to promote some abstract 
principle involving a citizen’s right to choose; they did it to pierce 
the heart of organized labor.

So who do we blame for the defeat?  Obviously, when something as big and 
expensive and widely publicized as the EFCA falls on its face, somebody 
has to be held accountable.  In truth, organized labor seems the 
likeliest candidate.

Not only was labor unable to speak with one voice (e.g., UNITE HERE’s 
battle, SEIU’s leadership scandals, Change to Win’s breakaway from the 
AFL-CIO, et al), but they once again allowed themselves to be 
sweet-talked and misled by the Democrats.  Yes, labor had on board its 
Russ Feingolds (D-WI) and Carl Levins (D-MI), but there were too many 
other DINOs (Democrats In Name Only) eager to jump ship.

In hindsight, organized labor should have relied more heavily on the 
support of America’s four “most popular” unions—police, firefighters, 
nurses and airline pilots.  This would have helped clear the public 
relations hurdle raised by teachers, autoworkers and longshoremen, 
unions that have been receiving bad press.

As much as we like to think we’re an “issue-driven” electorate, it’s 
often a handsome face, a nice smile, or a famous family name that wins 
elections.  After all, isn’t it the cute weather girl who gets hired for 
TV, and not the nerdy meteorologist?

Unbelievable as this sounds, it was reported that one of Governor Rod 
Blagojevich’s staffers once told him “he had the hair” to become U.S. 
president.  And polls showed that 25% of Republican males approved of 
Sarah Palin because they found her “hot.” (That whirring sound in the 
background is James Madison spinning in his grave.)

Still, organized labor may not have invented the game, but they’re 
compelled to play it.  Therefore, “pretty” unions (police, firemen, 
pilots) are going to be more popular than the conspicuously “ugly” 
ones—like teachers, who are being blamed for the nation’s low test 
scores, and the UAW, which, as urban myth has it, was responsible for 
killing the American auto industry and Detroit along with it.

At the EFCA’s coming-out party, the American Labor Movement should have 
dolled itself up before entering the room.  It should have made the 
grand, sweeping entrance worthy of a prized debutante.  Instead, it 
chose to conduct business in its usual, plodding fashion.  Granted, it’s 
easy to second-guess, but organized labor clearly needs a makeover.

Of course, we’re already hearing people say, “Wait til 2010,” suggesting 
the Democrats will pick up enough senate seats to have those 60 votes 
necessary for cloture.  The problem with that logic is it assumes the 
Democrats want card check to pass.  Alas, there’s little evidence to 
support that assumption.

David Macaray, a Los Angeles playwright (“Americana,” “Larva Boy”) and 
writer, was a former labor union rep.  He can be reached at 
dmacaray@xxxxxxxxxxxxx

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