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07.01.2008 0

Congress Considers Abolishing Secret Ballot Elections

  • On: 07/20/2008 13:36:12
  • In: Big Labor
  • A new poll from American Solutions finds that 79% of Americans support workers’ rights to Federally-supervised secret ballot elections when the question of whether to organize a union occurs.

    This poll was released as Congress considers stripping workers of their secret ballot rights:

    “Last year, Congress introduced a bill (H.R. 800) that would strip workers of their secret ballot rights when deciding whether or not to join a union. The bill, known as the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA), would replace the secret ballot with a card-check system that would make workers’ votes public and subject to intimidation by union organizers.

    “The EFCA is the top legislative priority for union bosses, so we decided to ask the American people their opinion.

    “We discovered that 79% of the American people support a worker’s right to a federally supervised secret ballot election when deciding whether or not to join a union.

    “The tri-partisan agreement to defend this right is overwhelming, as 77% of Republicans, 82% of Democrats, and 79% of independents believe in protecting private ballots. Support for private ballots was so broad it also spanned every subgroup examined, including majorities of every age, race, geographic group and both genders.”

    The title of this legislation says it all:

    “To amend the National Labor Relations Act to establish an efficient system to enable employees to form, join, or assist labor organizations…[emphasis added]”

    This is, of course, efficiency at the cost of decency. The implications of eliminating secret ballot elections when unions are organized cannot be understated.

    Without the Federal requirement for a vote, instead of their being a debate with alternative points of view expressed, followed by a democratic ballot, unions would be able to go door-to-door to approach workers with their new card-check system and get them to sign up. One does not need to be Andrew Carneige (sp) to see how this would be quite intimidating.

    Once the majority of workers in a company are signed up, that’s it. The union would be organized without a dissenting view having ever been expressed.

    The American people are not stupid, and it is no wonder that they would support private ballots on the matter of union organization. It is because they believe that the right to vote without political intimidation is the cornerstone of democracy.

    ALG CTA: H.R. 800 is a move by Big Labor to consolidate Big Power utilizing coercion and intimidation. This insidious piece of legislation is an abomination to our Republic. And its sponsors in Congress need to be put on notice that the People will consider it a violation of their oaths of office to support and defend the Constitution if this sort of fascistic coercion is allowed to be sanctioned as the law of the land.

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