Congress Takes Up Employee Free Choice Act

Gallup Poll Shows Majority of Americans Support Workers' Rights Bill

The right to organize and bargain collectively came one step closer to reality for millions of American workers in March, as leading members of the U.S. House and Senate formally introduced the Employee Free Choice Act.

U.S. Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.), chair of the House Education and Labor Committee and one of the bill's longtime champions, said it's time for struggling workers to get their fair share of the economic pie.

"Americans' wages have been stagnating or falling for the past decade," Miller said. "For far too long, we have seen corporate CEOs take care of themselves and shareholders at the expense of workers. If we want a fair and sustainable recovery from this economic crisis, we must give workers the ability to stand up for themselves and once again share in the prosperity they help to create."

A Gallup poll released in mid-March showed that a majority of Americans support the legislation. Asked if they favored a new law to "make it easier for labor unions to organize workers," 53 percent of 1,024 respondents said "yes." Only 39 percent were opposed.

Miller and 223 cosponsors introduced the House bill, H.R. 1409, on March 10, while hundreds of workers from across the country were in Washington to tell their stories about why Employee Free Choice is so important. The same day, Senator Tom Harkin announced the introduction of the Senate version, S. 560, by sponsor Senator Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.) and 39 cosponsors.

The Employee Free Choice Act overwhelmingly passed by the House in 2007, but Senate Republicans maneuvered to keep it from coming to the floor for a vote. Even if it had passed there, President Bush vowed to veto it.

Now, a strong majority of pro-worker representatives and senators support the measure, and working people also have the strong commitment of President Barack Obama to see the measure signed into law.

CWA President Larry Cohen called on lawmakers to make the bill a top priority. "The Employee Free Choice Act is necessary to rebuild our economy, increase workers' purchasing power and put the brakes on the extreme income inequality our nation has seen over the past decade," he said.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and other business-backed opponents are waging a fierce and expensive campaign against the bill. In addition to falsely claiming that the bill takes away workers' right to a secret ballot, employer front groups also are claiming that a recession is no time to bolster workers' rights.

Harkin said history proves these opponents wrong. During the Great Depression in 1935, when Congress passed the Wagner Act and made collective bargaining public policy, unemployment was 20 percent. In 1937, with unions flourishing, the jobless rate had dropped to 14 percent.

"This is exactly the time we should insist on a fairer playing field for people to organize themselves," Harkin said.

Despite Senator Arlen Specter's recent flip flop, the campaign to restore workers' rights and make Employee Free Choice the law of the land is in full force. Specter (R-Pa) was an original co-sponsor of the Employee Free Choice Act in 2005 and voted for cloture in 2007, but facing a 2010 primary challenge from the right wing of the Republican Party, he chose instead to betray working families.

Specter's action "will not defeat us," Cohen said. "We have educated millions of Americans in our movement and outside about why Employee Free Choice is critical to rebuilding our economy and restoring the middle class and we will go forward."

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