Rightist Group Tries to Stir Political Backlash

A right wing business group is trying to politicize the collective bargaining process by asking congressional officials to look into the CWA-SBC settlement, charging that "SBC has rewarded CWA's guerilla tactics with a massive windfall just as the union ramps up its partisan efforts to undermine free market policies."

Ken Boehm, chairman of the National Legal and Policy Center, a self-styled union watchdog organization, made the charge in a letter to House Financial Services Committee Chairman Michael Oxley (R-Ohio). He copied the letter to all the Republican members of the committee, but not to the Democrats.

Boehm was especially incensed that the settlement included "guaranteed job security" (his emphasis), as well as "across the board base wage increases totaling twelve percent, pension increases totaling thirteen percent and health care benefits fully paid by SBC." The "generous terms" would mean higher costs for consumers and lower profits for shareholders, he said.

He asked the GOP lawmakers to share his outrage that, "conservatives must fight a re-galvanized union movement," as a result of the workers winning these gains. In attacking the settlement, Boehm also seemed to think it relevant to mention that, "CWA has consistently opposed President Bush on a host of issues."

CWA President Morton Bahr noted that, "It's a sign of today's hard-line ideological climate in Washington that a business group would even consider such a brazen attempt to promote congressional interference in private sector labor negotiations." All the more reason for CWA to work to elect a new president and a worker-friendly Congress this year, he said.