Thursday night I commented on the abbreviated release of the Washington State Labor Council's 2007 Legislative Wrap-Up. Friday, the WSLC had the entire document up. All the political cartoons are cool, but the discussion of the top 2008 priority, so-called union "neutrality" legislation, is particularly notable. That's the effort to gag employers from expressing opinions about or contrary to unionization, especially if the employer is part of an industry, like aerospace, enjoying the fruits of targeted economic development incentives.
WSLC readily admits "[s]tates are . . . restricted from passing legislation to strengthen worker rights regarding unionization. But there is still plenty that they can do to discourage the illegal suppression of unions." Rhetoric aside (if the "illegal suppression of unions" is already illegal, which it is, then what more is needed beyond even-handed enforcement of the law?), it seems to me the union neutralists bear the burden of persuasion:
First, how can the state prohibit protected employer speech about unionization without running afoul of the First Amendment and the National Labor Relations Act? Stated differently, is the federal preemption doctrine elastic enough in this context to allow the state to prohibit what federal law expressly allows?
Second, so long as there is no coerced outcome in a required attendance staff meeting, why should the employer lose its legitimate control over the workplace to hold such meetings? Stated differently, is there anything actually wrong with an employer facing a union organizing campaign holding a meeting of its employees, paying them for their time but requiring their attendance, in which the employer's opinion about the choice to unionize is expressed?
Third, does the state's choice to provide economic development incentives thereby empower it to require a pledge to surrender the right to express an opinion contrary to unionization? Equally important, how is participation in a (say) preferential tax rate (where public revenue is perhaps foregone because it is not collected) tantamount to the affirmative receipt of public money (where public revenue is collected and then redistributed to a private entity)?
Last, bombast from labor-purchased "studies" notwithstanding, where is the actual evidence to substantiate claims of employer abuse? Pro-union testimony on HB 1828 last session relied entirely on anecdotes. Does the National Labor Relations Board not publish reports with statistics showing the number of elections in which unions prevail, the number of complaints of unfair labor practices against employers, the frequency and severity of penalties against employers? Given the widespread public availability of third party data, if there really is something to this, why all the conjecture and hearsay?
