On Sunday, Denver Post columnist Al Lewis asked with skepticism "Where are the victims of unions?"

It must have struck a nerve out there. Only days later he writes a column with quotes from the "scores" of people who wrote in. Here are a few of the responses Lewis received:

• "I don’t like the direction they are headed in now… They’ve drifted from protecting the main interest of the working man into the outskirts of politics."
• "Unions use the same methods as street thugs. They steal the money of hard working people through lies and intimidation."
• "I unwillingly have $44.75 taken out of my pay check every month. My opinion of the . . . union is . . . we are nothing more than a ‘cash cow.’ "
• "If the union had to earn its money, it would really make them a better union."

The Heritage Foundation has just put up an interesting — if at times confusing — new web memo on possible alternatives to compulsory unionization. One of the more salient points the author raises is that the legislation governing workplace relations – the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) – is almost entirely obsolete. Times have changed since 1935 (the year the bill was first drafted), and the workplace now emphasizes cooperation over confrontation between management and labor:

That economy no longer exists. Businesses today rely on feedback and communication from employees. Employers do not simply give top-down orders, but incorporate bottom-up communication and employee discretion. The line between workers and management has increasingly blurred, and most workers want cooperative—not adversarial—relations with their employers.

Unfortunately, Big Labor hasn’t changed with the times. If anything, union officials are promoting an increasingly adversarial relationship with management that relies on hate-the-boss rhetoric, vicious corporate campaigns, coercive card-check organizing drives, and scurious lawsuits to force companies to herd their employees into forced-dues-paying union collectives.

Would a more cooperative approach benefit employees? According to the memo, alternatives to the current system is certainly popular with American workers:

The fact that few workers want to join traditional unions does not mean that they do not want a voice in workplace relations. Surveys show that workers want to participate in decisions in the workplace and want to be heard by their supervisors, but they do not want hostile relations with management.

Ultimately, the policy prescriptions put forth in the web memo are unfortunately vague on the vital isues of compulsory union dues and monopoly bargaining.

If Heritage’s proposed reforms eliminate forced dues, monopoly bargaining, or both, then they would be a step forward for employee rights. However, if the "reforms" do nothing to dismantle these extraordinary monopoly union privileges and make unionism more voluntary, then it is hard to see how trying to add "employee involvement" programs to the NLRA would be anything other than a gigantic waste of time and resources.

In March, at the urging of the National Right to Work Foundation, the U.S. Supreme Court took up Ysursa v. Pocatello Education Association. Now the Foundation has jointly filed an amicus curiae brief (pdf) in the case.

The High Court is reviewing a ruling by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit that says that Idaho’s state law banning payroll deductions for union political expenditures (narrowly defined) can not apply to payroll deductions at the local government level. 

As the Foundation’s brief explains, the Ninth Circuit’s ruling wrongly forces Idaho taxpayers to subsidize union political activities by offering valuable payroll deduction services to union officials.

When the U.S. Supreme Court announced it would take the case, Foundation vice president Stefan Gleason noted "like state governments, local governments should not act as bagmen for union political funds."

And even more alarmingly should the Supreme Cout fail to overturn the Ninth Circuit’s ruling, it will open the door for union lawyers to misuse the court’s reasoning to launch fresh new attacks on state Right to Work laws as applied to local government bodies.

The Foundation’s joined with the Utah Taxpayers Association, the Sutherland Institute, and the National Federation of Independent Business Small Business Center in filing the brief.

A few Right to Work-related updates from around the Internet:

1.) Over at "The Next Right," blogger Soren Dayton has an interesting post up about the implications for Right to Work if a union stooge wins the White House. Money quote:

This vision is about coercively moving more and more Americans into political organizations which use their precious financial resources in a way that they neither control nor even understand.

The entry also offers a compelling indictment of the SEIU’s reliance on "card check" organizing drives. Check out the rest of the post here.

2.) The Detroit News has published a rebuttal by Foundation President Mark Mix to a union operative’s misleading editorial on the economic benefits of Right to Work policies. Here’s the letter’s conclusion:

While the moral case for a right-to-work law rests on the principle
that no worker should be compelled to join a union against his or her
will, the economic benefits of protecting employee freedom are also clear. Michigan lawmakers would do well to heed the example of their more prosperous right-to-work neighbors when contemplating what to do about the Wolverine State’s economic woes.

Read the whole thing here.

Danielle Cookson made the news in San Diego last year when then 16-year-old girl (she’s now 17) took on UFCW union officials who were illegally demanding that she join the union or lose her part-time job. Danielle told a local news reporter:

"I don’t want to join because I don’t want to have to pay the fees since I’m saving up money for college… [The union is] not going to do anything for me. I’m sixteen with a part-time job and they just want my money."

Refusing to be bullied, Foundation attorneys helped Cookson file unfair labor practice charges at the National Labor Relations Board against the UFCW Local 135 union officials. Many of the issues of the case have already been settled, with UFCW bosses having backed off some of their illegal demands.

But UFCW officials persist in demanding that Cookson pay more than can be legally required under the Foundation-won Beck U.S. Supreme Court case.

Cookson’s case recently had a positive development when the Office of the General Counsel of the NLRB ordered its regional officials to further investigate union bosses’ improper attempts to force Cookson to pay for overhead expenses for activities not related to collective bargaining. (The letter asking for more information can be downloaded here [pdf].)

Here’s video of Cookson talking about her case:

The U.S. Supreme Court has set the date for oral argument in Locke v. Karass, which was brought to the High Court by Foundation attorneys on behalf of a group of Maine state employees.

Arguments will be at 11am on October 6, 2008 – the opening day of the the Supreme Court’s session.

The case deals with the criteria for determining what workers can be forced to pay to a union as a job condition. For more on the Locke case stay tuned for an upcoming video.

Here at Freedom@Work, we’ve been covering Big Labor’s vicious corporate smear campaigns for quite some time. With the likelihood of pro-compulsory unionism politicians being swept into office and Big Labor’s power on the rise, it looks like union organizers have redoubled their efforts to impose card-check certification drives across the country.

First, we have the case of Aramark Food Services, headquartered in Philadelphia. As mentioned earlier, Aramark has been targeted by the SEIU for refusing to cooperate with the union bosses’ efforts to forcibly organize company employees. Now comes this latest update from Chicago’s Daily Herald (emphasis mine):

"It’s very typical of SEIU to … put pressure on the employer by … pointing out the various problems with the employer’s labor relations or management practices," said Bob Bruno, a labor relations researcher at the University of Illinois at Chicago…

Hade said the union is pursuing agreements that would allow suburban service workers to unionize without holding an election.

"It’s a fair process," [service union spokeswoman] Hade said. "They don’t face intimidation from anyone."

A fair process? Note how the article euphemistically alludes to card-check elections as "agreements that would allow suburban service workers to unionize without holding an election." That’s an interesting way to characterize a process that subjects workers to coercive public pressure from both management and union organizers. Hade would do well to check out the Foundation’s video on card-check harassment and intimidation.

But not surprisingly, this is happening all over the place. In Oregon, United Farm Workers operatives are pressuring Beef Northwest to organize its workers. The locale may change, but Big Labor’s tactics stay the same (emphasis mine):

Now, the United Farm Workers’ efforts to organize the state’s largest cattle feedlot has turned ugly, as the two sides clash over one central question: whether or not the company’s 80 employees even want union representation.

Union organizers say Beef Northwest workers don’t get regular salary raises, affordable health insurance or respect. They want a card check process, in which workers sign union cards and a third party oversees the vote. In the card check process, at least 50 percent of workers need to agree to union representation.

Beef Northwest owners say their workers are among the highest paid in the industry and that the majority of their workers appear happy. They want the vote taken by secret ballot, in which workers vote anonymously without union involvement.

Oregon’s experience foreshadows Big Labor’s coming political ascendancy. Union operatives are in the process of securing the allegiance of state and local governments across the country. With a big national election coming up, Forbes has the story on union organizers’ goals for the next election cycle:

Teamsters spokesman Galen Munroe says, "It’s pretty much accepted that Americans want change after the Bush Administration," adding that the Employee Free Choice Act, designed to make it easier for workers to choose a union, would help strengthen the middle class. The measure didn’t make it out of the Senate last year, but Obama has vowed to revive it if elected.