Should we take secret ballots away from employees?

By Tom Quiner

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MjU8psjeHIQ]

My next door neighbor, Bill, is about the nicest guy you’d ever want to know. You’d be hard-pressed to find a better neighbor.

He was a lifelong union member, which colors his politics. We got into our usual pre-election dust -up last Sunday. After viewing the plethora of Republican signs in my front yard, Bill asked me why I’m voting Republican.

I talked about government spending, about passing legislation to protect the pre-born, about downsizing government. He countered that Democrats look out for the little guy (unless they’re in the womb, of course). He waxed eloquent about what unions have done for America.

I conveyed my respect for unionism, but expressed the concern that they have gone too far. He asked for an example. There’s one brewing right now: the “Card-Check Forced Unionism Bill” (H.R. 3619/S. 1925) as Republicans call it, or the “Employee Free Choice Act,” as Democrats call it.

What it does is strip away free choice from employees, despite the dishonest title used by Democrats. According to the National Institute for Labor Relations Research:

[this bill] “empowers union officials to force a business’s employees to accept a union as their “exclusive” bargaining agent solely through the acquisition of signed union authorization cards. Individual workers under the watchful eye of union organizers may be tricked or intimidated into signing themselves, and ultimately all of their nonunion fellow employees, over to union-boss control.”

In other words, it forces non-union employees to submit all labor bargaining to a union monopoly. They would not have the free choice to negotiate directly themselves, again, even if they are NOT a member of the union.

The bill also would not allow a secret-ballot election when it comes time to vote on whether to grant the union exclusive bargaining privileges.

So, you’re not a union member. You don’t want them representing you. It comes time to vote on whether the union negotiates for you, and you want to vote no. But the union is looking over your shoulder when you vote.

Is there any chance they might try to intimidate you? Watch the CNN video above. You decide.

The unions want to cram this bill through in the upcoming lame duck session of Congress. Republicans may not be able to stop it no matter how well they do in November’s midterm elections.

I’ll vote Republican and hope they can un-pass it in next year’s session.