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Obama's War on the Secret Ballot
· Tuesday, August 30, 2011
Editor's Note: This column was co-authored by Clint Bolick of the Goldwater Institute
The Obama Administration has fired its opening salvo against a cornerstone of democracy: the right to secret ballot.
Last fall, voters in four states voted overwhelmingly to amend their constitutions protect the right of workers to vote by secret ballot in deciding whether or not to form unions. That right has been enshrined in federal law for 75 years but is threatened by bills pending in Congress.
Nonetheless, the Obama National Labor Relations Board has filed a lawsuit against Arizona seeking to halt its protection of the right to secret ballot. Federal law governs labor relations, the NLRB asserts, and states cannot provide greater security for worker rights.
Why is the Obama Administration taking such a profoundly anti-democratic position? The answer is simple: it's pay-off time for the massive labor union support Barack Obama received in the 2008 election.
Private-sector unionization has been dwindling for a long time. To reverse that, unions pushed a "card-check" system that would replace secret-ballot union-recognition elections with a system by which unions are automatically created once 50 percent of employees in a workplace sign cards requesting them. The card-check system is an open invitation to intimidation by both unions and employers. Only in the privacy of the ballot booth can workers express their true views.
The card-check legislation failed in the last Congress, but the NLRB may try to impose it through bureaucratic mandate. The threat from our nation's capitol led the Goldwater Institute to draft a model state constitutional amendment to protect the right to secret ballot, and inspired activists mobilized to enact amendments last fall in Arizona, South Carolina, South Dakota, and Utah.
With support from liberals and conservatives, union members and non-members alike, the measures passed overwhelmingly in all four states, averaging over 70 percent of the vote and sweeping 153 out of 154 counties. In the real world, that amounts to a popular tsunami. In politics, it's called a serious mandate.
NLRB will try to overturn the mandate through sheer force of federal law. But the agency will face a heck of a fight. The right to secret ballot is recognized under the federal constitution. States are free to give even greater protection to individual rights. And of course the decision whether to organize a labor union affects freedom of association, which is protected by both the federal and state constitutions.
A key consideration for courts in deciding if federal law "pre-empts" state laws is whether the conduct is so "deeply rooted in local feeling and responsibility" that state autonomy should be respected. It is hard to imagine anything more deeply rooted in local feeling and responsibility than the right to secret ballot. Further, the state protections do not significantly interfere with federal law, which has vigilantly safeguarded the right to secret ballot until the current administration came to town.
Indeed, the Supreme Court last spring upheld Arizona's employer sanction law, even though Congress has express constitutional authority to regulate immigration, emphasizing it would not lightly set aside state sovereignty. In another recent case involving a clash between federal and state law, the Court declared that federalism "secures the ability of states to respond, through the enactment of positive law, to the initiative of those who seek a voice without having to rely solely upon the political processes that control a remote central power." That is exactly what Save Our Secret Ballot represents.
It's clear from last November's results that mainstream Americans care deeply about the right to secret ballot. Similar propositions will appear on the 2012 ballot in as many as six other states.
What clear-thinking politician wants to stand against the right to secret ballot? But so long as the NLRB persists in its efforts to overturn popularly enacted protections of the right to secret ballot, that is exactly where Obama stands. It is not too late to correct that profound error.
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Richard Ryan
Anyone who wants to see a clear picture of what the Obama administration is doing to the right of employees and companies to unionize or not to unionize,only has to look at what the feds are currently doing to The Gibson Guitar Company.Gibson just happens to be located in a right-to-work state and is a non-union company.The Obama adm.has sent it`s thugs and goons in to the Gibson factory and stolen one million dollars worth of wood used to manufacture guitars.Every guitar company of any size in the US uses the same wood,secured from the same sources,yet only Gibson has been singled out for persecution.Martin Guitar Co., on the other hand has not been raided.It just happens that Martin is a union company and it`s CEO,C.F.MartinIV has contributed over $35,000.00 to the Democrat party over the past election cycles.Any guesses as to why?What we are seeing is Chicago style politics being engaged in by our Kenyan-born communist thug currently residing in the white house.
Richard Ryan
Lamar,Missouri - Birthplace of Harry S Truman
Posted August 30, 2011 at 11:57:28 AM
Todd Mac
Mr. Ryan,
Good to know. We should all put the word out to buy Gibson and not buy Martin guitars. Hit 'em in the purse. That's the only thing that will get their attention.
Posted August 30, 2011 at 12:51:57 PM
Alex
Mr Ryan,
Gibson was raided by the "Green Police". The EPA and the ESA put real teeth in what most consider, at fist blush, a good thing, not realizing the power the Feds now have over our lives. There may well be a connection, as you've described. Mr Obama is a deeply connected to the unions, that is clear.
I think Mr Obama is not a legitimate occupier of the White House, but due to his Indonesian citizenship, not his birthplace, which we now know was HI, not Kenya.
Thank you for sharing.
Posted August 30, 2011 at 1:15:47 PM
Emcee
Alex: Obama was not born in Hawaii. He was born in Kenya. The birth certificate that he provided is a fraud, having been severely edited by a computer program.
Also, both the phony President and his wife are both recorded on video admitting this fact. Impeachment would be possible, but he, like Clinton, would never be convicted by his Senate Democrat cronies.
Posted August 30, 2011 at 1:45:31 PM
Joe
With respect to the Gibson guitar story...
The wood in question only violates Indian trade laws and does not violate any US law. The excuse for the raid was illegally harvested wood. However, Martin guitars uses the same exact wood on their fret boards.
As Mr Ryan stated, this is DoJ playing politics.
Posted August 30, 2011 at 2:34:50 PM
Joe
Correction (wanna make sure we get the facts straight):
The company stated it assumes the raid stems from an alleged violation of the U.S. Lacey Act, legislation that requires anyone coming into the U.S. to declare with unambiguous specificity the nature of materials being brought into the country.
According to Gibson: “The U.S. Lacey Act does not directly address conservation issues but is about obeying all laws of the countries from which wood products are procured. This law reads that you are guilty if you did not observe a law even though you had no knowledge of that law in a foreign country. The U.S. Lacey Act is only applicable when a foreign law has been violated.”
...so basically, the Lacey Act says you're guilty of US law if you violate another country's law? WTF?
http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2011/08/the-gibson-guitar-saga-gets-steadily-curiouser.php
Posted August 30, 2011 at 4:00:57 PM
Ed
Next step: All votes for Republican candidates shall be counted as votes for their Democratic opponents.
Posted August 30, 2011 at 10:33:42 PM
Free Spirit
What is the union line of reasoning against the secret ballot? Do they have a legitimate line of patter to justify the need to get rid of the secret ballot? It seems obvious that they just want to know how people are voting so that they can lean on those who don't want the union. But even then shouldn't there be something they say besides that to advance their position? Someone please clue me in.
Posted August 31, 2011 at 7:54:18 AM
Abu Nudnik
The argument for the establishment of the NLRB is based on the power of the feds to regulate interstate commerce. So unfortunately, this won't be a slam dunk.
About the two guitar companies, playing politics with the DOJ is a favorite trick of the Tyrant-in-Chief.
"Corruption" is a word that should not be wasted in 2012.
Posted August 31, 2011 at 9:04:23 PM
Ellen
Am reminded of some remarks Hillary made during a debate with the Almighty One -- "and the skies wil open and a celestial choir will sing" --what Obama prommised and those who voted for him expected. What happened? He promised to transform America. That was enough for me - I did not vote for him.
Posted September 1, 2011 at 7:24:59 AM