Importance of the Secret Ballot -- Then & Now

If the rally we attended this past weekend is any indication, we will be hearing a lot in state and national campaigns about "card check" -- the so-called Employee Free Choice Act. This bill, introduced last month in both the House and the Senate, strips workers of the secret ballot process when it comes to unionizing. Instead of a secret ballot, union organizers would need only produce cards allegedly signed by a mere majority of the workers to turn an open shop into an airtight union shop. This bill has many people who value their freedom and their right to a secret ballot fighting mad.

Rep. George Miller of California is one of the House sponsors of card check. In introducing the bill, he said: "The current process for forming unions is badly broken and so skewed in favor of those who oppose unions, that workers must literally risk their jobs in order to form a union.... Even when employers don't break the law, the process itself stacks the deck against union supporters. The employer has all the power.... The Employee Free Choice Act would add some fairness to the system ."

But a few years ago, Miller was one of 16 congressmen who lectured union organizers in Mexico on the importance of the secret ballot: "As members of Congress of the United States who are deeply concerned with international labor standards and the role of labor rights in international trade agreements, we are writing to encourage you to use the secret ballot in all union recognition elections. We understand that the secret ballot is allowed for, but not required, by Mexican labor law. However, we feel that the secret ballot is absolutely necessary in order to ensure that workers are not intimidated into voting for a union they might not otherwise choose" (emphasis added).

I'll let you draw your own conclusions. But suffice it to say that President Obama, who first introduced this legislation two years ago when he was a senator, owes a heavy campaign debt to the unions -- as do many of the sponsors of this misguided legislation.

Mexico, by the way, now requires a secret ballot.

Source: Congressional Record, March 1, 2009