Right-to-Work Feud Points Up Democratic Tie

A bitter legislative battle in Idaho offers significant further evidence that, for better or worse, Democrats and organized labor are linked almost inextricably in a political marriage and are terribly dependent on one another.

The presidential election clearly demonstrated the close relationship between labor and the Democrats at the national level. Even though it wasn’t enough to overcome President Reagan’s popularity or Walter F. Mondale’s lack of it, unions were the major force behind the Democratic Party’s ill-fated choice of Mondale as its presidential nominee last year.

The ties between unions and the Democratic Party are just as close at the state and local level, as the current fight in Idaho over the anti-union “right-to-work” law shows so clearly.

GOP-Dominated Legislature

The fight began when Idahoans not only voted for Reagan but also elected a state Legislature dominated by right-wing Republicans eager to retaliate against unions, Reagan’s main opposition.

Within days after taking office in January, the conservative majority in the Legislature ignored the furious opposition of organized labor and became the 21st state in the nation to adopt a right-to-work law, which prohibits any labor-management contract that requires all members of a bargaining unit to join a union or pay a fee for the cost of contract negotiations.

Although the right-to-work issue has been a battleground between pro- and anti-union forces since 1903, Idaho Republican legislators were so eager to hit back at unions that they attached an “emergency status” clause to the law so that it could go into effect immediately.

Labor’s allies--Democratic Gov. John V. Evans and Democratic members of the state Legislature--tried in vain to block the measure. Evans vetoed it, but the Legislature, voting along strict party lines, overrode him.

Restraining Order Won

There is still a possibility that the measure can be killed. Unions have won a temporary restraining order blocking enforcement of the law on grounds that the measure should be submitted to a popular vote at the next general election in November, 1986. The court will rule on that question later this month.

But the unions aren’t sure that they want to test their popularity in the election.

The national AFL-CIO is spending $25,000 for a public opinion poll in Idaho to test sentiment on the new law. If the anti-union feeling is as high among the voters as it is among the legislators, the unions will almost certainly not try to put the measure on the ballot.

Beyond possible voter approval of the right-to-work measure, unions fear that it could result in the defeat of Democrats who oppose it.

It’s unusual for unions to worry about such elections. They almost always have won them before.

For instance, in 1958, right-to-work proposals were on the ballot in six states. That year, the measure won approval only in Kansas. In California, it was defeated so badly that its supporters haven’t tried to put it on the ballot since.

More Than 1 Million Votes

Californians rejected the measure by more than 1 million votes, and the union’s campaign against it was so powerful that it helped Democrats take over both houses of the Legislature and all statewide constitutional offices. It helped Democrat Edmund G. (Pat) Brown defeat one of the nation’s best-known conservatives, Republican Sen. William F. Knowland, in the gubernatorial race--a defeat that ended Knowland’s political career.

Since the anti-union National Right-to-Work Committee was formed 30 years ago by its current president, Reed Larson, it has spent an estimated $100 million trying to get a national law banning union shop contracts or, failing that, to get all states to enact the law.

Seventeen states, mostly in the South, had adopted such laws before the committee was formed.

The last state to pass the measure before Idaho was Louisiana, in 1977.

That means it has taken 30 years for the committee to help push the law through in just four states. Labor defeated the proposal by nearly 900,000 votes when it was on the ballot in Missouri in 1978.

Thus, history indicates that labor would do well again if the measure is put before Idaho voters. But these are not good days for unions.

‘The American Way’

If Idaho voters do approve a right-to-work law, it could add to what Right-to-Work Committee spokesman Clayton Roberts said is the “increasing momentum” of the committee’s efforts “to ban compulsory unionism.”

The campaign that was started in 1903 by the National Assn. of Manufacturers concentrated on trying to ban the “closed-shop” clause that requires workers to be union members before they can get a job in a unionized company.

In the early 1920s, many Republicans and conservative Southern Democrats joined employers in a similar campaign that they called “The American Way,” which was aimed at various ways that unions have required non-members to pay their share of the cost of collective bargaining, including the union shop contract provision that requires workers to join a union after being hired for a job in a unionized company.

Congress did ban closed-shop contract provisions when it passed the Taft-Hartley Act in 1947.

‘Compulsory Unionism’

That law also gave individual states the option of adopting their own right-to-work laws that would ban other union security contract clauses.

Advocates of right-to-work laws contend that no worker should be compelled by a union contract to join a union, arguing that it is undemocratic and amounts to “compulsory unionism.”

But union shop provisions in contracts stem from the principle that the majority should rule.

The union shop can become effective only when a majority of workers in a company first vote to be represented by a union and then approve the union shop contract after management agrees to accept it.

And, because all workers must, by law, be given the same wages and benefits negotiated by a union for its members, then all employees in the bargaining unit should be required to pay their share of the costs of negotiating such wages and benefits.

Frank Emig, who heads campaigns by the AFL-CIO against right-to-work laws, says that “there is no secret about the fact that those who advocate such legislation are out to weaken or destroy unions. Once the public understands the real motive behind such campaigns, labor’s job in defeating them is relatively easy.”

Public Opinion Low

But the public’s opinion of unions is so low these days that they will need all the help they can get from Democrats to defeat the measure in Idaho and perhaps in a few other states that are not heavily unionized.

As long as the link between labor and the Democrats remains solid, however, unions should be able to fend off further success by right-to-work advocates in the large industrial states. In the short run, the close relationship could cost Democrats some votes because of labor’s unpopularity these days.

In the long run, however, the best hope for both Democrats and labor may be in maintaining close ties.

New Organizing Tactic

The Sheet Metal Workers International Assn. has adopted a unique tactic for organizing workers, and companies that employ sheet metal workers will help pay for the organizing campaigns.

Edward J. Carlough, president of the union, said that unions in several cities, including Los Angeles, will use young apprentices this summer to help “reach out to other young workers in their late teens and early 20s who have been particularly difficult to reach through conventional organizing efforts.”

There has already been a test by one sheet metal workers’ local in Atlanta, he said, “and it worked. We figured they--the young apprentices--could explain the advantages of unionism to other young workers better than somebody 30 years older could, and we turned out to be right.”

Unions, he said, “haven’t been speaking the language of the young. If we are going to reach new entrants into the construction field we have to get them before they are stuck in non-union jobs.”

The innovative plan would involve adding one full year to the present four-year apprenticeship program.

During the third year, the young workers will spend almost all their time as union organizers.

Because employers pay for the apprenticeship program, much of the money for using apprentices as organizers will come from management.

But Carlough said other sources of funds, including money from the union’s own treasury, also will be used.

Unions are going to have to devise more new ideas for organizing if they are to avoid a further erosion of their ranks. Only 18% of America’s workers are in unions today, compared to a high of 35% in 1954.

Poll Findings

Acceptance by the sheet metal industry’s management of the plan to use apprentices as union organizers contradicts the current trend of most corporations to fight unions whenever possible.

A poll conducted for the AFL-CIO and issued last month said that 95% of all employers would “actively resist unionization, and 75% hire so-called labor-management consultants to guide their efforts to avoid unionization, at an estimated cost of over $100 million annually.”

In view of such figures, unions cannot expect non-union firms to help in organizing campaigns.

But, if encouraged by labor leaders, the sheet metal industry idea could help unionized companies that would like to see their non-union competitors pay union wages and benefits which, on the average, are 33% more than non-union workers get.