Defeat of Prop. 226

As The Times and its fellow liberals celebrate Prop. 226’s defeat, you have glossed over a critical fact. According to your own polling data (June 4), one-third of union members voted for Prop. 226. In other words, out of the $22 million the union bosses spent to demagogue Prop. 226 to defeat, over $7 million came out of the pockets of union members who voted for the proposition. In my view, nothing could more dramatically illustrate why we need Prop. 226. Only such a measure can keep the union bosses from spending members’ money for political purposes opposed by their members.

STEVE BAINBRIDGE

Los Angeles

* “The opposition just didn’t tell the truth,” lamented Gov. Pete Wilson, “They told lies.” Prop. 226 would have passed, he insisted, if “people had understood the issues” (June 3).

Someday it might dawn on our governor that it wasn’t “lies” or labor’s big bucks that ultimately defeated that ill-conceived proposition. A majority of voters did understand the issue and saw the “paycheck protection initiative” for what it was--a hypocritical effort by the governor and wealthy out-of-state ultraconservatives to muzzle the political clout of organized labor under the phony guise of “payroll protection.”

What defeated Prop. 226? People power. Thousands of people--myself included--at phone banks, talking to neighbors and making speeches wherever and whenever possible.

ROBERT G. DYE

Torrance

* After complaining about how “big business” outspends labor by 11 to 1 on political issues, labor unions spend $22 million of members’ dues without their permission (a 10:1 ratio versus Prop. 226 proponents) to publish and televise a pack of lies that sways a gullible public. Rhetoric and money win out again.

It cost my family of teachers a nice night out on the town in order to contribute to a political cause they did not believe in.

MEL WOLF

Burbank