The Joplin Globe, Joplin, MO

Joplin Metro

Discussion

January 1, 2009

Proposal seeks guarantee of secret union ballots

By Kelsey Ryan

news@joplinglobe.com

A newly launched organization wants to amend the Missouri Constitution amid fears that a new administration and labor unions will eliminate secret ballots for employees in union elections.

Save Our Secret Ballot officially launched on Tuesday. It must obtain the signatures of 151,274 Missourians to place a measure on the ballot in 2010.

Missouri is part of a five-state launch, state Sen. John Loudon, R-Ballwin, a Save Our Secret Ballot advisory board member, told the Globe this week. The group also plans initiative efforts in Arizona, Arkansas, Nevada and Utah. Citing elimination of secret votes as a union priority, Loudon said the group will work across the country in an additional 20 to 30 states

“We’re trying to guarantee the right to a secret vote in city hall or in the workplace, free from intimidation,” Loudon said. “Unless the vote is secret, you’re exposed to undue intimidation for whatever reason.”

The Employee Free Choice Act, designed to boost union membership by having employees sign union cards to form unions instead of holding secret-ballot elections, passed the U.S. House in 2007 but died in the Senate under a Republican filibuster. Loudon said the shift of power in Washington, D.C., has “made the threat of this right being stripped very real.”

Unions are opposing the group’s effort. Fred Azcarate, a spokesman for the AFL-CIO, told The Associated Press that the group is a “shadow front group” opposed to workers’ rights.

“They’d like to have the debate center around the lie that the Employee Free Choice Act takes away workers’ ability to have a secret-ballot election,” Azcarate told the AP.

Kevin Kollmeyer, president of Joplin Local 6313, Communications Workers of America, said the Employee Free Choice Act would not eliminate secret votes.

“(Save Our Secret Ballot is) a business-backed coalition,” Kollmeyer said. “Some people have taken the Employees Free Choice Act out of context because it doesn’t really take away a secret ballot.”

The Employee Free Choice Act states that its purpose is to “amend the National Labor Relations Act to establish an efficient system to enable employees to form, join, or assist labor organizations, to provide for mandatory injunctions for unfair labor practices during organizing efforts, and for other purposes.”

It also states that the “(National Labor Relations Board) shall not direct an election but shall certify the individual or labor organization as the representative.”

A guarantee in the state constitution of secret ballots would not favor businesses over individual workers, Loudon said.

“This issue is colorblind,” he said. “It affects everyone equally, and the worker whose vote is exposed has the most to lose. That exposes them to management intimidation and union and co-worker intimidation, with potential blacklisting.”

The Associated Press contributed to this report.





Proposed amendment



The group Save Our Secret Ballot is proposing that the following amendment be added to the Missouri Constitution:

“The right of individuals to vote by secret ballot is fundamental. Where state or federal law requires elections for public office or public votes on initiatives or referenda, or designations or authorizations of employee representation, the right of individuals to vote by secret ballot shall be guaranteed.”

The Goldwater Institute has said it will defend the language if it is challenged in court, according to the Save Our Secret Ballot Web site.

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