Critics fear Card Check is bait for compulsory arbitration

Labor officials and their Democratic allies in Congress might compromise on the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA or "Card Check") to abolish secret ballots in union representation elections in exchange for passage of a new compulsory arbitration system.

Under Card Check, companies would have to recognize a union when 50 percent-plus-one employees sign cards supporting the action. Current law requires a union representation election in which all employees are guaranteed a secret ballot.

Rep. Buck McKeon, R-CA, the ranking minority member on the Education and Labor Committee, calls Card Check an "undemocratic assault on workers' rights" that would have "far reaching consequences for millions of workers."

The California Republican cites polls in which more than 70 percent of respondents say they oppose the proposal.

The bill passed the House of Representatives in 2008, but failed in the Senate. Union activists are pushing Congress to take up the issue again this year, confident that increased Democratic majorities in both chambers will gain passage.

President Barack Obama promised during the 2008 campaign to sign the bill if it reaches his desk.

With attention focused on the secret ballot issue, however, Stefan Gleason of the National Right to Work Committee worries that a possible compromise enable Democrats to also "ram through" arbitration measures that would have dire economic consequences.

"For the government to come in and impose contracts on the private sector is probably unconstitutional but that's what would happen with this bill," Gleason said. "Under so-called binding arbitration, a union can come in with totally unreasonable demands and force an impasse and allow the government to step in. EFCA will result in totally uneconomic contracts that are implemented and imposed on business."

Some unions officials are hinting that they would drop Card Check, for the time being, in exchange for passing the arbitration changes, Gleason said. He is concerned that the prospects for arbitration might be improved with some "misdirection" of secret ballot proponents.

"There cannot be any compromise whatsoever on this bill," he said. "Stripping out one provision to ram through another is totally unacceptable. It's an abomination to give union bosses more coercive power in an economic crisis."

Senate Democrats are likely waiting to see if Democrat Al Franken wins a recount and unseats Republican incumbent Norm Coleman in Minnesota, said James Sherk, who studies union issues at the Heritage Foundation.

If Coleman wins, Democrats might be more amenable to a compromise, he said, but the bill contains multiple problems besides the secret ballot question.

 "The intended goal of the legislation to swell union membership from 12 percent of the economy to, say, 20 percent, creating millions of new Democratic voters and hundreds of millions of new funds for Democratic campaigns, Sherk said. "This would shift the entire political spectrum to the left."

For more:

Card Check gives unions too much power.

State legislators, workers' rights activists seek new safeguards for secret ballot.

Card Check co-sponsors favor secret ballot for Mexico, but not for U.S. workers