Washington: Employers have right to challenge unions
According to The Columbian:
On June 19, the U. S. Supreme Court (7-2 decision) struck down a California law imposing so-called “union neutrality” requirements on employers in the state. The law limited what employers could say about union organizing campaigns in the workplace.
The high court’s ruling should be the final stake in the heart of a similar union-backed proposal here in Washington. Democratic Gov. Chris Gregoire took the issue off the table last legislative session pending the outcome of the California case.
In its long-awaited decision in Chamber of Commerce v. Brown, the U. S. Supreme Court ruled that a law that limits employer speech during union organizing efforts runs afoul of the First Amendment’s freedom of speech and the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA).
Writing for the majority, Justice John Paul Stevens — considered to be the most liberal of the high court justices — said that employers have an inherent right to engage in “free debate on issues dividing labor and management” and that Congress expressly intended to leave this area unregulated when it passed the NLRA. In addition, the Court noted that the NLRA “expressly precludes regulation of speech about unionization” so long as the communications do not threaten or promise anything to the employee.
A proposed law being pushed by the AFL-CIO in Washington is even broader than the invalid California law.
Backers claim the Washington measure is needed to prohibit employers from forcing their religious and political views on their employees. That is just a smokescreen. What labor leaders want is to restrict employer opposition to unionization.
Employers rarely, if ever, hold meetings to talk about religion, and the Washington state measure’s language about political issues is astonishingly broad. It bans employer communications about “matters directly related to candidates, election officials, ballot propositions, legislation, election campaigns, political parties, and political, social, community, and labor or other mutual aid organizations.”... click to continue.
