Open up closed shop unions

The Mon., Mar. 20 issue of U.S. News & World Report contains an article on the unionization of graduate student employees ("Graduate students, the sorest apprentices, organize"). The article quoted political science Professor Steven Smith, and provided a national context for Yale's controversy. Yet U.S. News missed its mark. It's not just grad students who have to deal with the unionization question. The argument is an aspect of a larger issue affecting us all, especially if we are on work-study here or have summer jobs at home. All such disputes may be traced to a single source: the National Labor Relations Act, commonly called the Wagner Act.

Connecticut, along with other "closed-shop" states, subscribes to the Wagner Act's provisions. Under Section 8a.3 of the Act, the majority of employees in a corporation or division are allowed to designate representatives (usually in the form of a labor union) for contract negotiations and collective bargaining. In addition, these representatives "shall be the exclusive representatives of all the employees." This means that a majority of workers can force the entirety of the working body to join a union or other organization, and then possess the legal authority to speak on their behalf. Subsequently, hired employees can be required to join that organization as a condition for employment.

When professors warn of an "us-versus-them" mentality, this is what they are talking about. While grievances can and will arise under any system, the Wagner Act creates a false dichotomy between employees on one hand and management on the other. It ignores differences of opinion between individual workers, silencing the minority who may like things just the way they are. In this way it impedes, rather than facilitates, the open discourse that should characterize any negotiation.

The Wagner Act also faces serious constitutional issues. By forcing employees to join an organization that has legal authority to speak on their behalf, it runs seriously afoul of the speech and assembly articles of the First Amendment. The Supreme Court has asserted on numerous occasions that freedom of speech includes the freedom not to speak. By allowing some workers to take others' voices away and use those voices for their own ends, Connecticut state law and a Wagner Act-empowered majority violate that right. One might also make the argument that freedom of assembly includes the freedom not to assemble and the right to remain independent. Such a protection prevents individuals from being forcibly connected with organizations that may misrepresent them and damage their relationships with faculty and students.

The Supreme Court addressed this issue in 1988's Communications Workers of America v. Beck, but it didn't go far enough. While it allowed so-called "Beck objectors" to refuse to pay for political contributions and other nonessential activities, it still required them to join unions and pay dues toward the costs of collective bargaining and contract administration. In other words, it still allowed some individuals to co-opt the voices and property of others, further entrenching the violation of free speech and assembly.

If Connecticut were an "open-shop" or "right-to-work" state, or if Section 8 of the Wagner Act were repealed, this wouldn't be a problem. Individual graduate students would be free to join whatever organization they felt represented them best—and if they didn't want anyone speaking for them they could choose to stand their own ground. If a single union really speaks for the vast majority of graduate students, students will demonstrate that fact by joining voluntarily.

Organized labor is a powerful force, and one that's often quite positive. Unions and other organizations are entitled to whatever power their members are willing to give them. At the same time, Connecticut and Yale must act to protect free speech and assembly. If they do not, they are no better than the corrupt, coercive corporations the Wagner Act was meant to hold at bay.

Back to Opinion...