Free Republic

On the ballot Tuesday in two states (Washington and South Dakota) voters will find deceptive initiatives to vote on. Both were concocted by the forces of Big Labor for the purpose of getting and keeping more money from workers who don’t want to pay them. Businesses that operate in a competitive market under the rule of law need to persuade consumers to buy whatever goods and services they offer. That’s good: consumers get to decide what’s worth parting with their money and what isn’t. Also, buyers are free to stop buying any time they become dissatisfied or discover better uses...

With her unpopular positions and repulsive mindset, the real question is why isn’t Hillary Clinton 50 points behind in this election? In a bizarre video message this week to the Laborers International Union of North America, Hillary Clinton asked, “Why aren’t I 50 points ahead?” She seemed concerned that her opponent, Donald Trump, had closed the gap in the polls. Clinton claimed that Trump was staunchly opposed to labor unions, but she had a long history of support. She also noted her strong opposition to Right to Work laws. According to Clinton, “Right to Work is wrong for workers and...

Democrats love to talk about rights. They say people have the "right to affordable health care," the "right to a debt free college education," the "right to choose," and so on. But there's one right they apparently want to erase: The right to work. Here's how Hillary Clinton put it in a videoconference this week at the Laborers' International Union of North America: "I will fight back against so-called right to work. Right to work is wrong for workers and wrong for America." Come again? The right to work is wrong for America? Clinton is referring to state right-to-work laws...

Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton sent a passionate video message to the Laborers’ International Union of North America, demanding that they help get the message out about Donald Trump. She pointed out that she was against “Right To Work” and appeared upset that Trump was gaining in the polls despite his record of supporting it. “Having said all this, ‘Why aren’t I 50 points ahead?’ you might ask,” she said, highlighting Trump’s anti-Labor union stance. “Nobody should be fooled,” she said. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0EyoKB3ZHSc

If the judge is on your side, you can win a case despite pathetic arguments. So if the cost of losing is near zero and the possible gain from winning is huge, why not launch a suit and see what happens? That’s the thinking behind a case challenging Idaho’s Right to Work (RTW) statute on the grounds that the state is taking property that belongs to labor unions when it allows workers to keep their jobs even if they don’t pay the dues demanded by the union. The theory of the suit is that Idaho’s law (and, logically, all other...

State bars across the country have become havens for the left in recent years, increasingly used to target conservative attorneys. With deep pockets — due to the exorbitant amount of dues they charge attorneys in order to practice law — it is impossible to fight back once targeted. More than half of state bars are mandatory, which means they are unavoidable if you want to practice law. This is very disturbing, considering many of these states have right-to-work laws. Why are attorneys required to join a union? Arizona has one of the most corrupt state bars in the country. Many...

A leaked memo revealed how the state’s largest teachers union planned to get around Michigan’s new right-to-work law soon after it was enacted. The law repeals the power previously enjoyed by the union to get a school employee fired for not paying it dues or fees. In the memo from December 2012, Michigan Education Association President Steve Cook laid out the union’s strategy: “We will use any legal means at our disposal to collect the dues owed under signed membership forms from any members who withhold dues prior to terminating their membership in August for the following fiscal year. Same...

A May 10 election in West Virginia could leave the state’s new right-to-work law in peril. On that day, voters will decide whether to re-elect Republican Justice Brent Benjamin to the West Virginia Supreme Court of Appeals, or replace him, possibly with union-supported Darrell McGraw. McGraw, who is seen as leading the pack of those challenging the 12-term justice, is endorsed almost entirely by unions. If elected, he would be the fourth Democrat on the five-member court. Flawed Dane County ruling may show the way to killing RTW in West Virginia and nationally The main concern of those who favor...

Now you’ve done it, Republicans. You’ve disappointed John Kasich. In a Wednesday interview with The Washington Post, Kasich — continuing his sad presidential campaign’s efforts to equate Ted Cruz with Donald Trump — whined about being one of few Republicans who cares about ideas.“See, I am a fundamental believer in ideas,” Kasich said. “If you don’t have ideas, you got nothing. And frankly, my Republican Party doesn’t like ideas. They want to be negative against things.”Every word of this is trademark John Weaver, the sometime Democrat consultant running Kasich’s campaign. Within a few hours, lefty opinion columnists were using Kasich’s...

Just over a year ago, Wisconsin became the 25th state to adopt a “right to work” law, as states are allowed to do under Section 14(b) of the Taft-Hartley Act of 1947. Many people misunderstand what the phrase “right to work” (RTW) means. A RTW law does not guarantee anyone a job. Nor does it damage or prohibit unions, as Big Labor advocates often suggest. All that a RTW law does is to deny the validity of collective bargaining contract clauses that require the company to fire a worker because he or she refuses to pay the union dues. But...

The right-to-work law promoted by Governor Scott Walker of Wisconsin was struck down Friday by a judge in Dane County. ABC affiliate WBAY reports: The unions, including the Wisconsin AFL-CIO, United Steelworkers and International Association of Machinists, argued the law amounts to an unconstitutional seizure of their property because it allows workers who donÂ’t pay union dues to still receive union benefits.State attorneys argued the law is constitutional since it technically doesnÂ’t take any money out of union coffers.Judge William Foust agreed the law amounts to taking the unionsÂ’ property without just compensation, and that it violates the state...

Wisconsin’s right-to-work law, championed by Republican Gov. Scott Walker as he was mounting his run for president, was struck down Friday as violating the state constitution. Attorney General Brad Schimel, also a Republican, promised to appeal the decision and said he was confident it would not stand, noting that no similar law has been struck down in any other state. […] Three unions filed the lawsuit last year shortly after Walker signed the bill into law. […] The unions argued that Wisconsin’s law was an unconstitutional seizure of union property since unions now must extend benefits to workers who don’t...

A study published by the University of Michigan claims that the state's decision to hire a nonunion contractor to run prison cafeterias led to gangs. But the report’s methodology allowed a labor union critical of privatization to hand-pick which prison guards participated in focus groups that the author used as a foundation for his report. According to the report, "The Michigan Corrections Officers recruited participants, arranged interview locations, and reimbursed participants for travel." Roland Zullo wrote the publication for the Institute for Research on Labor, Employment, and the Economy at the University of Michigan. It concluded that the contractor's employees...

The two sides in Friedrichs v. California Teachers Association, the closely watched U.S. legal case in which a 4-4 U.S. Supreme Court barely upheld a 39-year-old precedent regarding the constitutionality of forced union fees as a job condition in the government sector on March 29, seemed bitterly divided. And they were, for the most part. But on one important matter in Friedrichs, by the time oral arguments were heard in January, there was no longer any dispute between the plaintiffs – 10 independent-minded Golden State educators – and the respondents – the officers of the National Education Association (NEA) union...

The debate started with a bleep, when Sen. Jamilah Nasheed, D-St. Louis, questioned Republican Sen. Dan Brown of Rolla, the bill's Senate carrier. "Senator, you know, out of all due respect, this is some bull (expletive)," Nasheed said. Brown disagreed, and Nasheed was chastised for not maintaining decorum. "Senator, what you're doing right now — what you're doing is trying to undermine and do away with unions as we know it. That's what you're doing."

Democratic Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin has vetoed legislation to make West Virginia the 26th right-to-work state, but was quickly overridden by the Republican legislature. For bills that don't deal with budgetary matters or appropriations, a simple majority is needed to override a veto. The state senate had already done so. And the State House of Delegates was expected to follow suit, given that there are 64 Republican members. The law goes into effect July 1 (via Metro News ): The House of Delegates and state Senate made quick work of Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin's vetoes on the bills that...

On February 12, the West Virginia legislature voted to override Governor Earl Ray Tomblin’s veto of the right-to-work bill it had passed on February 4. The measure will take effect in May and the state will then be the 26th state to have such a law. Exactly what do “right-to-work” laws do? They provide that workers cannot be fired because they decline to pay union dues. Public opinion polls consistently show that a solid majority of Americans agree that no one should lose his or her job for deciding not to pay what the union demands. Public opinion isn’t always...

West Virginia is set to become the 26th state with a so-called right-to-work law. State lawmakers rebuked Thursday's veto by Democratic Gov. Earl Ray Tomblin, voting along party lines in their House and Senate. Some House Republicans voted "no," though only a simple majority was required. ...

A federal judge struck down Hardin County's [Kentucky] right-to-work ordinance in an order Wednesday, ruling that states, not counties, can exempt themselves from portions of the National Labor Relations Act. U.S. District Judge David Hale dismissed each of the county's arguments for its ordinance, which passed Hardin County Fiscal Court Jan. 13 and barred unions from collecting fees from non-members. "The NLRA preempts the right-to-work, hiring-hall, and dues-checkoff provisions of Hardin County Ordinance 300," Hale wrote in his order. "Section 14(b) is the only exception to NLRA preemption of the field of labor relations, and it does not extend to...

In a ruling Wednesday, U.S. District Judge David Hale said only state governments have the authority to opt out of a federal law that allows closed shop or agency shop agreements, which require employees to join a labor union or pay union dues regardless if they are a union member.