Posted on 08/07/2009 10:57:44 AM PDT by jazusamo
The debate over the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA) is being reframed now that the notorious “card check” provision—which would have taken away the right to secret ballots on union representation—will be pulled from the bill. Business groups and members of Congress on the fence will now come under tremendous pressure to support the act, although equally objectionable provisions, such as mandatory arbitration, remain.
Yet there has been virtually no debate over the bill’s onerous and unprecedented penalties against employers who may fall afoul of vague National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) rules as workers try to unionize. These penalties will stifle employer free speech. Would an employer be willing to inform employees about the potential downsides of unionization in the face of fines, treble damages, injunctions and costly litigation levied by EFCA?
Today, according to the National Labor Relations Act—as amended in 1947—employers are permitted to express themselves to their employees with “views, argument, or opinion . . . if such expression contains no threat of reprisal or force or promise of benefit.” Of course, this leaves unclear just what constitutes lawful opinion versus unlawful threats or promises. And over the years, the shifting composition of the NLRB—and of the courts—has caused disagreements over what permissible free speech is.
For example, employers who might sincerely assert to their employees that “unions cause plant shutdowns” or “could cause loss of customers” may or may not be exercising lawful free speech, depending on the views of the labor board at the time. If employers fall afoul of the law today, they face only nonpunitive “make-whole” and “cease and desist” sanctions.
But EFCA dramatically escalates these penalties. Under the new bill, the employer could be subject to a $20,000 fine for each questionable statement...
(Excerpt) Read more at online.wsj.com ...
Using this kind of Orwellian doublespeak is one reason that Capitol Hill is so out of touch with America.
It seems like a small thing, but language and the choice of words has big consequences.
Employers, or anyone else, for that matter, don’t deserve a damn thing that gubmint can rip away from them. Including their (our) money which will be used, in the form of taxes, to prosecute them (us) when we complain about what is happening.
Agreed, the naming of this bill is outrageous, nothing but deceit.
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