Free Republic

In an op-ed published this week regarding a landmark legal case about to be heard by the U.S. Supreme Court, Erwin Chemerinsky, dean of the University of California, Irvine School of Law and part-time pundit, gets one important thing right. As Chemerinsky says, the High Court’s 1977 decision in Abood v. Detroit Board of Education — the precedent that is being challenged in the case at hand — is “based” on the “simple . . . premise” that employees who are subject to “exclusive” union bargaining, but choose not to be members, “benefit . . . from the union in...

As you watch your children board the school bus for the first day back to classes, consider this: That school bus driver is likely forced to pay fees to a union as a condition of driving that bus. Why? Because he or she works in one of the 25 forced-unionism states in America — states where it is lawfully permissible to force a worker to pay fees to a union as a condition of employment. You're not alone if this sounds absurd. According to a recent Gallup poll, nearly 80 percent of your fellow Americans agree: No worker should be...

A little more than nine years ago, the Oklahoma Supreme Court rejected a two-year-long campaign by labor union lawyers to get the state's right-to-work law invalidated. Chief Justice Joseph Watt rebuffed union lawyers: “[T]o hold the right to work amendment unconstitutional under the circumstances presented here would be to thwart the clearly expressed will of the people.” Oklahomans' primary aim in putting a right-to-work law on the books was to end a gross imbalance in public policy. Prior to passage of right to work, the law protected each Oklahoma employee's right to support a union, but at the same time...

Today, U.S. Senator Jim DeMint (R-South Carolina), introduced the National Right to Work Act to reduce workplace discrimination by protecting the free choice of individuals to form, join, or assist labor organizations, or to refrain from such activities. Seven Republicans joined Senator DeMint as original cosponsors to the Right to Work Act including Senators Tom Coburn (R-Oklahoma), Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), Mike Lee (R-Utah), Rand Paul (R-Kentucky), James Risch (R-Idaho), Pat Toomey (R-Pennsylvania) and David Vitter (R-Louisiana). During the 111th Congress, all Senate Democrats united to vote against workers’ rights but now they have a chance to protect American workers’ freedom...

The anti-business agenda of Obama and the Democrats is a major factor. The only way a job is created is for someone to risk their money to start or expand a business. Anyone considering that must look at current and future economics. That look shows an increasing level of financial risk and headaches as Obama keeps pushing for higher taxes, higher energy costs, more regulation and more forced unionism. Obama Care has a new accounting nightmare, that requires a 1099 for all financial business transactions over $600... Obama is still pushing for the card check bill, which eliminates the secret...