Free Republic

Gerawan's employees do not want to be unionized by the UFW or forced into union servitude by the California ALRB Surprising no one, on Nov. 27, the California Supreme Court upheld the dubious Mandatory Mediation and Conciliation law against Gerawan Farming. The California Supreme Court heard the Gerawan case last fall on whether the state’s attempting to force mandatory agricultural labor union contracts violates the constitutional safeguard of equal protection. Fresno-based peach grower Gerawan Farming is one of the largest agriculture employers in the state. The serious wrangling with the United Farm Workers Labor Union and ALRB began again in...

Mackinac Center senior investigative analyst Anne Schieber has a frightening new video about the continued fleecing of home health care workers ensnared in an ongoing forced unionization scheme. At its best, government exists to protect the rights of its citizens: To establish a rule of law that applies equally to everyone and have clear rules that are easily known and followed. This scheme adheres to none of those principles. In documenting the complex twists-and-turns of the “dues skim,” Schieber’s video truly captures government breech of trust at its worst. The backers of the forced unionization claim they sent voting ballots...

Should people be forced to be part of a union just for receiving checks to look after their own story? Fox Business Network interviews Robert and Patricia Haynes, who discuss the Michigan law that forces them to join a union because they care for their kids with cerebral palsy.

On Tuesday, two Michigan Senate committees addressed the growing controversy of the stealth unionization of the state's home day care owners and providers, as well as the mechanism by which it happened. One committee took the legislative route, and the other asked probing questions of a Department of Human Services representative. On a 2 to 1 vote, the Senate Committee on Families and Human Services approved Senate Bills 1173 and 1179 to effectively see to it that private-sector business owners cannot be categorized as government employees and unionized. These measures now head to the full Senate for consideration.

The barren economy of this rustbelt state is weakening the labor movement, but well-connected unions continue to shape Michigan's politics. So it's not surprising that some are willing to take extraordinary measures to help repopulate union ranks--even to the extent of making the state an accessory to a scheme to shanghai more than 40,000 home-based day care entrepreneurs and providers into a government-employee union. This development was first brought to the attention of the Mackinac -Center for Public Policy, where we work, in early 2009, when the center was approached by Sherry Loar, owner of Baby Steps Childcare Center in...