Card check editorial needs correction
Monday, April 21, 2008 at 10:56AM Yesterday I placed the following comment under the online version of the editorial in Sunday's Hawaii Tribune-Herald.
Your anti-union hysteria got in the way of an important fact. Union membership did not decline in 2007. It grew nationwide. You could look it up and publish a correction. Check the Washington Post, Saturday, January 26, 2008, Page D02.
Yes, union membership has declined nationwide over many years but it is rising again, slowly but surely. And measures such as the Employee Free Choice Act will help it continue to grow and contribute to the healthy tradition of a strong middle class in America. Opponents like Governor Lingle and Hawaii Tribune-Herald, however, want to hide behind the flag, McCarthyism and fear to prevent workers from organizing to protect themselves from unscrupulous employers. House Bill 2974, also known as the card check bill, will help maintain an even playing field between management and employees who want to establish a union in their workplace by facilitating the organization process and ensuring that the company can't stonewall the ensuing contract negotiations.
Anybody willing to lay odds on a correction being published?
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Reader Comments (3)
We at Stephens Media feel union elections are precious because we used them to great advantage ourselves years ago when the Hawaii Newspaper Guild attempted to organize West Hawaii Today. As the owners of both West Hawaii and Hawaii Tribune-Herald, we spared no expense hiring lawyers and consultants to fend off the union drive that began when more than 50 percent of our own employees at West Hawaii signed union cards in 1996.
In the weeks between the submittal of the union cards and the election, we summoned our workers to mandatory meetings to indoctrinate them with anti-union propaganda. We had them worrying about lockouts, and some even feared the West Hawaii paper might close if they voted to unionize. We argued the union was engaged in some sinister attempt to get WHT workers to join the Guild pension fund (later we stopped contributing to our employees' 401k plans, but that's another issue entirely).
On a more personal level, our anti-union employee-friends attended union meetings after work hours, and reported back to us on which of our other employees attended the meetings. There were reports that we abruptly granted certain workers raises, but there was no proof. In other cases we summoned workers individually to meetings with groups of managers, thereby intimidating them and making them fear for their jobs.
Naturally, throughout this anti-union campaign we prohibited anyone from the Guild from setting foot on our plant to make their case in favor of unionization. After all, why should we be fair and democratic? That is a burden for others to carry.
Yes, we scared our employees silly, and in the end we won: Some of the people who signed cards in favor of unionization later voted against it. After the vote, we fired one of our Hilo employees who worked on the organizing drive (but that timing was a coincidence, of course).
Now do you people see how undemocratic the card-check system would be?
It looks like Hawaii Farm Bureau Federation was opposed
this
http://www.westhawaiitoday.com/articles/2008/04/24/opinion/letters_-_your_voice/letters01.txt
Richard Ha of Hamakua Springs Country Farms echoed those sentiments http://hahaha.hamakuasprings.com/2008/04/richard-ha-writ.html
But it looks like it is all for not. There is not enough votes override Lingle's veto.
http://starbulletin.com/2008/04/24/news/story11.html