Senator Alexander Needs to Read the NLRA

X post in Labor

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/larry-cohen/senator-alexander-needs-t_b_5901762.html

Larry Cohen Posted: 09/30/2014 6:19 pm EDT Updated: 09/30/2014 6:59 pm EDT
President, Communications Workers of America

Sen. ​Lamar Alexander has become the newest worst expert on U.S. labor law. Instead of upholding the law as required by his oath of office, he wants to gut it while claiming to reform it.

For 80 years, the preamble of the National Labor Relations Act has stated that its purpose included "encouraging the practice and procedure of collective bargaining... and full freedom of association." As the ranking Republican on the Health Education and Labor Committee, who aspires to being the committee chair if his dream of a Republican majority is realized in November, he ought to read the Act or at least the preamble. Instead of promoting collective bargaining, Alexander wants to change the law so that the National Labor Relations Board, which administers the Act and prosecutes offenders, is stripped of its historic mission of promoting collective bargaining.

Even worse Alexander claims that he wants to restore the board's role as umpire. The NLRB is supposed to be an advocate for working Americans to offset the enormous power of management. For 80 years, until now, it was well understood that capital and labor are not equal and that in part government needs to promote collective bargaining or it will disappear.

Ironic isn't it that collective bargaining has all but disappeared with private sector collective bargaining coverage now at 6 percent or 1900 levels, and now Alexander wants to strip away the last vestige of support for working Americans. His fix is to change the NLRB composition from five to six members and mandate that three must be from each of the two major parties. Furthermore, four members would need to agree on any decision, insuring that the guts of virtually all decisions would be destroyed.

FULL story at link.