[Congressional Record Volume 147, Number 42 (Tuesday, March 27, 2001)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E452]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




 MACHINIST BATTLED BIG LABOR FOR FOUR DECADES; RIGHT TO WORK ADVOCATES 
               MOURN JOHN WALDUM, THEIR ``HAPPY WARRIOR''

                                 ______
                                 

                             HON. TOM DeLAY

                                of texas

                    in the house of representatives

                        Tuesday, March 27, 2001

  Mr. DeLAY. Mr. Speaker, throughout its 45-year history, the National 
Right to Work Committee has been blessed with many loyal friends who 
selflessly offered their support in one legislative battle after 
another.
  But even in the pantheon of Right to Work champions, there is no one 
else like John Waldum Jr., a retired machinist and former union member 
and a Committee board member since 1967.
  Mr. Waldum, who served as the Committee's chairman from 1998 until 
last spring, passed away November 28 in Lake Worth, Fla.
  ``John had a slogan. `You only keep what you are willing to defend.' 
And John took that slogan seriously. He spent his life fighting against 
the odds, but with an indomitable spirit that was, and will continue to 
be, an inspiration to us all.''
  Mr. Waldum first recognized the injustice and inherent dangers of 
compulsory unionism as a young man working in Missouri, which had (and 
has) no Right to Work law.
  Kansas City union bosses wielded their monopoly power over his job to 
intimidate him into joining a strike--even though he believed it unjust 
and contrary to his long-term best interest.
  Mr. Waldum quickly became a convinced Right to Work supporter, even 
as he continued to try to improve the system from within, both as a 
member of the Machinists union and as a shop steward for the United 
Auto Workers union.
  As a result of his outspoken support for Right to Work, he endured 
years of harassment from power-hungry union officials.
  Finally, in the early 1960s, Mr. Waldum and his family moved to 
Florida, a Right to Work state.
  He later became a research and development machinist for the Pratt-
Whitney Engine Corporation. All the while, he kept on fighting for the 
Right to Work cause.
  When President Lyndon Johnson and the union hierarchy moved in 1965 
to reimpose forced union membership and ``fees'' in Florida and other 
Right to Work states by abolishing Section 14(b) of the Taft-Hartley 
Act, Mr. Waldum enlisted in efforts to stop them.
  The pointed testimony that Mr. Waldum and other freedom-loving 
workers gave to the U.S. House Labor Committee helped slow
  During the 1970s Mr. Waldum participated in a successful campaign to 
tighten enforcement of Florida's Right to Work law and stiffen 
penalties for violators.
  After he retired and moved with his wife Dorothy to Sebring, FL, Mr. 
Waldum relished the opportunity to expand his lobbying activities on 
behalf of the Right to Work cause.
  During the 1990s he visited Washington, D.C., a number of times, and 
accepted invitations to testify before the National Labor Relations 
Board and congressional committees.
  In 1993, he undoubtedly dumbfounded NLRB officials when he called the 
federal laws empowering union bosses to force workers to pay union dues 
as a job condition ``a travesty of justice'' that has transformed 
Organized Labor into ``nothing more than a union press gang.''
  His testimony and his many letters to the editor often brimmed with 
moral indignation about how federal law and Big Labor-influenced 
bureaucrats trample the freedom of the individual worker.
  But the ever-present twinkle in his eye made it clear that Mr. Waldum 
was not angry--only determined to make the world a better place.
  John Waldum was a true gentleman and an outstanding spokesman for the 
Right to Work cause and he will be deeply missed.
  Mr. Waldum is survived by his wife and their son and daughter, and 
four grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.

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