[Congressional Record Volume 147, Number 90 (Tuesday, June 26, 2001)]
[Senate]
[Pages S6924-S6926]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

      By Mr. WELLSTONE:
  S. 1102. A bill to strengthen the rights of workers to associate, 
organize and strike, and for other purposes; to the Committee on 
Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions.
  Mr. WELLSTONE. Mr. President, I rise today to introduce legislation 
to strengthen the basic rights of workers to organize and to join a 
union. This legislation, the ``Right-to-Organize Act of 2001,'' 
addresses shortcomings in the National Labor Relations Act, NLRA, that, 
over the years, have eroded the framework of worker empowerment the 
NLRA was designed to ensure.
  The NLRA, also known as the Wagner Act, was enacted to ``protect the 
exercise by workers of full freedom of association, self-organization 
and designation of representatives of their own choosing for purpose of 
negotiating the terms and conditions of their employment or other 
mutual aid or protection.'' Its proponents envisioned that the commerce 
of the Nation would be aided by workplaces that respected and empowered 
workers' voices about the terms and conditions of their own employment. 
Its proponents envisioned that supporting workers' right to organize 
would help lay the basic platform for healthy economies, healthy 
communities, and healthy families.
  Grounded in lofty notions of ``full freedom of association'' and 
``actual liberty of contract,'' the promise of the NLRA was a 
fundamentally democratic one: participatory processes as a way to 
guarantee basic protections and to give those affected a role in 
decision-making about issues of paramount concern to them.
  That was the promise of the NLRA. Unfortunately, today that promise 
is far from being realized. Indeed, today

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the democratic foundation we have attempted to erect for our workplaces 
is crumbling beyond recognition.
  Today, instead of celebrating the participatory voice of workers, we 
are faced with the stark reality that in all too many cases, workers 
who do participate, workers who choose to organize, workers who choose 
to voice their concerns about the terms and conditions of their 
workplace live in fear. They live in fear of being harassed, of losing 
wages and benefits, of being put on leave without pay, and ultimately 
fear of losing their jobs. In a country that celebrates democracy and 
freedom, the land of the free, it is unconscionable that hard working 
men and women can be placed in fear of losing their livelihood because 
they choose to exercise their legal rights to associate for the 
purposes of bargaining collectively and participating in decision-
making about their own workplaces.
  Today, as one organizer told me, all too many times you have to be a 
hero when you try to organize your own workplace. That's true. The men 
and women who do this--who step up to take some ownership for what's 
going on in their own workplaces--are doing heroic work. But that 
shouldn't have to be the case. That wasn't the promise of democracy and 
participation--of the associational and liberty of contract values this 
Nation endorsed in the National Labor Relations Act.
  It's urgent that we take action here. Estimates are that 10,000 
working Americans lose their jobs illegally every year just for 
supporting union organizing campaigns. The 1994 Dunlop Commission found 
that one in four employers illegally fired union activists during 
organizing campaigns. Estimates are that one out of 10 activists is 
fired.
  This is unacceptable. This is truly one of the most urgent civil 
rights and human rights issues of the new millennium. Working Americans 
are harassed, threatened and fired simply for seeking to have a voice 
and be represented in their workplace. According to the Dunlop 
Commission, the United States is the only major democratic country in 
which the choice of whether workers are to be represented by a union is 
subject to such confrontational processes.
  As Chair of the Employment, Safety, and Training Subcommittee with 
jurisdiction over the National Labor Relations Act, NLRA, I am 
introducing the ``Right-to-Organize Act of 2001'' to shore up the 
crumbling foundation of democracy in the workplace that the NLRA was 
intended to promote. The Act will target some of the most serious 
abuses of labor law that unfortunately have become all too common in 
recent years.
  First, employers routinely monopolize the debates leading up to 
certification elections. They distribute written materials in 
opposition to collective bargaining. They require workers to attend 
meetings where they present their anti-union views. They talk to 
employees one-on-one about the dire consequences of unionization, such 
as the possibility that the individual employee or all employees could 
lose their jobs. All too often, at the same time that this flagrant 
coercion, intimidation, and interference is taking place often on a 
daily basis--union organizers are barred from work sites and even 
public areas.
  Second, as noted above, employers too frequently are firing employees 
and engaging in other unfair labor practices to discourage union 
organizing and union representation. They are doing this sometimes with 
near impunity because today's laws simply are not strong enough to 
discourage them from doing so. As the report, Unfair Advantage noted 
just last year, employers intent on frustrating workers' efforts to 
organize can, and do, drag out legal proceedings for years, at the end 
of which they receive a slap on the wrist in the form of back pay to 
the worker illegally fired and a requirement that they post a written 
notice promising not to repeat their illegal behavior. ``Many 
employers,'' according to this report `` have come to view remedies, 
like back pay for workers fired because of union activity as a routine 
cost of doing business, well worth it to get rid of organizing leaders 
and derail workers' organizing efforts.'' We need to put teeth into our 
ability to enforce the legal rights that are already on the books.
  Third, as part of efforts to discourage organizing, employers are 
able today to drag out election campaigns, giving themselves more time 
in some cases to harass workers through methods such as those I have 
described. Their hope may be that the climate of fear and intimidation 
will encourage workers to vote against the union seeking certification. 
While just across our border in Canada, elections take place on average 
within a week of the filing of a petition, here in the United States, 
it takes on average 80 days between petition and certification. That is 
an enormous amount of time for workers to live in fear of casting a 
vote to help empower their voice in the workplace.
  Finally, there is a growing problem of employers refusing to bargain 
with their employees even after a union has been duly certified. 
Achieving so-called ``first contracts'' can often be as harrowing as 
the organizing effort itself.
  I want to be clear. Most employers do not take advantage of their 
workers in this way. Indeed, in tens of thousands of workplaces across 
the country, employers are working together with employees and their 
unions, to create safe, healthy, productive, and rewarding work 
environments. I applaud the efforts these employers and workers are 
making.
  Unfortunately, however, this is not universally the case. All too 
frequently employers are disempowering workers and undermining their 
rights to organize, join, and belong to a union. That is why, that I 
say this is one of the most urgent civil and human rights issues of the 
new millennium. Civil rights and human rights is fundamentally about 
protecting the dignity and well-being of the less empowered against 
excesses of the more powerful. Nothing could be more important to 
protecting workers' rights to advocate for themselves and their 
families than securing a meaningful right to organize.
  The Right-to-Organize Act of 2001 is a first step in tackling some of 
the most serious barriers to workers' ability to unionize. In 
particular, the Act would do the following:
  First, it would amend the National Labor Relations Act to provide 
equal time to labor organizations to provide information about union 
representation. Under this proposal the employer would trigger the 
equal time provision by expressing opinions on union representation 
during work hours or at the work site. Once the triggering actions 
occur, then the union would be entitled to equal time to use the same 
media used by the employer to distribute information and be allowed 
access to the work site to communicate with employees.
  Second, it would toughen penalties for wrongful discharge violations. 
In particular, it would require the National Labor Relations Board to 
award back pay equal to 3 times the employee's wages when the Board 
finds that an employee is discharged as a result of an unfair labor 
practice. It also would allow employees to file civil actions to 
recover punitive damages when they have been discharged as a result of 
an unfair labor practice.
  Third, it would require expedited elections in cases where a super 
majority of workers have signed union recognition cards designating a 
union as the employee's labor organizations. In particular, it would 
require elections within 14 days after receipt of signed union 
recognition cards from 60 percent of the employees.
  Fourth, the bill would put in place mediation and arbitration 
procedures to help employers and employees reach mutually agreeable 
first-contract collective bargaining agreements. It would require 
mediation if the parties cannot reach agreement on their own after 60 
days. Should the parties not reach agreement 30 days after a mediator 
is selected, then either party could call in the Federal Mediation and 
Conciliation Service for binding arbitration. In this way both parties 
would have incentives to reach genuine agreement without allowing 
either side to hold the other hostage indefinitely to unrealistic 
proposals.
  The need for these reforms is urgent, not only for workers who seek 
to join together and bargain collectively, but for all Americans. 
Indeed, one of the most important things we can do to raise the 
standard of living and quality

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of life for working Americans, raise wages and benefits, improve health 
and safety in the workplace, and give average Americans more control 
over their lives is to enforce their right to organize, join, and 
belong to a union.
  When workers join together to fight for job security, for dignity, 
for economic justice and for a fair share of America's prosperity, it 
is not a struggle merely for their own benefit. The gains of unionized 
workers on basic bread-and-butter issues are key to the economic 
security of all working families. Upholding the right to organize is a 
way to advance important social objectives, higher wages, better 
benefits, more pension coverage, more worker training, more health 
insurance coverage, and safer work places, for all Americans without 
drawing on any additional government resources.
  The right to organize is one of the most important civil and human 
rights causes of the new millennium. I urge my colleagues to join me in 
helping to restore that right to its proper place.
                                 ______