[Congressional Record Volume 161, Number 39 (Monday, March 9, 2015)]
[Senate]
[Pages S1340-S1341]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


                  NATIONAL LABOR RELATIONS BOARD RULE

  Mr. BROWN. Mr. President, I rise in opposition to S.J. Res. 8 which 
was passed by this body earlier last week but without a veto-proof 
majority. It would protect corporations looking to rig union elections, 
always at the expense of working families. Our labor movement helped 
build the middle class and fought for protections so many Americans 
take for granted: overtime pay brought about because of collective 
bargaining, child labor laws, collective bargaining, and talking to 
Members of Congress. Child labor laws, safer workplaces, unemployment 
insurance, workers compensation were all brought about because people 
came together in unions to organize and bargain collectively and came 
together in unions to talk to State legislators and Members of Congress 
in support of unemployment insurance and in support of safer work laws, 
child labor laws, and workers' compensation.
  I am wearing my lapel with a picture of a canary in a birdcage. It 
was given to me 20 years ago at a workers' Memorial Day rally in 
Lorain, OH, a city on Lake Erie, about 25 miles west of Cleveland. This 
picture illustrates what the mine workers used to do 100 years ago. 
They took a canary down to the mines. If the canary died from lack of 
oxygen or toxic gas, the mine worker got out of the mines.
  He was on his own. He did not have a union in those days strong 
enough to protect him. He did not have a government in those days that 
cared enough to protect him. Since the days of the canary in the 
birdcage down in the mines, we have seen Congress move forward on 
workers' compensation, on minimum wage, on unemployment insurance, on 
prohibition of child labor. Much of that progress, many of those 
advancements were because of the labor movement.
  The growing voice of workers at the table was critical to all of 
these advances made especially in the early part of the 20th century. 
Then it was Social Security, then it was Medicare and Medicaid, and 
then it was all of the other things that helped us together, from Head 
Start to Pell grants, that helped create a middle class.
  The labor movement got children out of the sweatshops and into the 
classrooms. We expanded the rights of workers, we expanded the rights 
of women, we expanded the rights of people of color, and prosperity 
followed, shared by a growing portion of the country.
  This week I led a delegation with Senator Scott--a Republican from 
South Carolina--to Selma, AL, and also to Montgomery and Birmingham to 
mark the 50th anniversary of Bloody Sunday, where the young--mostly 
students--were nonviolently walking across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in 
Selma, and they were attacked by State troopers and local police and 
local deputized citizens of Alabama who participated in the melee and 
beat up a number of those students. That got the Nation's attention, 
and the Nation pushed Congress to pass the Voting Rights Act. Labor 
unions were there. Labor unions were there to ensure if we work hard 
and we take responsibility, we can work in a safe environment, with 
decent wages and benefits that allow us to take care of our family. But 
over the last decade that has changed. Workers in working families have 
paid the price. It used to be as profits went up, wages went up with 
those profits because the workers who helped those companies be 
profitable shared in the wealth they created.
  That is not socialism. That is what happened in American capitalism 
for decades after World War II. When profits went up, wages went up, in 
large part because unions at the bargaining table--through the process 
of collective bargaining--made sure that as their workers were 
increasingly productive and companies did better and better and 
executive salaries went up, workers got a piece of the pie. But since 
the 1970s, profits have gone up, but wages have been pretty stagnant. 
American workers, our workers, continue to be the most profitable and 
most productive and talented in the world, but the rewards for 
productivity gains go to an ever-dwindling number of the richest 
Americans. So as companies do better and better and stockholders do 
better and better, as profits go up and up, workers simply have not 
shared in the wealth they have created. They have not gotten their 
piece of the pie that they have earned. A big part of that is the 
decline of the labor movement. Today the middle class accounts for the 
smallest share of our national income since World War II. I will say 
that again. The middle class accounts for the smallest share of our 
national income since World War II.
  It is not a coincidence that workers are reaping fewer of the rewards 
of their work while union membership has declined. That is why the 
National Labor Relations Board proposed the rule change which is so 
important and why it is critical that Republican efforts--Republicans, 
again, doing it on behalf of the largest corporations in America--are 
not successful. This change would make modest, commonsense reforms to 
modernize and streamline the election process by which workers form 
unions.
  Right now companies seeking to block workers' rights to form a union 
can delay elections sometimes up to 2 years, and they can drag out 
anti-union campaigns, they can intimidate workers, and they can find 
reasons to fire organizers. Delay works in the corporations' favor, as 
workers leave the jobs, as workers who wanted the union get discouraged 
from the union, and delay almost always works on the side of the 
employer.
  Workers have a right to timely elections, the right to make up their 
own minds free of intimidation. Choosing one's representation is a 
right we cherish as Americans, and the National Labor Relations Board 
rule preserves it for our workers. The NLRB rule would cut back on the 
frivolous court cases these corporations file over and over, these 
frivolous court cases that companies use to stall elections. It would 
allow NLRB hearing officers to move forward with an election despite 
pending litigation, the stalling tactics of frivolous lawsuits to 
ensure workers aren't silenced by expensive legal battles.
  These reforms will not only help workers but also help businesses 
that act in good faith by streamlining the election process. This isn't 
an antibusiness move the workers and unions want to engage in, it is a 
cooperative move because moving quickly will bring everybody to the 
table more quickly.
  Right now the election process varies widely from State to State. It 
relies on outdated forms of communication. This change will provide 
certainty to workers and businesses alike and will allow both to file 
electronically instead of only by mail, saving everyone time and money.
  The lobbying effort by corporations on this is opposed to filing 
electronically. Imagine that. It is 2015. Why do they want to do that? 
Because they want to slow down the process. We know the consequences. 
Stalling tactics have real consequences for workers. We have seen that 
over and over again.
  In Massillon, OH--a city near Canton, south of Akron, in Northeast 
Ohio--nurses at Affinity Medical Center elected to form a union in 
August 2012. Ann Wyat, who was awarded Nurse of the Year, was fired for 
leading the activities for unionization. The company did everything it 
could to crush the unionizing efforts. I have been to that hospital. I 
have met with those nurses. I have talked to them about this. The NLRB 
found in favor of the workers, ruling that Affinity Medical refused to 
bargain and used illegal coercion and intimidation tactics, but still 
the company refused to comply with Federal labor law. The matter went 
to Federal court, which ruled in favor of the nurses and filed an 
injunction against Affinity Medical for failing to follow NLRB rulings, 
for breaking Federal law.
  Last month a jury in a civil court ruled unanimously and awarded the 
wrongfully terminated nurse $2 million in damages. It was serious 
enough what they did to this nurse that the jury ruled this nurse was 
due $2 million, not just because of the inconvenience to the nurse and 
the denial of her rights but the punishment for a company that breaks 
the law.
  Two and a half years later Affinity Medical is still stalling, and no 
contract has been agreed to. The nurses in Massillon deserve better. 
All workers deserve better. That is the importance of this NLRB ruling, 
to make it a more level playing field.

[[Page S1341]]

  That is what the American labor movement and our commitment to our 
workers is about--to speak out on behalf of honest pay for an honest 
day's work. It is a story of a nation--and a government--respecting the 
dignity of work and reflecting the decency and dedication of workers.
  It has been nearly 80 years since American workers' right to 
collective bargaining has been confirmed. We have been doing this 
experiment for 80 years. Rather than ending that right--and, with it, 
squeezing the middle class--we should be working to preserve and expand 
the rights of workers.
  We need equal pay for women, and we need a minimum wage that supports 
families. The minimum wage is worth 30 percent less today in real 
purchasing dollars than it was 30 years ago. Rather than eroding that, 
we need to strengthen and grow the middle class, and we need paid 
family leave and paid sick leave.
  We need to be able to make it a little bit easier for a union, for 
workers to stand up to corporate interests when workers' interests are 
not respected.
  That should be on the Senate's agenda, but sadly it is not. Instead, 
we have wasted our time on a resolution that we know will fail--all to 
pay back political scoring points for those corporations that fund 
campaigns and continue to dissolve organized labor. Without a veto-
proof majority--and the resolution wasn't even close to that last 
Tuesday--we know it is nothing more than an empty gesture. Just as 
importantly, we know that if this resolution succeeded, it would do 
real damage to working Americans by impeding their ability to come 
together to organize and to build the power they have in numbers to be 
able to get their fair share of the American dream.

                          ____________________