REVIEW & OUTLOOK
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* NOVEMBER 21, 2009
Obama Union Rules
A federal agency rips up 75 years of labor policy.
The National Mediation Board, which oversees labor relations in the air
and rail industry, this month moved to overturn 75 years of labor policy.
The board plans to stack the deck for organized labor in union
elections. Under a proposed rule, unions would no longer have to get the
approval of a majority of airline workers to achieve certification. Not
even close. Instead, a union could win just by getting a majority of the
employees who /vote/. Thus, if only 1,000 of 10,000 flight attendants
vote in a union election, and 501 vote for certification, the other
9,499 become unionized.
This radical break with precedent is the handiwork of President Obama's
appointees to the three-member board: Harry Hoglander, once president of
a pilots union, and Linda Puchala, former president of the Association
of Flight Attendants.
The board got a request to adopt the jerry-rigged voting standard from
the AFL-CIO in September. Without a hearing or invitation for
preliminary views, the Obama duo drafted the AFL-CIO demand and
published it in the Federal Register. It's now subject to a 60-day
comment period, after which Ms. Puchala and Mr. Hoglander will no doubt
vote to inflict it on all the nation's airline and rail carriers.
Since 1934, every National Mediation Board---even those with Democratic
majorities---has upheld the current rule on grounds that companies
governed by the Railway Labor Act are vital to the U.S. economy. The
existing rules were designed to reduce strikes by ensuring that a
majority of airline and rail employees support union representation. In
their rule change, Mr. Hoglander and Ms. Puchala brush aside the many
historical and legal barriers to their change, arguing that under "broad
statutory authority" they can do what they want.
And that's kind compared to their treatment of the board's
Bush-appointed Chairman Liz Dougherty. According to a letter Ms.
Dougherty sent Congress, the two Democrats never sought her input or
participation in crafting the proposal. Instead, they gave her a "final"
version of the rule, said they were sending it in two hours and forbade
her from publishing a dissent. They relented later, but only if she
removed some of her criticism.
Ms. Dougherty noted such "arbitrary" and "exclusionary" behavior (we'd
call it thuggish) has never been the norm at the agency. Her Democratic
colleagues' frantic rush to change a 75-year-old rule "gives the
impression that the Board has prejudged this issue," and is trying to
"influence the outcome of several very large and important
representation cases currently pending."
Indeed. The AFL-CIO letter was inspired by Delta's acquisition of
Northwest. Northwest was largely unionized but Delta wasn't. The unions
are now struggling to win the required new elections, and they want the
Mediation Board to manipulate the rules in their favor. It is growing
clear that Ms. Puchala and Mr. Hoglander are in on the game. So too,
presumably, are the folks who appointed them.
Printed in The Wall Street Journal, page A14
Copyright 2009 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved
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