If You Think It Is Bad Now, Give the Dems Total Control

by McQ | July 28, 2008 1:31 pm

Name another single type of organization that could get away with this sort of political coercion[1] of its membership:

The mighty Service Employees International Union (SEIU) plans to spend some $150 million in this year’s election, most of it to get Barack Obama and other Democrats elected. Where’d they get that much money?

That’s a question the Departments of Labor and Justice are being asked to investigate by the National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation. Specifically, the labor watchdog group wants Justice to query a new SEIU policy that appears to coerce local workers into funding the parent union’s national political priorities.

The union adopted a new amendment to its constitution at last month’s SEIU convention, requiring that every local contribute an amount equal to $6 per member per year to the union’s national political action committee. This is in addition to regular union dues. Unions that fail to meet the requirement must contribute an amount in “local union funds” equal to the “deficiency,” plus a 50% penalty. According to an SEIU union representative, this has always been policy, but has now simply been formalized.

No other major institution could get away with its bosses demanding that every single one of its workers step in line behind its political preferences. This is the sort of imposed political obeisance that infuriates so many workers and turns them away from unions.

Of course federal law requires all contributions to the political PACs unions maintain be ‘voluntary’. And while this mandate by the SEIU doesn’t require individuals to actually fork over the $6, it does require the equivalent – that money has to come from somewhere, and it isn’t supposed to come from dues. Additionally, federal law specifically prohibits use of dues from nonunion members who have to join a union to work from being used in any political activity. Again, the per head assessment sure seems to be including them as well.

$150 million is a lot of money to spend on influencing an election, which is precisely what the SEIU is spending it to do. And they know that if successful, they can count on labor union friendly legislation next January which has little chance of being stopped or, for the most part, modified or amended.

So why not flaunt the law, get the job done and then worry about the law when the Justice Department is in friendlier hands?

Sounds exactly like the plan they presently have..

Crossposted at QandO[2].

Endnotes:
  1. this sort of political coercion: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121720084081888385.html?mod=opinion_main_review_and_outlooks
  2. QandO: http://www.qando.net/

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