The enormous role that unions play in politics has been highlighted
recently by national scandals involving the Teamsters and Laborers unions. But the most
spirited debates over the unions’ political influence are at the local level.
California and at least three other states are set to vote next year on initiatives that
bar corporations and unions from collecting or using money from employees for political
purposes without their written permission.
The concept is overwhelmingly popular
with voters. The most recent Field Poll in California found 72% would support the
initiative. Democrats and union members favor the idea by more than two to one. The unions
are so worried about the "paycheck protection" initiatives that they held a
nation wide meeting in Chicago to discuss them as well as a case the Supreme Court will
hear this spring involving 150 Delta Airlines pilots who object to their union’s
attempts to block their efforts to have compulsory dues that go to politics refunded.
The reason for such concern is
simple. The unions have seen the future in Washington state and are terrified. In 1992,
72% of that state’s voters approved I-134, a campaign reform initiative that included
"paycheck protection." For teachers unions it allowed contributions to the
union’s PAC to be deducted from paychecks, but only with written approval. Within
months the number of teachers willing to finance their union’s political agenda fell
to only 8,000 from over 45,000. I-134 imposed even more stringent limits on state employee
unions by prohibiting them from any political paycheck deductions and requiring members to
write checks directly to the union’s PAC. The number of public employee union members
who made PAC contributions fell to an astonishing $2 (that’s not a misprint) from
over 40,000.
Union leaders have had a hard time
accepting this reality. The state’s Public Disclosure Commission reported that the
teachers union, or WEA, realized that the end of automatic deductions "would cause a
huge decrease in money available to its political committee." The commission found
that they imposed a required fee for "community outreach" to replace the banned
deduction for PAC "contributions." A union lobbyist has admitted under oath that
this fee was just "an internal ploy to raise more WEA-PAC money."
This subterfuge helped the WEA to
maintain its political empire, which involves the collection of $42 million a year in
union dues. The state’s Democratic and Republican parties combined only to have a
annual budget of $8 million. In a state with only 5.50 million people, the WEA supports 12
full-time political organizers, eight lobbyists, 12 initiative workers, 22 full-time
regional directors and more than 300 local representatives who under union contracts can
be relieved of their teaching duties to spend anywhere from one-half to all their time on
union political activities.
Given the size of this political
army, it is nothing short of remarkable that Democratic Attorney General Christine
Gregoire is suing the WEA in the largest election violation case in the state’s
history. She has charged the WEA with as much at $574,000 in improper political
expenditures that have "severely frustrated the public’s right to know" who
is frustrated the political campaigns. The WEA is also charged with using its
"community outreach" fee to disguise its PAC spending and with illegally
financing the opposition to school voucher and charter school initiatives in 1996.
The case is proceeding slowly,
although last month the Public Disclosure Commission levied a $6,000 fine against Jim
Seibert, the WEA’s executive director. He was charged with concealing the fact that
he was paid not by the WEA, but by the National Education Association, its parent union.
He continued to misidentify the source of his income on three separate occasion after
another WEA official was fined $2,300 for a similar violation last August.
The teachers union was able to keep
much of this out of the news through an extraordinary "gag order." The Public
Disclosure Commission agreed as part of its settlement with Mr. Seibert not to issue any
press release about the fine. It also agreed in writing not to notify the Evergreen
Freedom Foundation, the group that had made the WEA’s violations public, about the
settlement. "This shows teachers unions will do anything to hide the fact that they
are not grass roots but have a political agenda dictated by the NEA in Washington,"
says Evergreen President Bob Williams. "That’s why local teachers don’t
want to give political money to their local union when given a chance."
Union members will be given such a
chance next year not only in California, but in Oregon, Nevada, and Arizona. Ohio,
Missouri and Florida may also see initiative drives. If the experience of Washington state
holds, the "paycheck protection" movement has the potential of enacting that
rare phenomenon: a campaign finance reform that is genuinely popular, easily
understandable and workable all at the same time.