Employee Free Choice Act
The best opportunity working people have to get ahead economically is by uniting to bargain with their employers for better wages and benefits - what the union movement calls "the union difference." But the current system for forming unions and bargaining is broken. The Employee Free Choice Act would level the playing field for workers and employers and help rebuild America's middle class.
Check out the presidential candidates' positions on the Employee Free Choice Act and the importance of unions.
Current Members of Congress in the 2008 Presidential Race:*
Positions on the Employee Free Choice Act
Hillary Rodham Clinton (D)
An Employee Free Choice Act co-sponsor, Clinton says she's committed to its passage. On the Senate floor on June 21, 2007, Sen. Clinton said that the Employee Free Choice Act
"is about preserving, supporting, and growing the American middle class...It's time we passed into law the Employee Free Choice Act to give unions a level playing field so they can organize for fair wages, safe working conditions, and the hard-won rights and responsibilities that American workers demand and deserve." ()
At a June 19, 2007 Capitol Hill rally in favor of Employee Free Choice, Clinton stated that as president, she would sign the Employee Free Choice Act. At the 2007 Take Back America conference and the AFSCME Leadership Forum, Clinton said that she would strongly support unions as president.
"I am committed to ensuring that workers are able to organize a union without coercion or intimidation, and also that federal contractors that benefit from taxpayer dollars demonstrate fairness towards their employees. The card check process, which requires majority sign-up, is the most effective way to protect employees' freedom to choose to form a union." (Clinton's Senate website)
The bill, she says, is not anti-business but pro-worker.
"'It is important to put this in a larger context, to look at the benefits to our country by giving workers a voice,' she said." (Investor Business Daily, 3/30/07)
Clinton supports workers' freedom to form unions and recently wrote a to the management of Parkview Community Hospital in California in support of a free and fair union election for nurses.
John McCain (R)
McCain is not a co-sponsor of the Employee Free Choice Act. On June 26, 2007, he voted to block a Senate vote on the bill.
Barack Obama (D)
Obama told the 2007 AFSCME Leadership Forum and the Take Back America conference that as president, he would sign the Employee Free Choice Act.
"It's time to turn the page for all those Americans who want nothing more than to have a job that can pay the bills and raise a family...let's finally allow our unions to do what they do best and lift up the middle-class in this country once more. And when you head to Capitol Hill in a little bit to rally for the Employee Free Choice Act, say it loud enough so that the folks on the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue can hear you - in this country, we believe that if the majority of workers in a company want a union, they should get a union. We can do this." (Take Back America Conference, 6/19/07)
Obama, who is an Employee Free Choice Act co-sponsor, says workers are victimized by the current system for forming unions and bargaining:
"A Senate panel convened Tuesday to discuss new legislation to make union organizing radically easier. Sens. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., and Barack Obama, D-Ill., were right there for it. Both eagerly backed the legislation, called the Employee Free Choice Act...In fact, the two senators seemed to be in a contest over who could offer the strongest words for the bill, also called 'card check.' Obama went further than Clinton, saying workers were being victimized by the current organizing laws. 'The employers are abiding by the letter of the law...but it turns out we (still) have an overwhelming number of voters who would want to join a union...It would seem to me that we should change the law.'" (Investor Business Daily, 3/30/07)
Obama has promised he'll sign the legislation into law if he's elected president.
"'We will pass the Employee Free Choice Act. It's not a matter of if, it's a matter of when,' said Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.). 'We may have to wait for the next president to sign it, but we will get this thing done.'" (Chicago Tribune, 3/4/07)
Obama charged up a March 3 rally in Chicago supporting the Employee Free Choice Act and the 10,000 health care and support service workers at Resurrection Health Care who are struggling to form a union with AFSCME.
"Keep marching for justice. Where there is injustice anywhere, it suppresses justice everywhere. And organized labor has a history of bringing about justice." (AFSCME Council 31 website, 3/3/07)
Ronald Paul (R)
Paul voted against the Employee Free Choice Act in the House, which approved the measure in a 241-185 vote.
