Early next year, after a new President moves into the White House and many new members of the House and Senate take their oaths of office, Congress will reconsider the most important piece of labor legislation since the Wagner Act of 1935.

 

 We’ve talked about the 2007 Employee Free Choice Act before. If and when it is signed into law, the EFCA would repair much of the crumbling framework that was built by the Wagner Act and the National Railway Act to protect the rights of working people to organize as unions and negotiate the terms of their employment.

 

That foundation of worker protection has been undermined by a quarter-century of abuse by employers and hostile bureaucrats in the anti Labor administrations of several Presidents.

 

The EFCA would reinforce the legal rights of workers by simplifying the organizing process. Once it becomes law, the EFCA would let workers choose a Union simply by signing a card. Once a majority of the workers signs these cards, their preferred Union would be certified to represent all of the workers.

The EFCA would close loopholes that let corporations coerce their employees into voting against union representation. It would impose meaningful penalties on companies that violate their employees’ labor rights. And when a company refuses to negotiate in good faith with a newly certified Union, a new contract would be determined through binding federal arbitration.

 

 

 

The U.S. House of Representatives passed the EFCA last year by a margin of 241–185. Unfortunately, a minority of senators used legislative maneuvers to prevent the bill from coming to a vote in the Senate.