Bedingfield: State Constitution Must Protect Workplace Privacy

Published in THE STATE Newspaper          January 17, 2009

http://www.thestate.com/satopinion/story/653511.html

 

If you’ve had children attend a S.C. school, you’ve had them come home after learning the federal system of government and the S.C. Constitution. While we may not remember every word of the state constitution or we moved here after our last government class, there are some powerful and important ideas woven into it. One of the most important rights guaranteed everyone the right to vote by secret ballot, and we should stop to think what our elections would look like without a secret ballot.

 

In November, more than 1.9 million South Carolinians cast ballots in the presidential election. Instead of casting absentee ballots in the privacy of our homes or by ourselves at our precinct, imagine that anyone, including the government, your employer, your pastor or your neighbor, could look at your ballot.

 

It sounds far-fetched, but Congress is poised to eliminate the secret ballot for some elections. Specifically, Congress is set to consider the disingenuously labeled “Employee Free Choice Act” that would eliminate union-organizing secret ballot elections in workplaces across the country. S.C. workers would no longer have the right to a secret ballot when deciding to have a labor union represent them, essentially overturning South Carolina’s right-to-work law. Instead, a labor union would only need to collect authorization cards from 50 percent of the workers — and the union bosses would have total control over which workers to cajole, coerce or even intimidate.

 

This process, which is commonly called a card-check agreement and is permitted under current law, could become the only method of union organizing. If organized, employers would be required to have a collective bargaining agreement with 120 days, or else a mediator would write one that could not be challenged. This requirement on employers reverses more than 70 years of labor case law that has been fair and transparent to both labor and management.

 

If this invasion of privacy wasn’t scary enough, there are severe economic consequences due to card-check agreements. Union contracts increase labor costs, and rest assured that the prices for consumers will also increase. We’re already paying higher prices for food, and they’ll increase again as retailers cover increased labor costs. South Carolina’s employment rate is unacceptably high, and artificially increasing labor costs could drive employers to not fill vacancies or even lay off workers. These union contracts are also detrimental to our business climate, because unions often target small employers, even as small as 10 employees, for organizing drives.

 

As an entrepreneur, I know employees are a business’s biggest asset, and they’re treated like family. But with paid union organizers on the prowl, the trust between employer and employees can erode, and many entrepreneurs may decide not to start their next business because it’s simply not worth the risk of losing your business to an unaffordable labor union agreement.

 

In the face of such daunting odds of passage of this disastrous bill, is there anything that we can do about it? The answer is yes, and it’s because our federal system of government is based upon the premise that rights not enumerated in the U.S. Constitution are reserved by the people, and those rights can be enumerated through a state constitution.

 

This week, I introduced a constitutional amendment that guarantees the right of workers to a secret ballot in a union-organizing election (H.3305). Amending our state constitution requires a higher threshold for passage —a two-thirds vote of both bodies of the General Assembly and majority approval by the voters. But the right to a secret ballot is fundamental to our democracy, and I believe it cannot be weakened as a political payback to Big Labor.

 

This amendment will only pass the General Assembly if workers, employers, consumers and voters engage in the political process. While I’ll be working with any lawmakers who support this initiative, they need to hear from the source of their political power: you. Please contact your state representatives and state senators today, and ask them to support this constitutional amendment to guarantee workers a secret ballot, protect privacy in the workplace and maintain a competitive business climate.

 

Mr. Bedingfield is a Republican who represents Greenville County in the S.C. House.