The term “right-to-work” refers to Section 14(b) of the Taft-Hartley Act of 1947 that amended the National Labor Relations Act of 1935 (NLRA). The NLRA of 1935 granted private-sector employees the right to organize and join unions without fear of retaliation. The NLRA also granted private-sector unions the right to petition the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to hold union representation elections, providing employees the opportunity to have a union represent them in negotiations with their employer over wages, hours, and working conditions.
As part of labor negotiations, the NLRA permitted labor and management to agree to a number of different union security provisions, including the closed shop and the union shop. A closed shop provision required management only to hire union members. A union shop provision, in contrast, permitted management to hire individuals who did not belong to the union but required any newly hired employee to join the union or face termination. Organized labor regarded both the closed shops and union shops as essential to the long-term viability of unions, because union members must pay union dues. Shortly after the Republican Party took control of Congress in 1946, Republicans pushed through Congress the Taft-Hartley Act of 1947 that sought to weaken the NLRA. The Taft-Hartley Act banned all closed shops and gave states the right to enact so-called right-to-work laws. A right-to-work law prohibited management and labor from agreeing to include a union shop provision in a collective bargaining agreement. Not surprisingly, unions viewed right-to-work laws as part of efforts to bust organized labor.
From its enactment in 1947 through June 2015, twenty-five states enacted right-to-work laws. Southern states make up the majority of right-to-work states. During the 1970s, large American corporations began to move factories out of largely northern and midwestern states without right-to-work laws to southern right-to-work states. By the 1990s, a number of major foreign automobile and manufacturing companies also began operating plants in southern right-to work states. By the 1980s, the Republican Party emerged as the right-to-work party, as part of its generally hostile attitude toward organized labor. Yet the right-to-work issue did not become a major campaign issue in presidential campaigns, largely because of the need for Republican presidential candidates to compete for blue-collar votes in key Midwestern states such as Michigan, Ohio, and Wisconsin. During the Campaign of 1980, for instance, Ronald Reagan, the Republican nominee for president, stressed that he had belonged to a union while he worked as an actor in Hollywood. Reagan served twice as president of the Screen Actors Guild. To have openly advocated the passage of right-to-work laws in these states could have proven politically disastrous. The electoral votes of Wisconsin, Michigan, and Ohio again proved crucial in the presidential elections of 2000 and 2004. Again, right-to-work laws did not become a major campaign issue. In the Campaign of 2000 and Campaign of 2004, Republican presidential nominee George W. Bush did not attempt to make right-to-work a wedge issue. Again, in the Campaign of 2008, right-to-work did not emerge as a major campaign issue. John McCain, the Republican presidential nominee, had voted for the passage of a national right-to-work law.
The battle over right-to-work laws did not directly impact public-sector union members and collective bargaining. The NLRA only protected the right of private-sector employees to join unions and to have a union represent them in collective bargaining with their employers. Each state has the power to either grant or deny public-sector employees collective bargaining rights. Beginning in the 1960s, states began to grant public employees the right to engage in collective bargaining, much like their private-sector counterparts. In 1959, Wisconsin became the first state to grant public-sector unions the right to negotiate contracts. In Abood v. Detroit Bd. of Educ. (1977), the U.S. Supreme Court held that although the First Amendment prohibited union shops in the public sector, the First Amendment’s right to freedom of association did not make unconstitutional so-called agency shops that required public employees who did not belong to a union to pay union representation fees. The Court, however, held that public employee unions could not use any of the funds collected from non-union members for political activities.
In 2010, the voters of Wisconsin elected Scott Walker as Wisconsin governor and gave Republicans control of the Wisconsin General Assembly. Elected as part of the anti-Obama 2010 midterm wave, Walker immediately embarked on a campaign to strip most Wisconsin public employees of collective bargaining rights. Early in March 2011, Walker signed into law legislation sharply limiting the collective bargaining rights of Wisconsin state and local government employees, with the exception of police and firefighters. The action, and a subsequently failed effort to recall Walker, turned Walker into a national political figure and helped to move the Republican Party toward taking openly hostile positions on a range of union issues.
In the Campaign of 2012, following the lead of Scott Walker, the majority of candidates seeking the Republican presidential nomination expressed open hostility to labor unions and strongly supported the adoption of right-to-work by more states. Of the candidates for the Republican presidential nomination, Mitt Romney cast himself as one of the strongest anti-union candidates since the late nineteenth century. Romney stated that, if elected, he would push a broad anti-union agenda that included supporting the enactment of right-to-work laws by more states. Romney also called for the repeal of a federal law requiring contractors on projects being paid for with federal funds to pay the prevailing local wage, and he supported legislation to prohibit collective bargaining agreements to contain a provision requiring management to withhold union dues from the checks of employees to fund political activities by unions.
The 2012 Republican Party platform adopted one of the most anti-union planks in American history. “The current Administration has chosen a different path with regard to labor, clinging to antiquated notions of confrontation and concentrating power in the Washington offices of union elites. It has strongly supported the anti-business card check legislation to deny workers a secret ballot in union organizing campaigns and, through the use of Project Labor Agreements, barred 80 percent of the construction workforce from competing for jobs in many stimulus projects,” stressed the Republican platform. “The current Administration has turned the National Labor Relations Board into a partisan advocate for Big Labor, using threats and coercion outside the law to attack businesses and, through ‘snap elections’ and ‘micro unions,’ limit the rights of workers and employers alike,” continued the platform. “We will restore the rule of law to labor law by blocking ‘card check,’ enacting the Secret Ballot Protection Act, enforcing the Hobbs Act against labor violence, and passing the Raise Act to allow all workers to receive well-earned raises without the approval of their union representative. We demand an end to the Project Labor Agreements; and we call for repeal of the Davis-Bacon Act, which costs the taxpayers billions of dollars annually in artificially high wages on government projects,” furthermore stated the plank. And the Republican platform supported the enactment “of a National Right-to-Work law to promote worker freedom and to promote greater economic liberty.” Mitt Romney, the Republican presidential nominee, went on to lose the battleground states of Wisconsin, Michigan, and Ohio and the presidency.
Despite the loss of the presidency, Republican state legislators continued to push anti-union measures. In December 2012, the Republican-controlled legislature of Michigan signed a right-to-work law. In March 2015, Wisconsin governor Scott Walker and his state’s Republican-controlled legislature passed a right-to-work law, which made Wisconsin the twenty-fifth state with a right-to-work law on the books. In the Campaign of 2016, almost all of the candidates seeking the Republican presidential nomination continued with strong anti-union rhetoric. On the other hand, candidates for the Democratic presidential nomination threw their full support behind expanding the rights of unions. The Republican Party had now become the anti-union party, while the Democratic Party continued with the New Deal legacy as the defender of employee workplace rights. By the start of the Campaign of 2016, private-sector union membership had fallen nationwide to 6.6 percent of the workforce, with public-sector union membership holding steady at 35.7 percent of the workforce. By deciding to go after both private-sector and public-sector unions, Republican candidates and the Republican Party made a conscious decision that this part of the electorate would never support Republican candidates. By depicting union members either as privileged or as victims of corrupt union leaders, Republican candidates hope to turn anti-union attacks into an effective wedge issue. On the other side of the political spectrum, the Democratic Party has continued its post-New Deal legacy as the defender of organized labor in both the private sector and the public sector.
Bureau of Labor Statistics. “Union Members Summary.” http://www.bls.gov/news.release/union2.nr0.htm. Accessed October 19, 2015.
Davey, Monica. “Unions Suffer Latest Defeat in Midwest with Signing of Wisconsin Measure.” New York Times, March 9, 2015. http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/10/us/gov-scott-walker-of-wisconsin-signs-right-to-work-bill.html. Accessed October 19, 2015.
Greenhouse, Steven. “Wisconsin’s Legacy for Unions.” New York Times, February 22, 2014. http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02/23/business/wisconsins-legacy-for-unions.html. Accessed October 19, 2015.
McClatchy DC. “Romney Targets Labor Unions, Which Could Be Risky Come Fall.” February 19, 2012. http://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/politics-government/election/article24724393.html. Accessed October 19, 2015.
Meta, Seema. “Mitt Romney’s Anti-Union Tone Could Haunt Him Later.” Los Angeles Times, February 26, 2012. http://articles.latimes.com/2012/feb/26/nation/la-na-romney-labor-20120226. Accessed October 19, 2015.
National Conference of State Legislatures: Right-to-Work Resources. http://www.ncsl.org/research/labor-and-employment/right-to-work-laws-and-bills.aspx. Accessed October 19, 2015.
Saleh, Ian. “Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker Signs Collective Bargaining Bill, Bypasses Senate Democrats.” Washington Post, March 11, 2011. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/03/11/AR2011031103966.html. Accessed October 19, 2015.