Per the secretary of state's website, Amendment 47 says:
Shall there be an amendment to the Colorado constitution concerning participation in a labor organization as a condition of employment, and, in connection therewith, prohibiting an employer from requiring that a person be a member and pay any moneys to a labor organization or to any other third party in lieu of payment to a labor organization and creating a misdemeanor criminal penalty for a person who violates the provisions of the section?
The tricky or sneaky part of that is that mandatory union membership is already illegal in every state according to the Taft Hartley Act of 1947. Before this bill, unions could have closed shop agreements where every employee had to be a member of the union. The next step down is simply called a union shop, where new employees usually have 30 days to become members of the union. Then there are agency shops where not everyone is required to join the union but they do have to pay some amount of fees or dues to the union for their representation. However, federal law allows non members to have money meant for political purposes to be refunded. That doesn't sound so bad does it? If you don't want representation then don't join the union. Isn't that what Amendment 47 would do? Nope. According to many documents and case files, unions are required to represent all employees of the company with which there is an agreement whether that employee is a member of the union or not. This is spelled out most clearly by this document from the Legal Aid Society of San Francisco. Considering that the language of Amendment 47 does not at all address changes to this provision, know as "duty of fair representation", we must assume this would remain intact. This, in effect, creates union free-loaders.
If that's the case, why would anyone pay union dues if the union would continue to bargain for them and be forced to represent them in the case of a grievance? This is simply an effort to further weaken unions.
When the Bureau of Labor Statistics shows that 8.7% of Coloradans are members of unions why is this even important? Because Jon Caldara (who just called union members terrorists), Pete Coors, and Jake Jabs want no unions what so ever in Colorado.
Disclosure: I'm working for Coloradans for Middle Class Relief because I think our workers and economy have enough problems without this needless amendment.
RSS Feed
