Check-mate: protecting workers' paychecks from predatory unions is good politics - and simple justice

National Review, Jan 26, 1998 by Christopher Rapp

Since the campaign began this past May it has attracted the attention of conservative and Republican heavy-hitters nationwide. Insurance executive and school-choice supporter J. Patrick Rooney came forward in July with a timely donation. Grover Norquist of Americans for Tax Reform courted Gov. Pete Wilson and financed a major mailing to collect the signatures needed to put the initiative on the ballot. Wilson and former Vice President Dan Quayle serve as honorary chairmen of the initiative, and it has received the endorsement of California's Republican legislative leaders.

The unions and the Left are poised for a counterattack. CTA official John Hein has dismissed the initiative as a "scheme to silence those of us who defend the public schools." Art Pulaski, an official of the California Labor Federation, calls it "an attack on workers' ability to have a voice in the political process." In a Los Angeles Times column, Jesse Jackson opined that "California's rabid Right is now opening a new front in its class war," and suggested that the initiative threatened the environment, civil rights, the 40-hour work week, and -- yes -- child-labor laws.

Jackson's hysteria is understandable. In 1996, the CTA reported $2.7 million in contributions, with close to $1.1 million going directly to the state Democratic Party. (The state Republican committee received only $65,800.) The effect Initiative 134 has had in Washington state suggests what will happen to those figures if unions have to ask permission before taking members' money.

The California initiative is on the ballot for the June 2 primary voting this year, and if passed it will go into effect on July 1. If a significant percentage of union members decide not to authorize the use of their dues, the unions will be faced with a disaster during the fall gubernatorial and congressional elections. Even if the unions defeat the initiative, doing so will be likely to cost them some $25 to $30 million, reducing the resources they will have available to oppose other reforms. An initiative to dismantle the state's disastrous bilingual-education program is already set for the June ballot, and there are whispers about an effort to prepare a school-choice proposition in time for this coming November's ballot.

Last spring, local union affiliates were so desperate to derail the Campaign Reform Initiative that they harassed and even attempted to bribe CRI signature gatherers into putting down their pens; the matter eventually had to be settled in court. When the CRI campaign turned in 775,000 signatures in November -- nearly twice as many as required to qualify for the ballot -- a union-sponsored organization called Californians to Protect Employee Rights sued (unsuccessfully) to have signatures invalidated because of the placement of the contribution flap on the letter sent out by Gov. Wilson and Mr. Norquist.

Union leaders are also threatening to move forward with three retaliatory initiatives targeted at business interests -- despite the fact that, by the unions' own admission, corporate California has played no part in the CRI campaign. Dan Terry, president of California Professional Firefighters, explained that his initiative -- which would phase out all corporate tax benefits -- is simply a threat -- although one he is prepared to carry out. "If business gets actively involved in CRI," he warns, "we will be inclined to go forward with ours."