Tim Fernholz has a nice look at what Labor wants from Obama, and includes this bit on their proposed strategy for passing the Employee Free Choice Act:
The unions would like to see EFCA pass as part of whatever economic-stimulus package materializes early next year, arguing that a new jobs program should allow workers to collectively bargain for their wages. They also note that while the U.S. economy has recovered from two recent recessions, neither recovery saw improvements in income inequality for middle-class workers. "We have to create jobs ... and workers have to have a voice in those jobs [through union organizing] so that they're good jobs," Anna Burger, the secretary-treasurer of the Service Employees International Union and chair of the Change to Win coalition, said. "We have a huge economic crises that we have to grow our way out of, but we have to take this step and it won't cost the government a dime."While the new administration and congressional leadership have reiterated their support for the card-check bill, they haven't signaled that the bill will come up for a vote as part of the stimulus package that will be the government's first priority in January. Obama himself declined to specify a timetable in a Tuesday interview. The bill, which passed the House in 2007, was filibustered successfully in the Senate after 52 Senators voted for cloture, eight less than the required 60. Vote counting for the bill's next appearance is murky, but with seven new Democratic senators, the situation looks slightly more optimistic than it did in 2007. Nonetheless, Republicans see the issue as a way to unite and rally a somewhat fractured party while picking off some vulnerable Democrats.
In 10 years, you can imagine the history being written either way. You can imagine EFCA being rammed through atop the stimulus package, and it ascends into the pantheon of crucial changes that would never have survived our system if not for the reformist opportunities of a national emergency. That is, after all, how the National Labor Relations Act passed in the first place. There's precedent here. But you can also imagine the stimulus bill getting bogged down in a fight over worker ballots, with business interests spending hundreds of millions on the campaign, and the Obama administration suffering a humiliating early defeat as they find themselves unable to overwhelm a Republican filibuster. In that world, EFCA will look like Clinton's damaging effort to allow gays in the military. Like with most policies, the question is passage. If EFCA is tried and passed, it will be a great victory, If it's tried and failed, it will be a deep wound. Obama's administration surely knows this, and the question is simply how committed they are to the policy, as that decides how much they'll be willing to gamble on it.
