The Right to Organize

Floor Speech

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Mr. MERKLEY. Mr. President, let's turn to another attack on workers. Our entire Constitution had a theme, had a mission statement, and that mission statement was ``we the people,'' government of, by, and for the people. My colleagues might be surprised to discover that the Constitution didn't say ``we the privileged; we the wealthy; we the well-connected; we the powerful'' because they bring bill after bill to the floor of the Senate that is exactly government of, by, and for the wealthy and the well-connected.

Now we see that the Supreme Court is getting in on the act in this effort to undermine the ability of workers to organize, to get a fair share of the wealth that they create.

Former President Jimmy Carter once said:

Every advance in this half-century--Social Security, civil rights, Medicare, aid to education, one after another--came with the support and leadership of American labor.

Well, he was absolutely right. I would also add a few more things to the list, such as 8-hour workdays, the 40-hour workweek, overtime pay, the minimum wage, family and sick leave, health and safety working standards. When workers have organized, they have fought for better conditions for every American--better pay, better safety, better and fair working conditions--and America is a better nation because of it. It is a much better nation because of the men and women of the labor movement who have fought tirelessly to ensure that our country lives up to that ``we the people'' vision statement. Thanks to their work, an honest day's work means an honest day's pay for millions of Americans. But that is exactly what the Supreme Court is poised to undo. All the powerful and the privileged--they want even more squeezed out of the workers, so they have spent decades really demonizing and attacking the ability of workers to organize.

During the three decades after World War II, workers got a fair share of the wealth they were creating. Their wages went up as productivity went up, and it turned out that this is good for business as well because workers who have paychecks are able to buy products, and then the companies can sell more. The companies do well when people get paid fairly, but that concept is about to be undermined in a massive way with an attack on what are called fair share fees.

When workers organize and bargain for better benefits, there is a cost of developing that organization and conducting those negotiations, and every worker who benefits chips in a share under fair share fees. Everyone wins, so everyone contributes.

This is not about contributing to political activity. It is not about contributing funds that are distributed to causes. This is simply the cost of the negotiating process. For this foundation to be able to negotiate successfully, people have to share in that effort.

The heart of the right to organize has been absolutely embodied in law for well over half a century in a case called Abood v. Detroit Board of Education. Collective bargaining among workers doesn't work if you create a strategy for workers to freeload; that is, to get all the benefits without putting in any of the effort.

I am reminded of a story that I read as a very young child just learning to read. It was about the barnyard. It was about some member of the community baking bread and asking for help from all the other animals--would they help with this aspect or that aspect of making the bread. They all said: No, we are not interested in helping. At the end, when the bread was baked, all the animals in the barnyard wanted their share. They wanted a share of it without having contributed a thing.

That system is what the Supreme Court is trying to foist on America, undermining the fundamental right to organize and allowing freeloaders to essentially create a situation where you can't afford to represent the group. Well, that undermines the success of our workers to get a fair share of the wealth they create. It undermines their ability to negotiate for a safer workplace.

Again, this is not about political activity; this is simply about the function of representing a group in negotiations with the owner.

That is the case in Illinois, where Mark Janus works as a specialist for the Department of Healthcare and Family Services. He works under a contract negotiated between the State of Illinois and the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, or AFSCME. He is not a member of the union. He is not required to be a member of the union. But Mark Janus says: I want all the benefits that are produced by the union organizing and negotiating on my behalf, but I don't want to have to share any of the costs.

Everyone knows that if people are given a permission slip to not share in the cost of organizing, the ability to organize is undermined. It is a fundamental part of it: You negotiate together; you benefit together. He is challenging that portion of the contract.

The powerful and privileged titans of industry have been waging a decades-long campaign against the workers of America. They are excited about this. Don't worry, the Koch brothers are in control. Well, we have certainly seen their control here in the Senate. This certainly bears on the case right before us. They invested vast sums in 2014, and they supported and pushed campaigns in Arkansas, Louisiana, North Carolina, Iowa, Colorado, and Alaska, and they turned those seats in favor of folks who supported the Koch brothers. They took a majority of this body.

What happened in 2016? Well, there was a vacant Supreme Court seat. We have all taken a pledge to support the Constitution. We have an advice and consent responsibility. But the majority leader came down here and said: We are not going to do our responsibility of advice and consent on any nominee from President Obama--none. It doesn't matter who the nominee is; we are not going to do this. Why? Because the Koch brothers said: Don't allow a debate or a vote on a nominee from President Obama.

The majority leader said that this was justified because it was an election year. Let's look at American history. Fifteen times in an election year, there has been a vacancy on the Supreme Court. All 15 times previous to 2016, the Senate debated and the Senate voted.

There were Members of my colleague's team across the aisle who thought we should honor that responsibility of advice and consent. You can vote somebody down or you can vote somebody up, but we should have the debate and we should have the vote. As soon as they said one word about how there should be a debate or there should be a vote, they got their chain yanked. In one case, the Koch brothers said they would immediately put in millions of dollars against their primary opponent.

That is why the Koch brothers are known as the puppet masters of this body right here in which I stand right now. When they say ``jump,'' the majority says ``how high?'' That certainly came to fruition in 2016 when they refused to exercise their constitutional responsibility to debate and vote on a nominee for the Supreme Court. That was done so that the empty seat would be passed on to the next President. That is the first time in U.S. history a Supreme Court seat has been stolen and passed on to the next President--the only time.

Well, what does that result in? That results in a Supreme Court that now has been selected where we know four people stand on one side of the issue and four stand on the other side. Then you have, essentially, an illegitimate process for the ninth Justice--a Justice who by every indication is willing to join the other four in attacking the foundation of the right to organize in our Nation. That right to organize was envisioned in the Constitution, in the ``we the people'' Constitution, not ``we the powerful,'' not ``we the privileged,'' not ``we the wealthy,'' and not ``we the well-connected.''

Mr. Janus is being represented and funded by the National Right to Work Foundation. Let's call it the right to freeload because that is what it is. You don't contribute your share, but you get all the benefits.

It reminds me a little bit of the conversation about citizenship in America. People talk about the rights of citizenship and their responsibilities of citizenship too. There are responsibilities of being part of a group when you bargain for wages. That means paying your fair share. So it is their share. It is the heart of the ability to organize versus the position orchestrated by the Koch brothers to assault the ability to organize in this country so that workers can get a fair share of the wealth they work to create.

We have seen these right-to-freeload bills pass with the influence of the titans across this country in State after State. Here is what we know. In those States that protect the constitutional vision of the right to organize, workers earn over $5,000 a year more than in other States. In the right-to-freeload States, workers earn a lot less. And that is apparently why the owners of the companies love that action so much--because they can squeeze more out of the workers. The right-to- freeload States have higher poverty. They have higher infant mortality. They have higher workplace deaths than other States. They support public schools less than other States.

It is a mistake to have a Court assembled through an illegitimate process of stealing a Supreme Court seat proceed to gut the constitutional right to organize and assault the workers of this Nation just to put more zeros on the bank account statements of the millionaires and billionaires and titans and wealthy and powerful Americans.

Let's have a remedial course in this Chamber about what our Nation and our Constitution are all about. It is not about coming here and getting elected by the wealthiest Americans to serve the wealthiest Americans; it is about coming here to form laws that serve ``we the people.'' Thomas Jefferson made this point again and again. He said that if you concentrate power in the few, you will get power from the powerful--you will get decisions from the powerful. You will never get the will of the people if you concentrate power. He called on every voter to have an equal voice--not just a vote but an equal voice.

So let's remember Jefferson. Let's remember that our Forefathers put together this document so that we wouldn't have government by the few and the powerful, such as they have in Europe, but this would be different here in the United States of America, where we would try to forge laws that gave all families the opportunity to thrive.

We can see the impact that the reversal of this principle has had. We spent half of last year on a healthcare bill or versions of a healthcare bill designed to rip healthcare from 22 to 30 million Americans, depending on the version. Then we spent the other part of the year on a tax bill designed to borrow $1.5 trillion from our children and deliver the vast amount of the benefits to the wealthiest of Americans. That is government for and by the powerful. Let's return to government for and by the people.

Thank you, Mr. President.

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