Hard-working U.S. taxpayers, devastated by the politically motivated COVID-19 lockdowns, continue to shake their heads in disbelief over the obstructionist coronavirus response of many of our public school teachers’ unions across the country this past year. The same holds true for the massive $1.9 trillion Democrat COVID stimulus bill, passed March 11, that includes coercing the entire country to bail out over-spent “blue state” municipal union pension plans. We have reached the apex of power-hungry elitist irresponsibility.
The National Labor Relations Act of 1935 (also known as the Wagner Act) is the foundational statute of U.S. labor law. It guarantees the right of private-sector employees to organize into trade unions. The act specifically doesn’t apply to certain workers ... including government employees.
The reason government employees were excluded from the act is because tax paying citizens would be forced to foot the spiraling tax bill for above-market rate union member compensation, without having a direct “seat at the table” in the government union negotiations. This would be the ultimate “taxation without representation” abuse of power.
Intellectually dishonest people, pushing a political agenda, have systematically gotten us to where we are today. They, quite simply, need to get out of the way. It is unchecked nonsense to allow our government “of the people, by the people and for the people” to negotiate with itself and then let the citizen taxpayers know how it turns out.
The time has come for a collective bipartisan challenge to the fundamental legality of government unions.
Thomas J. Murphree
