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From: mjk@tty3b.UUCP (Mike Kelly)
Newsgroups: net.politics
Subject: Re: Re: The Sub-Minimum Wage Again - (nf)
Message-ID: <485@tty3b.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 6-Sep-84 14:34:34 EDT
Article-I.D.: tty3b.485
Posted: Thu Sep  6 14:34:34 1984
Date-Received: Sun, 16-Sep-84 12:21:14 EDT
References: <476@tty3b.UUCP>, <22400002@ea.UUCP>
Organization: Teletype Corp., Skokie, Ill
Lines: 36

The closed shop argument is attractive, because it *seems* so democratic.
In fact, it is just another tool in managements toolbox for destroying
trade unions.  No one "forces" a union into a shop, with very few exceptions
(and I'll join you in condemning the undemocratic Teamsters, but I still think
that those workers are better with a corrupt union than no union at all -- and
many Teamsters have told me as much.  Organizations such as Teamsters for a
Democratic Union are trying to change the Teamsters internally, and they deserve
support.)

Unions are established in a shop as a result of a lot of hard work by workers
in that shop.   It is true that union organizers play a role, but it is
generally a very minor role.  It is up to the workers in the shop to organize
their fellow workers into signing election cards.  Only after a majority of
people in the shop have signed cards calling for an election can an NLRB-
supervised election be called. Then, a majority of workers must vote to accept
the union.  But it's not over.  The local board of the union is elected 
from among the workers to run the union local.  These people handle contract
bargaining (or in some large unions, elect the bargainers for national contract
talks), grievances, and the day-to-day operation of the union.  They hire the
union staff.  a

What I'm trying to show here is that unions are democratic, and like our
government, no one can just opt out.  You can fight within the democracy to
change it, but you can't decide that you just don't want to be part of it.  
That's anarchy, and it doesn't work very well.   The "right-to-work"  argument is
a management red herring.  The organizations that have helped more than any to
guarantee a right-to-work are unions themselves.  With few exceptions, they were
at the forefront of the civil rights movement.  They fought for the benfits that
everyone takes for granted today.  The "right-to-work" is just another way for
management to break workers up in a divide-and-conquer strategy that ends up
with very weak unions, or no unions at all.

Mike Kelly