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74–029 PDF 2012

THE RIGHT TO CHOOSE: PROTECTING UNION

WORKERS FROM FORCED POLITICAL CONTRIBUTIONS

HEARING

BEFORE THE

COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT

AND GOVERNMENT REFORM

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

ONE HUNDRED TWELFTH CONGRESS

SECOND SESSION

FEBRUARY 8, 2012

Serial No. 112–128

Printed for the use of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform

(

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.fdsys.gov

http://www.house.gov/reform
(II)

COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND GOVERNMENT REFORM

DARRELL E. ISSA, California, Chairman

DAN BURTON, Indiana

JOHN L. MICA, Florida

TODD RUSSELL PLATTS, Pennsylvania

MICHAEL R. TURNER, Ohio

PATRICK T. MCHENRY, North Carolina

JIM JORDAN, Ohio

JASON CHAFFETZ, Utah

CONNIE MACK, Florida

TIM WALBERG, Michigan

JAMES LANKFORD, Oklahoma

JUSTIN AMASH, Michigan

ANN MARIE BUERKLE, New York

PAUL A. GOSAR, Arizona

RAU ́ L R. LABRADOR, Idaho

PATRICK MEEHAN, Pennsylvania

SCOTT DESJARLAIS, Tennessee

JOE WALSH, Illinois

TREY GOWDY, South Carolina

DENNIS A. ROSS, Florida

FRANK C. GUINTA, New Hampshire

BLAKE FARENTHOLD, Texas

MIKE KELLY, Pennsylvania

ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland, Ranking

Minority Member

EDOLPHUS TOWNS, New York

CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York

ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of

Columbia

DENNIS J. KUCINICH, Ohio

JOHN F. TIERNEY, Massachusetts

WM. LACY CLAY, Missouri

STEPHEN F. LYNCH, Massachusetts

JIM COOPER, Tennessee

GERALD E. CONNOLLY, Virginia

MIKE QUIGLEY, Illinois

DANNY K. DAVIS, Illinois

BRUCE L. BRALEY, Iowa

PETER WELCH, Vermont

JOHN A. YARMUTH, Kentucky

CHRISTOPHER S. MURPHY, Connecticut

JACKIE SPEIER, California

LAWRENCE J. BRADY, Staff Director

JOHN D. CUADERES, Deputy Staff Director

ROBERT BORDEN, General Counsel

LINDA A. GOOD, Chief Clerk

DAVID RAPALLO, Minority Staff Director
(III)

C O N T E N T S

Page

Hearing held on February 8, 2012 ......................................................................... 1

Statement of:

Waites, Claire, employee of Baldwin County Public Schools, Alabama,

and 2004 and 2008 National Education Association Representative Assembly Delegate; Terry Bowman, UAW member and president of Union

Conservatives, Inc.; Sally Coomer, Seattle, WA, area home care provider; and Kenneth G. Dau-Schmidt, JD., Ph.D., Willard and Margaret

Carr professor of labor and management law, Indiana University,

Maurer School of Law ................................................................................... 8

Bowman, Terry .......................................................................................... 42

Coomer, Sally ............................................................................................. 14

Dau-Schmidt, Kenneth G. ......................................................................... 30

Waites, Claire ............................................................................................ 8

Letters, statements, etc., submitted for the record by:

Bowman, Terry, UAW member and president of Union Conservatives,

Inc., prepared statement of .......................................................................... 44

Coomer, Sally, Seattle, WA, area home care provider, prepared statement

of ..................................................................................................................... 16

Cummings, Hon. Elijah E., a Representative in Congress from the State

of Maryland:

Information concerning AT&T ................................................................. 64

Prepared statement of ............................................................................... 5

Dau-Schmidt, Kenneth G., JD., Ph.D., Willard and Margaret Carr professor of labor and management law, Indiana University, Maurer

School of Law, prepared statement of ......................................................... 32

Issa, Hon. Darrell E., a Representative in Congress from the State of

California, staff report .................................................................................. 103

Kucinich, Hon. Dennis J., a Representative in Congress from the State

of Ohio, information concerning Labor Day speech at Liberty State

Park ................................................................................................................ 75

Towns, Hon. Edolphus, a Representative in Congress from the State

of New York, prepared statement of ........................................................... 121

Waites, Claire, employee of Baldwin County Public Schools, Alabama,

and 2004 and 2008 National Education Association Representative Assembly Delegate, prepared statement of ..................................................... 10

(1)

THE RIGHT TO CHOOSE: PROTECTING UNION

WORKERS FROM FORCED POLITICAL CONTRIBUTIONS

WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 8, 2012

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES,

COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND GOVERNMENT REFORM,

Washington, DC.

The committee met, pursuant to notice, at 10 a.m., in room 2154,

Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Darrell E. Issa (chairman of

the committee) presiding.

Present: Representatives Issa, McHenry, Jordan, Chaffetz,

Walberg, Lankford, Gosar, Labrador, DesJarlais, Walsh, Gowdy,

Ross, Guinta, Kelly, Cummings, Towns, Norton, Kucinich, Tierney,

Clay, Lynch, Connolly, Quigley, Davis, Welch, Murphy.

Staff present: Kurt Bardella, senior policy advisor; Michael R.

Bebeau and Gwen D’Luzansky, assistant clerks; Robert Borden,

general counsel; Will L. Boyington, staff assistant; Molly Boyl, parliamentarian; Lawrence J. Brady, staff director; David Brewer,

counsel; John Cuaderes, deputy staff director; Linda Good, chief

clerk; Tyler Grimm and Michael Whatley, professional staff members; Frederick Hill, director of communications and senior policy

advisor; Christopher Hixon, deputy chief counsel, oversight; Justin

LoFranco, deputy director of digital strategy; Mark D. Marin, director of oversight; Christine Martin, counsel; Kristina M. Moore, senior counsel; Beverly Britton Fraser, Claire Coleman, Yvette

Cravins, and Brian Quinn, minority counsels; Lisa Cody, minority

investigator; Kevin Corbin, minority deputy clerk; Ashley Etienne,

minority director of communications; Susanne Sachsman Grooms,

minority chief counsel; Carla Hultberg, minority chief clerk; and

Jason Powell, minority senior counsel.

Chairman ISSA. The committee will come to order.

We exist to secure two fundamental principles. First, Americans

have a right to know that the money Washington takes from them

is well spent. And second, Americans deserve an effective, efficient

government that works for them.

Our duty on the Oversight and Government Reform Committee

is to protect these rights. Our solemn responsibility is to hold government accountable to taxpayers, because taxpayers have a right

to know what they get from their government.

It is our responsibility to work tirelessly in partnership with citizen watchdogs to deliver the facts to the American people and

bring genuine reform to the Federal bureaucracy. This is our mission.
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I will now recognize myself for an opening statement.

Individual freedom and personal choice are both cornerstones of

our democracy and at the heart of unionization in America. However, the roles of unions have evolved from being protectorates of

workers to being a powerful force in the political process. In America, what things become they have a right to become.

However, during the 2010 election cycle, unions spent more than

$1.1 billion to finance political and lobbying activities. The House

Committee on Oversight and Government Reform’s focus on these

issue will not be on the examination of the validity of unions or the

right to exist, but rather, an effort to ensure that the political activities of unions does not infringe on individual rights and freedoms of its workers. We are going to examine in a series of hearings the process by which union dues are collected and how transparent they are and how the money is spent.

I would like to thank our witnesses today for having the courage

to stand up in public and share their stories with us and the American people. Union spending transparency, this is not a unique

word to be said in this committee. Government transparency, bank

transparency, privacy issues and knowing when or how your personal information is being used, these are all part of transparency

in government, a cornerstone of this committee.

So today, as we look at recent court decisions that have lifted

limitations on the use of dues for political spending, and I might

add, lifted the limits on corporations in political spending, many

workers are intentionally left unaware of their rights, and in some

cases are subject to campaigns of threats and extortion.

Since taking office in 2009, the Obama administration has acted

to reduce union transparency and reporting requirements, particularly on what is called the LM2. Right now, union workers do not

know how much of their money is being spent or funneled to Super

PACs, like the one President Obama expressed support for yesterday.

Under Citizens United, all of this is legal, under Citizens United,

all of these activities are completely constitutional, and likely not

to change in the foreseeable future. But today, workers don’t have

a say. There is no reporting requirement that provides workers

with transparency we believe they deserve. In fact, just 2 weeks

after the Supreme Court ruling that paved the way for Super

PACs, the Obama administration began scrapping some of the disclosure requirements, particularly on international unions.

In addition to weakening the reporting requirements, the Obama

administration quietly scaled back on the Department of Labor’s

ability to conduct effective financial oversight of labor organizations, and in fact, disbanded the Division of International Union

Audits.

Although I can reach a conclusion that this is a union-friendly

administration, that in fact this was what the union would want,

and the like, I won’t reach that conclusion here today. I will only

reach a conclusion that this committee, in order to further transparency, asks, why wouldn’t we reinstate greater reporting? Why

wouldn’t we ensure that money taken involuntarily from union

members is in fact money that they have a right to know?
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Additionally, in the coming weeks and months, this committee

will look at the other side. I pledge today to look at corporate contributions to Super PACs.

Citizens United is now the law of the land. We don’t dispute

that. But Congress has a role particularly in ensuring greater

transparency. We believe that nothing will be outside the Constitution in ensuring that the money be tracked in a way in which there

is accountability for who is in fact providing great influence to the

outcome of this coming year’s election. But let’s all realize that in

the last few weeks, we have seen Super PACs play a huge role in

the outcome of primaries. Whether you are for one candidate, the

other, or none of them, we know Super PACs are here to stay. We

know that they are receiving large amounts of money.

And today, we are going to ask a more narrow question, which

is, do workers in unionized organizations have a right to know

more than they currently know about when it is being taken, what

it is being used for and whether in fact it has to be taken from

them.

As the ranking member is recognized, I have purchased copies of

a book that I think is very noteworthy for all of us through all this

series of hearings. And I recommend it to all of you. It really outlines the last time, I think, that the Senate did serious work in

looking at unions, not from an anti-union standpoint, but from in

fact a friend of the unionized workers standpoint. Hopefully it will

be taken to heart by both sides of the aisle.

With that, I recognize the ranking member for an opening statement.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. And thank

you for the book.

If you read today’s hearing title, you would think that it is about

protecting union workers. Unfortunately, the real purpose of tody’s

hearing is to continue the majority’s unprecedented year-long attack against millions of middle-class American workers and their

right to bargain collectively for their better wages and working conditions.

The majority’s premise for today’s hearing is that we need to conduct aggressive oversight to prevent unions from using the dues of

their members to fund political activities. The majority expresses

great concern and urgency over the prospect that unions are using

the dues of their members to advocate on behalf of certain candidates or causes.

Let’s start with the facts. First, Federal law already makes it

clear that employment may not be conditioned on an employee’s

willingness to fund a union’s political activities. In addition, unions

may not force their members to pay for political activities they disagree with. Unions are already subject to extensive administrative

procedures and reporting requirements to ensure they comply with

these laws.

In contrast, after the Supreme Court’s decision in Citizens

United, private corporations are free to spend limitless amounts of

money influencing political decisions. Corporate money is flooding

into American politics big-time. According to statistics from the

Center for Responsive Politics, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce,

which is funded by corporate donations, spent more than $32 mil-
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lion on electioneering communications during the 2010 election season, about 94 percent of which was on behalf of Republican candidates. This unlimited corporate money bankrolls political action

committees that will inject more than $200 million into the 2012

races, according to estimates.

As the Wall Street Journal observed, these corporate funds constitute possibly the largest force in the 2012 campaign aside from

the Presidential candidates themselves and political parties. These

corporations are not subject to any of the same rules that unions

face with respect to obtaining shareholder consent or input on political spending. Even if shareholders object to political spending by

a corporation, they have no comparable legal rights to opt out of

financing corporations’ political activities or to seek reimbursement

for these funds.

Our colleagues on the other side of the aisle like to use rhetoric

that sounds like they have the interests of workers in mind. They

talk about the right to work, States and paycheck protection. But

their rhetoric does not match the reality. These proposals hurt millions of American workers by driving down wages, eliminating benefits and putting more money in the pockets of corporate execs.

According to an analysis by the Economic Policy Institute, right to work laws lower the average income to workers by $1,500 a year

and significantly decrease the ability of workers to obtain health

insurance or pensions through their jobs. This hearing is not about

protecting the rights of workers. It is about further silencing the

voice of unions across this country that represent millions of American workers while at the same time encouraging private corporations to spend limitless amounts of money without transparency or

accountability. If the majority were really interested in giving the

American citizens a greater voice in how their money is spent on

political activities, it would immediately call hearings on the proliferation of corporate spending this election season after the Supreme Court’s decision in Citizens United.

I am very pleased to hear the chairman say that we will begin

to at some point look at the Citizens United and the ramifications

of it. That is very, very good news. If the committee did this on an

even-handed and balanced basis, that is something I would strongly support.

With that, Mr. Chairman, I yield back.

[The prepared statement of Hon. Elijah E. Cummings follows:]
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Chairman ISSA. I thank the gentleman. Would the gentleman

yield before he yields back?

Mr. CUMMINGS. Certainly.

Chairman ISSA. I made that pledge for a reason. The fact is that

the unlimited dollars are, as the gentleman said in his opening

statement, are on both sides. And although I don’t think you can

have a single panel talk about both, I know that your witness will

in fact touch on it. And whether or not it is a minority day or in

fact it is the second in the series, it is my intention to look at the

growing effect of Super PACs. I want to make sure that I do each

of them in a way that talks about the transparency.

I would say to the gentleman, the one thing that I know is that

you and I can’t un-ring the bell of the Supreme Court. So the intention of this committee is to concentrate on legislation after effective

hearings that mandate in law greater transparency. And I will only

offer legislation after we have looked at all the elements that feed

dollars into the process. I thank the gentleman for his opening

statement.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Thank you very much.

Chairman ISSA. With that, all Members will have 5 legislative

days to include not only their opening statements but other insertions for the record and extraneous information.

With that, we now recognize our first and only panel of witnesses. First we go to Ms. Claire Waites. She is a school teacher

in Alabama and a member of the National Education Association.

Mr. Terry Bowman is an auto worker in Ypsilanti, MI, close to my

alma mater, and a member of the United Auto Workers. Ms. Sally

Coomer is a home health care worker in Duvall, WA, and is a

member of the SEIU, or Service Employees International Union.

Last, Dr. Kenneth G. Dau-Schmidt is a Willard and Margaret Carr

professor of labor and employment law at the Maurer School of

Law at Indiana University in Bloomington, IN.

And with that, if you would all rise, pursuant to the rules of the

committee, all witnesses are to be sworn. Please raise your right

hands.

[Witnesses sworn.]

Chairman ISSA. Let the record respond all witnesses answered in

the affirmative. Please have a seat.

It is our practice to go down the row. It is committee practice to

have opening statements be 5 minutes. I understand all of you prepared roughly 5 minutes. Your entire opening statements will be

placed in the record completely. So you need not read verbatim

from them, if you choose not to. The only thing I will say is that

as we get to 5 minutes, and you will see the indication in front of

you, you will hear a quiet tapping. Please know that that is an opportunity to sum up, if you haven’t already.

Thank you very much. With that, we recognize Ms. Waites.
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STATEMENTS OF CLAIRE WAITES, EMPLOYEE OF BALDWIN

COUNTY PUBLIC SCHOOLS, ALABAMA, AND 2004 AND 2008

NATIONAL EDUCATION ASSOCIATION REPRESENTATIVE ASSEMBLY DELEGATE; TERRY BOWMAN, UAW MEMBER AND

PRESIDENT OF UNION CONSERVATIVES, INC.; SALLY

COOMER, SEATTLE, WA, AREA HOME CARE PROVIDER; AND

KENNETH G. DAU-SCHMIDT, JD., PH.D., WILLARD AND MARGARET CARR PROFESSOR OF LABOR AND MANAGEMENT

LAW, INDIANA UNIVERSITY, MAURER SCHOOL OF LAW

STATEMENT OF CLAIRE WAITES

Ms. WAITES. I would like to thank Chairman Issa, Ranking Member Cummings and the members of the committee for allowing me

to be present today to tell my story. My name is Claire Waites, and

I am a 28-year veteran teacher in Baldwin County Public School

System in Baldwin County, Alabama.

I am currently a member in good standing of Baldwin County

Education Association, which is affiliated with the Alabama Education Association and the National Education Association.

I would like to share with you my experiences with the NEA

Representative Assembly in the years of 2004 and 2008 of which

I attended as a delegate. I would like to focus on NEA’s Fund for

Children and Public Education and how the name itself leads one

to believe it is a charitable fund to benefit children, when in fact

it is a political action fund to benefit the candidates of NEA’s

choice.

In 2004, prior to attending my first representative assembly, during a required meeting of the local BCEA, delegates were told by

the president at the time that we were expected to donate to the

NEA Fund for Children and Public Education. We were told this

contribution was non-negotiable.

While in Washington, during the delegate assembly, all Alabama

delegates were reminded daily to make their donation to the fund.

Oddly enough, we were even told how to contribute. We must make

two different payments, totaling the amount of $180. In the beginning, I was puzzled why the two different payments had to be

made and neither payment was tax-deductible. I consoled myself by

saying it was for children.

Instead of making the contribution right away, I procrastinated

for several days, because my travel budget was tight. Every morning the AEA president would name off one by one the counties that

had already reached 100 percent. I soon began to fear that they

would know I was the only hold-out and obediently donated the

money with misgivings. I consoled myself again that it was for children. It was not until later in the day that I found out the true

nature of the fund. It was announced NEA would be endorsing

John Kerry for President, and the money from the funds that were

raised would be going to his campaign.

I must tell you, I felt a wave of illness come over like none I have

ever felt before. Educators, who were supposed to be my people,

had duped me into donating to a candidate I was not supporting.

Once again, I attended the NEA representative assembly in

2008. I was strong in my resolve that I would not make the same

mistake twice: I would not donate to the Children’s Fund. However,
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I never had the chance to show my strength. The BCEA president

at the time made the contribution in my name from a fund that

was given to us for travel. I was furious. I told her she had no right

to make a political contribution in my name under any circumstances. She replied to me by saying it was not a political contribution, it was a contribution to a Children’s Fund.

I explained to her what I had learned about the fund in 2004 and

I did not want to contribute and I wanted the money back. She replied that she did not think that I was correct in my statement,

but would have to confer with an AEA State leader. Still angry

over the issue the next morning, I found the AEA president and explained the contribution was made in my name without my permission and I wanted the money back. She refused.

On that same day, the BCEA president and I spoke again, and

she verified that the contribution would go to the Obama campaign, which was another candidate I did not support. She now told

me presumably after checking with AEA that I would not get my

money back. She also suggested that I should not insist upon the

contribution being returned, because the amount of the contribution had been included in our travel money. I told her I still wanted the money back. If it were returned to me, then I would return

it to the BCEA.

To this day, I have never received the involuntary contribution

money back. Instead, I believe it was used to help elect Senator

Obama, which was completely contrary to my wishes.

[The prepared statement of Ms. Waites follows:]
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Chairman ISSA. Thank you.

Ms. Coomer.

STATEMENT OF SALLY COOMER

Ms. COOMER. Mr. Chairman Issa, Ranking Member Cummings

and members of the committee, thank you so much for this opportunity that you have given me to share my testimony regarding

forced unionization and the dues I am required to pay that go toward political causes that I am opposed to.

If it were not for the forced unionization of parents like me, who

are merely caring for their loved ones, I would not be here today.

My name is Sally Coomer and I live in Washington State, near

the Seattle area. My husband Tom and I are the parents of seven

children and I have been married for 30 years.

To help you understand the unique situation regarding my union

membership, I would first like to share with you a picture of my

daughter, Becky. Becky is 21 years of age and lives with our family. As a result of a brain injury at birth, Becky has developmental

disabilities, blindness, cerebral palsy and a seizure disorder. Due to

Becky’s multiple disabilities, she requires total care and support.

Both my husband and I are committed to providing Becky with the

love and care she needs throughout her life.

Since age 18, Becky has qualified to receive assistance through

the Medicaid Personal Care program. This paid service can be provided by a family or non-family caregiver, qualified through the

State of Washington. In 2009, I, along with thousands of other parents and family members, providing personal Medicaid Personal

Care services to our adult children, or related family members,

were forced to leave our agency employment and become an SEIU

union member in the individual provider system. As a parent provider for Becky, I had no choice but to comply if I wanted to continue providing care for her.

I soon learned that because the State did not want to make all

home care workers State employees, they set up a system where

the recipient would be the employer and the caregiver the employee, with the Governor the employer for bargaining purposes

only. This means that Becky was now my employer and I am considered her employee. This may work for the sake of unionization,

but this s not a reality for Becky. This means that if she is my employer and I am her employee, as well as her guardian, then really

I am the employer over myself.

Becky is in no position, nor does she have the understanding to

be an employer or fulfill the functions of an employer or managing

me as a caregiver. I feel that she and many in her situation are

being exploited and used as pawns to make it possible for there to

even be a bargaining relationship.

Our State has more than 42,000 unionized individual providers,

of which about 65 to 70 percent are family members providing care

for a loved one. Since being a forced union member, not only have

I been subject to paying union dues, but as a parent provider, I

have lost the ability to pay into the Social Security system due to

the employment relationship that the State has set up for bargaining purposes.
15

In addition, I feel like a prisoner to the union and its causes

when I find that my union dues are going to political purposes of

which I greatly oppose. Most recently, I received a notice showing

that my dues were being increased to support the union’s Political

Accountability Fund, to pay for a lawsuit and fund a campaign and

initiative that would increase training for union caregivers at a

price tag of $80 million over 2 years. These types of unfunded initiatives directly impact the funding and direct services of the very

population the individual provider system serves, which would include my daughter.

The union dues I am forced to pay fund political candidates I do

not support. They fund campaigns that support initiatives that

have drained the budget allocated for Becky and other Medicaid recipients. I am tired of being hounded by mailings telling me how

to vote and what initiatives to support, as well as calls asking me

to go to Olympia and rally for political causes that I believe to be

false and misleading.

We are in a sad, sad state of affairs when as a parent, you are

forced to be a union member and pay union dues to care for your

own adult child with disabilities, especially knowing that your dues

are going to political causes that are detrimental to the very funding that your adult child depends on. My hope would be, rather

than divert millions of dollars in Medicaid funding for union dues

each month, if I could ask you to try and put yourself in my situation as a parent. If Becky was your daughter and you were her

voice, I am sure that you would feel the need to speak out against

this kind of manipulation of Medicaid funds for the purpose of

union gain. For families like ours, these fund are critical in making

it possible for us to provide the long-term care that Becky needs.

Caring for my daughter is not a job that needs union intervention. This is my daughter, and this is our life circumstance. Thank

you.

[The prepared statement of Ms. Coomer follows:]
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Chairman ISSA. Thank you.

Dr. Dau-Schmidt.

STATEMENT OF KENNETH G. DAU-SCHMIDT

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. Mr. Chairman, my name is Professor DauSchmidt of Indiana University. I am part of the 9 percent that still

has a positive view of the House, and so I am very glad to be here

today. [Laughter.]

But I haven’t told anybody about it.

Chairman ISSA. Doctor, you are behind. It is well below 9 percent. [Laughter.]

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. I hope there is no record being made of my

appearance here.

But anyway, I do want to thank you, I genuinely want to thank

you for appearing here today and to get a seat at the main table

with the other witnesses. We are here today to discuss a very important problem in a democratic society of balancing the free

speech rights of organizations like corporations and unions with

the free speech rights of individuals associated with those organization that might dissent.

The problem is how to allow corporations and unions to effectively communicate their legitimate concerns with their members

and their constituents and with the public and engage in political

activity without unfairly requiring dissenters within these organizations to pay a political support for views they oppose. This problem, of course, was brought to a head by the Supreme Court’s surprising ruling in Citizens United that corporations are people, and

as a result, they can spend all of their Corporate wealth on political

campaigns, including supporting directly candidates.

This surprising holding by the Court made investment in a corporation a political act. And government programs that encourage

or require such investment is basically, of course, political activity.

Although we have extensive Federal law protecting the right of dissenting employees to opt out of supporting union political activity,

we have no similar law to allow dissenting shareholders, including

employees with pension plans, to opt out of supporting corporate

political activity. This asymmetry and the treatment of employees

who dissent from union activity, employees who dissent from corporate political activity, is not only unfair to people who dissent to

corporate activity, but also it is a detriment to our democratic government.

As I have said, we already have an extensive body of Federal law

to protect the rights of employees who want to dissent from union

political activity. Under Federal law, no one can be required to join

a union. No one can even be required to pay full union dues. Although in a State that allows the enforcement of union security

agreements between unions and employers, an employee can be required to pay an agency fee to the union to cover the cost the union

incurs in representing the employee.

In calculating agency fees under Federal law, unions are only allowed to charge employees for the costs of negotiating and administering the collective bargaining agreement and they are expressly

prohibited from charging them for political activities such as the

support of particular candidates. Unions are also required to give
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dissenters a Hudson notice each year, containing information that

adequately explains how the fee reduction for political activity was

calculated along with an opportunity of at least 30 days to challenge the amount of the reduction.

And finally, no dues or fees can automatically be deducted from

the employees pay check without the employee’s affirmative agreement, regardless of what the union or the employer agree. Failure

on the part of the union employer to follow these practices can result in prosecution by the National Labor Relations Board or a private suit by aggrieved employees in either Federal court or State

court.

Some have argued, including some here today, I am sure, that

we need more laws to protect the interests of employees who dissent from unions. But let me remind you of the words of Chief Justice Marshall in McCullough v. Maryland, ‘‘The power to regulate

is the power to destroy.’’ And I would argue that further limitations

to requirements on union activities will undermine the ability of

unions to function and also interfere with the right of union supporters to express themselves in a political discourse.

Some have argued for a Federal right to work law, that would

prohibit union security agreements nationwide. But union security

agreements are necessary under our Federal law to ensure that

unions have the financial support they need to perform their duties. Under Federal law, not only can you not require someone to

become a member, but unions have an obligation to fairly represent

all people in the bargaining unit.

As a result, this creates a free rider problem, where the union

is obligated to provide services but people are not obligated to pay.

Union security agreements, where they are obligated to pay by the

employer to pay the agency fee, solves this problem and gives the

union the resources it needs to perform its functions. You can

imagine the trouble in trying to run a business where you had the

obligation to provide services but nobody had an obligation to pay.

It would not work.

Some have argued in favor of paycheck protection laws that seek

to hobble union activity and speech by requiring advance written

authorization from all affected members and non-members of actions. Such laws elevate the minutest interests of dissenters over

the interest of majority and violate the majority’s First Amendment

rights. And here I think the experience in Alabama is instructive

in this regard. What we do need to do instead is to afford employees and other shareholders who dissent from Corporate political activity the same rights that are currently afforded to employees who

dissent from union activity.

As an employee of Indiana University, the State of Indiana takes

10 percent of my salary and requires that I invest it in a limited

number of mutual funds, none of which allow a political opt-out. I

have no information on what these companies are doing with my

money, although I know some of them are doing political activity

that I do not agree with. And I have no opportunity to either know

about it or to dissent.

I thank you for your time, and I look forward to your questions.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Dau-Schmidt follows:]
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Chairman ISSA. Thank you, Doctor.

Mr. Bowman.

STATEMENT OF TERRY BOWMAN

Mr. BOWMAN. Chairman Issa, Ranking Member Cummings and

members of this committee, first of all, thank you for giving me the

privilege of testifying before you today regarding the wrongful use

of union dues for political spending by labor union officials.

For over 15 years now, I have been a UAW member, and I have

personally observed the intimidating political activities of my

union. I am pro-union, but in the context of what unions were

originally created to do, and that is to represent their employees

in the realms of the workplace.

I am also the president and founder of a non-profit organization

called Union Conservatives. The entire reason I felt the need to

start this organization was because my union was using my union

dues to push a political agenda that I oppose.

Now, since I started Union Conservatives, I have heard the stories of hundreds of union workers who are also tired and fed up

with the political activities of their own unions. Up to 40 percent

or more of union workers actually vote for Republicans. That

means almost 6 million union workers in the United States alone

feel harassed and persecuted because of the political activities of

their union officials.

So to protect workers from the constant political abuses of their

dues by their union officials, there really are only two options. The

first option would be to require a combination of audits and Beck

rights. A non-partisan third party would audit all spending by the

unions, and all subjective educational spending or anything regarding any political activity must be omitted from the agency fee and

make the Beck decision the default position for all union workers.

But the second choice is really the best and only clear way to ensure that the rights of all union workers are protected, and that

is to pass a national right to work law. This would ensure that only

those workers who agree with the political activities of their unions

are paying for it, and those who find the far left political activities

of their unions to be despicable would not be forced, as a condition

of employment, to financially support those activities.

So let’s take a look at the first option. The Supreme Court decision called the Communication Workers of America v. Beck acknowledged that unions do not have the right to use for political

purposes the dues of workers or non-members who object to those

political activities. However, union workers must first resign their

membership and then they are frequently the victims of humiliation and harassment on the job for resigning their union membership. Because this fear stops the union member from exercising

their rights.

Second, unions still use the agency fee as a means to spend

money on political purposes. And it happens all the time.

The first option, making each worker a Beck rights worker as a

default position, would be a step in the right direction. But the

agency fee still contains many activities that are deemed extremely

offensive by a large number of union workers. And those union

workers fear the reprisal that comes with exercising those rights.
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The only effective answer to this violation of workers’ political

freedom is to eliminate compulsory union language from the National Labor Relations Act and the Railway Labor Act. This would

in essence establish a national right to work act. Only then will

union officials be held answerable and accountable to the workers

for their offensive and radical left-wing political actions. Only then

will union bosses have to compete for a worker’s loyalty. Competition instead of compulsion always makes an organization stronger.

I ask you to grant to the rest of the American workers what

President John F. Kennedy granted to the Federal work force in

Executive Order 10988, dated January 17, 1962: ‘‘Employees of the

Federal Government shall have and shall be protected in the exercise of the right, freely and without fear of penalty or reprisal, to

form, join and assist any employee organization or to refrain from

any such activity.’’

I also ask you to grant to the millions of union workers their

First Amendment right of freedom of association or conversely, the

freedom to not associate. The U.S. Government has given labor

unions the ability to trump an individual’s First Amendment rights

and force the seizure of an individual’s personal property, their

wages, for simply exercising their pursuit of happiness by applying

for a job. Because forced solidarity is no solidarity at all. Even prisoners in a chain gang have solidarity. Forced solidarity is nothing

more than being a prisoner in chains. Only through having a complete volunteer union is there real and true solidarity.

Finally, let me quote Founding Father Thomas Jefferson: ‘‘To

compel a man to furnish contributions of money for the propagation

of opinions which he disbelieves is sinful and tyrannical.’’ Thank

you.

[The prepared statement of Mr. Bowman follows:]
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Chairman ISSA. I thank the gentleman.

I will now recognize myself for 5 minutes. Mr. Bowman, you took

away one of my lines with the Jefferson one.

Mr. BOWMAN. I apologize.

Chairman ISSA. No, it was well said.

Doctor, I am going to start with you, because I just want to understand one thing. If what you say is true in practicality as it is

in law, then there should be a large difference between the agency

amount taken from our witnesses if they are under that and union

dues, presuming that a large amount is spent on, directly or indirectly, political activity. Is that correct, that there should be a large

amount?

If a large amount of the union’s activities is non-PAC activity,

particularly, it is spent on political activities, including asking for

more money, asking for people to go to rallies, all of that should

be reduced by the amount that the free rider, if you want to use

that term, pays to simply have the other negotiations. Is that correct? Very simply, the political activity money is to be only spent

from union dues and not from the agency under the law. That’s

what you said in your opening statement. Do you stand by that?

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. Yes.

Chairman ISSA. Ms. Coomer, have you looked into the difference

between what would happen if you asserted your Beck rights and

simply, instead of paying full dues, only paid for the portion that

was negotiated to help your employer, I guess it would be having

your employer treat you more fairly, your daughter, right?

Ms. COOMER. Yes.

Chairman ISSA. Have you looked into that?

Ms. COOMER. I have.

Chairman ISSA. And by the way, I am assuming that your

daughter is a good employer, even without the union.

Ms. COOMER. Very cooperative.

I have, and the reality is that according to the bargaining agreement, that the dues that I pay, the only way that I can not pay

dues, actually the amount that I pay is the same. It is not like

there is a reduced fee, I have to belong to a religious organization

and prove that I belong to a religious organization that prohibits

me. And then I am required, according to the bargaining agreement, to choose a non-religious organization and the union has to

approve of that. And when I choose it, and if they approve, then

that equal amount goes, I can then donate that to that organization. But it has to be upon the approval of the union.

So in the end, I am still paying the same amount of money. And

then every quarter, I have to show that I have taken that money

and done that.

Chairman ISSA. Okay, I am going to go to each of the witnesses

for their experiences, before I go back to the Doctor.

So your experience is, it is the exact same amount of money,

there is no reduction to you or, in this case, to the money you use

to care for your daughter, there’s no reduction if you try to opt out

of the union, even though the Beck decision says there should be?

Ms. COOMER. This is what I have been informed of by the union.

Chairman ISSA. Ms. Waites, have you found something similar?

What has been your experience?
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Ms. WAITES. To opt out of the union?

Chairman ISSA. Yes, ma’am.

Ms. WAITES. You are not forced to become a member of the union

in Alabama. But most teachers are members of the union, because

that is the only place we can get liability insurance. Alabama is a

right to work State, so we don’t have collective bargaining power.

Chairman ISSA. So what you are saying is that you would save

money in your particular case, if you opted out of the union. But

one of the most important parts, what you need, the insurance, is

only available in Alabama? Is that the reason you can’t get out?

Ms. WAITES. The insurance comes from being a part of AEA and

NEA, the liability insurance.

Chairman ISSA. And the State of Alabama doesn’t have an alternate program, so that you can choose to not be a union member?

Ms. WAITES. Not yet. Not at this time.

Chairman ISSA. Okay, so in your case, it is not the dues, per se,

it is something else that is essentially locked in by the union exclusivity?

Ms. WAITES. Yes, sir.

Chairman ISSA. Thank you. Mr. Bowman, what has been your

experience? I went to school down in Adrian, so I look north and

there you are. What has been your experience in the Ann ArborYpsilanti area?

Mr. BOWMAN. Well, I have not exercised my Beck rights.

Chairman ISSA. You are a very proud union member, as I understand.

Mr. BOWMAN. Yes. I want to maintain my union membership and

work within the union to get some of these what I would call offenses changed. So I don’t know the exact percentage of what the,

personally I don’t know. I have been told by many members that

the agency fee tends to be anywhere from 90 percent on up of what

regular union dues are. I think that is a fair assessment.

Chairman ISSA. Thank you.

Doctor, my original assertion does not appear to fit at all with

Mr. Bowman, who says it is 90 percent, and Ms. Coomer, who says

it is identical, the total amount out of pocket, or the amount denied

her ability to take care of her adult child is the same. How do you

answer that in light of your answer in the Beck decision?

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. It would be hard to comment on particular

situations.

Chairman ISSA. Well, let’s do something. Let me close with a

question and then you can have as much time as the ranking member will let us have. Shouldn’t there be transparency so we can determine what the appropriate number would be? Shouldn’t we

know how much is being spent on politics versus other stuff in

light of the Beck decision?

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. I think there should be transparency, and

there is transparency. Actually there is a good study by Masters,

Gibney and Zagenczyk, called Worker Pay Protection, Implications

for Labor’s Political Spending and Voice, published in Industrial

Relations. And you can make this part of the record.

It is hard to respond to anecdotal arguments about particular

cases. But at least, they looked at this across all labor organizations and across major international unions. What they found was
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that for all labor organizations, political spending was only 4.27

percent of the money that was collected.

Chairman ISSA. Okay, but then you have given me an answer.

And I am sure the ranking member would agree with you. But one

of the problems we have is that it is hard for us to believe that it

is in fact only 4 percent, with the experiences of how active they

are.

But having said that, the ranking member, without objection,

will be given an additional minute. The gentleman is recognized.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

Professor, political action committees, with regard to unions,

what role do they play? And with regard to funds.

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. Before Citizens United, neither unions nor

corporations were allowed to spend general funds in support of particular political candidates. And as a result, they would set up private political action committees, or voluntary political action committees, where they would solicit funds from their members or from

the public at large. And you see this, both corporations, you would

see these political action committees where all the managers would

donate the maximum amount, and you would see this in unions,

where members would donate money toward political action.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Now, is that voluntary?

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. Yes, that is completely voluntary.

Mr. CUMMINGS. And is that separate, then, from what, as Chairman Issa was just talking about, as far as dues are concerned?

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. Yes.

Mr. CUMMINGS. Those are two separate things?

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. Yes.

Mr. CUMMINGS. All right. Go ahead.

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. Well, and they still, corporations and unions

still maintain, even after Citizens United, where they are not actually required to any more, they still maintain these separate political action committees, because there is less regulation of them,

right? You don’t have to explain to dissenters what you spend the

money on or how you spend it, because they are not covered by

Beck rules. And since those are private, voluntary donations, it is

not clear to me why they should be covered by Beck rules.

Mr. CUMMINGS. So isn’t it true that in recent history, the vast

majority of union political activity is funded by the voluntary PACs

and not the union dues?

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. That is right, and that may explain some of

the confusion here. In other words, if the other panel members are

looking at political action committees and union spending there,

that is really not part of what they would be charged for in either

an association fee or union dues.

Mr. CUMMINGS. All right.

Now, you talked about, you had said there are laws that exist to

protect union workers. And you were talking about protecting them

from forced political contributions. So that is clear in the law, is

that right?

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. That is very clear in the law. There is some

variation. I think Ms. Coomer’s case is probably governed by State

law, from what I hear her describing. The Federal law is what I

am most familiar with. But it sounds to me, actually, once again
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I don’t want to, she knows her situation better than I do. But it

sounds to me, from hearing the description, that the State is her

employer, not her daughter.

Mr. CUMMINGS. So corporations are not entitled, now, corporations are not entitled to spend any corporate assets on political activities, even if their shareholders object? Is that right? In other

words, corporations are entitled to spend whatever they want to

spend?

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. That is correct. The corporations that I invest

my 26 years of 10 percent of my income in could take all of that

and spend it on political purposes. I would never even know about

it.

Mr. CUMMINGS. In fact, a 2012 paper by Harvard professor Benjamin Sachs explains it, and let me, I want you to listen to this

quote: ‘‘The problem from this perspective is rather that the asymmetric rules of opt-out rights provides corporations a legally constructed advantage over unions when it comes to political spending.

And this kind of legally conferred advantage is consistent with Federal campaign finance law. And in particular, with that regime’s insistence that unions and corporations be put on exactly the same

basis insofar as their financial activities are concerned. The result

is problematic, too. From the broader perspective of democratic politics, corporations undoubtedly will be the most well-funded speakers in the electoral arena.’’

And corporations are using shareholder funds for political donations. A 2010 joint study by the Sustainable Investments Institute

and the Investor Responsibility Research Center Institute found

that ‘‘Nearly 60 percent of the largest U.S. companies spend shareholder money from the Corporate treasury on political activities.’’

Now that corporations can give unlimited amounts of funds to political action committees, those PACs are estimating that they will

inject more than $200 million in the 2012 elections. The Wall

Street Journal has observed that aside from the political candidates and the parties, these outside groups have become possibly

the largest force in the 2012 campaign.

Professor, how does this disparity in the rules impact unions and

those that impact corporations influence the democratic political

process?

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. Well, I think as, first of all, I was glad to hear

you have looked up Professor Sachs’ article. It is an excellent article. I cited it in my own written testimony. And when you have a

hearing on this in the future on the possibility of corporate dissenters, he would be an excellent witness to have.

I think as he outlines, it does make a systematic bias in favor

of corporate funding. In other words, unions have all these obligations that they have to meet. And I think rightfully have to meet.

But corporations have no obligations to meet. And we are talking

about putting further obligations on unions. As a result, any time

a union tries to do anything political, there is always the possibility

that they could be sued or that they will have to file another form

or whatever. And it hampers their collective action and their voice.

And when you look at the larger political perspective, as Professor Sachs demonstrates in his article, corporations already have

the vast majority of spending on political activities. And they have
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access to much more money for spending on political activities. And

to hamper the weaker party in this debate, but not to require reasonable notice and reasonable chance to opt out from corporations

is just not fair and it is not good for our democracy.

Mr. CUMMINGS. I see my time is expired. Mr. Chairman, I ask

unanimous consent that a political article dated today, entitled

AT&T Shareholders Demand Answers, I would ask that that be

made a part of the record.

Mr. JORDAN [presiding]. Without objection.

[The information referred to follows:]
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Mr. CUMMINGS. Thank you.

Mr. JORDAN. The gentleman from Arizona, Dr. Gosar, is recognized.

Dr. GOSAR. It has been interesting that we have been hearing the

good doctor talk about all these checks and balances. But I want

to ask Ms. Waites, Ms. Coomer and Mr. Bowman, application is another thing. I am a dentist impersonating a politician, so I like application and the beauties in the detail.

A Hudson notice, Ms. Waites, were you ever given a Hudson notice?

Ms. WAITES. I am not familiar with what that is.

Dr. GOSAR. Ms. Coomer, were you ever given a Hudson notice?

Ms. COOMER. No.

Dr. GOSAR. Mr. Bowman, how about a Hudson notice?

Mr. BOWMAN. No.

Dr. GOSAR. Were you made aware of a Hudson notice?

Mr. BOWMAN. Not to my knowledge, no.

Dr. GOSAR. Ms. Coomer.

Ms. COOMER. No.

Dr. GOSAR. Ms. Waites.

Ms. WAITES. No.

Dr. GOSAR. So when you actually, Ms. Waites, when you were

told about the Children’s Fund, and its name, and you found out

it was very deceptive, how did your inquiry go? How were you satisfied from the union?

Ms. WAITES. To get my money back? I was told no, that it wasn’t

going to happen. And it did not happen.

Dr. GOSAR. You were not provided any grievance or a Hudson notice?

Ms. WAITES. No, sir.

Dr. GOSAR. Do you want to answer that, sir?

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. Yes, I do. It sounds to me like both of them

are public employees, who would be governed by State law. And he

is not a Beck objector, so he would not get a Hudson notice. If he

was Beck objector, then he would get a Hudson notice.

Dr. GOSAR. So for all of you, when you are a part of this union,

are you apprised of everything as far as your rights, as freedoms,

that you are entitled to? Mr. Bowman.

Mr. BOWMAN. In the Solidarity Magazine that the UAW publishes, I do believe they have a small paragraph in the magazine.

I don’t know if it is in every issue, but maybe once a year they publish that you do have the right to rescind and exercise Beck rights.

Dr. GOSAR. Has anybody done that?

Mr. BOWMAN. I believe there are Beck rights objectors, yes.

Dr. GOSAR. Okay. And do you have a counselor that you can go

to?

Mr. BOWMAN. I believe you do it on your own. It is, there is no

counselor in the manufacturing facility that I work at that helps

you with that process. And like I said, most people don’t do it, because there is ridicule and harassment that goes with exercising

your Beck rights.

Dr. GOSAR. Now, Ms. Coomer, when you are talking about what

your risk is, are you familiar with what Mr. Dau-Schmidt had said,

that you are mainly a State organization?
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Ms. COOMER. I am not a State employee. I have been told that,

I have asked that multiple times. And any of the paperwork I have

received shows that I am the employee of the client, which would

be my daughter. And I have contacted the union to ask them as

well about that, and they have expressed the same thing, that I am

the employee of the client, which is my daughter. I explained that

her developmental level was that of a small child, and they were

very confused by that.

So I don’t get the same benefits as a State employee, I am not

a subcontracted worker. I am, according to the State of Washington, an employee of my daughter with the Governor as the employer for bargaining purposes only.

Dr. GOSAR. Ms. Waites, your opportunities belonging to the

union, if you don’t belong to the union, what are the consequences?

Ms. WAITES. There are no consequences, but you are on your own

as far as if you have an issue with a parent or you are being sued.

You will have to put that out of your pocket.

We consider AEA, in Alabama in the beginning, more of a Professional organization and not a union, because we have no collective

bargaining power. Most people, especially in my county, are members of AEA for that liability insurance. Without it, we would be

on our own.

Dr. GOSAR. But they are also still spending money on political actions, are they not?

Ms. WAITES. Yes, sir. Out of our paycheck, we have what they

call an A Vote taken out of our paycheck every month. And when

you first join AEA, on the application form it, in the very bottom

in the fine print it says, if you don’t want this A Vote, you have

to actually put it in writing to our county’s payroll department.

And I actually have checks with me from 1989 and 2008 where it

is still being taken out.

Dr. GOSAR. So that is a donation to a PAC?

Ms. WAITES. It is a donation to a PAC, A Vote, and it is a PAC

fund.

Dr. GOSAR. So have you inquired as to why there is only one opportunity for liability?

Ms. WAITES. I think the State of Alabama this last year, they

were trying to come up with something different for teachers. And

it got thrown out of the legislature, and nothing has become of it

yet. But we definitely do need another option.

Dr. GOSAR. Have the teachers pursued that?

Ms. WAITES. On our own? No.

Dr. GOSAR. Why not?

Ms. WAITES. As far as to get a carrier to handle our liability, I

have not pondered that. But you have given me food for thought.

We have just never done it on our own.

Dr. GOSAR. Thank you. My time is up.

Mr. JORDAN. I recognize the gentlelady from the District of Columbia, Ms. Norton.

Ms. NORTON. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

This hearing needs to be seen in its full context of what is happening in this country with respect to the right to organize. The

right to organize collectively is seen the world over as one of the

great human right protections. It is in every one of the great
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human rights declarations and whether you are talking about a

universal declaration of human rights, the U.N. Global Compacts

10 Principles has as principle number three, businesses should uphold the freedom of association and the effective, effective recognition of the right to collective bargaining.

But look at the trends we see throughout this country that come

close to trying to extinguish this very right. Here in the Congress,

Federal employees don’t even have the right to bargain for pay,

and yet they are harangued as if they were the cause of every problem facing the Federal Government. So the majority can entitle

this hearing the right to choose and protecting union workers, but

this majority will never be regarded as a champion, much less a

protector, of workers in the long struggle for collective bargaining

rights, when those rights were achieved.

We saw a trend that was very important, because that happened

right out of the New Deal, as the recovery occurred. Because there

were unions in place, management did not get all of the fruits of

the recovery, because there were unions there to bargain for some

of that, and America reached its highest point, its best economy,

when these unions were strong. Today, a worker essentially in this

country can, has to take what he can get and a huge income gap

has opened up that is shameful and all of us understand it to be

so.

And collective bargaining is not result-oriented. In a market

economy, you have a right to bargain for your labor. Ever since the

Taft-Hartley law, there have been a plethora of laws to protect the

right not to join a union. No scarcity of legislation there. But today

we see an effort almost to extinguish that right.

In Wisconsin, the right to collective bargaining, virtually all the

rights for all Federal employees would have been extinguished but

the Governor, Americans are fighting back, is now subject to recall,

along with the State senators who voted, got twice as many signatures. Ohio repealed a similar law. Eight hundred bills in our country have been introduced essentially to do all but repeal the right

to bargain collectively. We are seeing something that if it happened

in virtually any other country, we would be criticizing and withdrawing funds, if we gave them any money.

I do want to set the record straight, because Ms. Waites, you testified at length about your complaint. But I do not see in your testimony that your complaint with the FEC about your contributions,

I do not see in your testimony that the FEC threw out that complaint. Don’t you think you should have also testified, or at least

complained, maybe that’s what you want to do, that this, that you

complained about it before the FEC, were represented by counsel

and yet it was not recognized and was thrown out?

Ms. WAITES. Yes, ma’am, I did file a complaint and it was thrown

out.

Ms. NORTON. Thank you very much, I have very little time left.

I just wanted to establish that for the record. I am not complaining

that you filed.

Mr. Dau-Schmidt, I simply ask you to lay out just in clear form,

so that we can understand, has the Supreme Court established procedural safeguards to protect a worker’s right not to contribute to

union political activities? Indeed, has it provided workers with the
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right to challenge the union’s calculation of agency fees? I would

like you to spell that out. We need to know whether workers somehow are victims of unions or not.

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. Sure. I do want to clarify, and I have done

this just a little bit, there are basically three different legal regimes

here. There is the National Labor Relations Act, there is the Railway Labor Act and then there is public sector employees. And actually within public sector there are both Federal and State.

So there are three different legal regimes. But certainly in the

Federal, which is what Congress is primarily, I am sorry, in the

private sector, the National Labor Relations Act and the Railway

Labor Act, that Congress is primarily concerned with, in the law

and in its interpretations by the Supreme Court, we have a number

of established rights. I gave those in my introduction.

No one can be required to join a union, no one can be required

even to pay full dues, although if you are in a State that allows

the enforcement of union situated agreements, you can be required

to pay an agency fee. In calculating those agency fees, unions are

not allowed to charge members for political activities. They are

only allowed to charge them for the cost of actually negotiating and

enforcing the contract in the bargaining unit.

Unions, if they have dissenters who don’t want to be full members in the private sector under the National Labor Relations Act,

unions are also required to give dissenters a Hudson notice every

year where they give an accounting of their spending and they give

the dissenter an opportunity to challenge the assessment of their

agency fee. And also no dues or fees can automatically be deducted

from the employee’s paycheck without their consent.

Now, some States have emulated some of these provisions. So in

some States, you would have laws similar to that. I am not

familiar——

Ms. NORTON. This is the Congress, so it is the Federal law that

I am interested in. Thank you very much.

Mr. JORDAN. I thank the gentlelady.

I would now recognize the doctor from Tennessee, Dr. DesJarlais.

Dr. DESJARLAIS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you to all

the panelists for attending here today.

Really, I am going to be fairly brief. I just have a couple of questions I am going to direct to Ms. Waites and Ms. Coomer, and the

idea kind of came originally from your testimony.

First is kind of a question of policy. Second is more a question

of curiosity. If I was an attorney, I probably wouldn’t ask the second question, but I am a physician, so I will.

The first question would be, you both had testified to the fact

that you were forced to pay union dues that were given to political

campaigns against your will. Were you ever consulted by the

unions as to what your choice would be for the candidate? Ms.

Waites.

Ms. WAITES. No, and we had to make a political contribution for

the Children’s Fund, and we never had a voice or ballot or survey

on who NEA would support with that money.

Dr. DESJARLAIS. Ms. Coomer.

Ms. COOMER. No. I was just informed that my union dues were

going to be increased for, and then they listed the different causes.
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Dr. DESJARLAIS. And then the second question, out of curiosity,

I heard your testimony, was that the money in both your cases

went to candidates you didn’t support. If it had been the other way

around and it was a candidate that you supported, would you have

felt differently, or would you have preferred that you get to make

those choices on your own?

Ms. WAITES. No, I wouldn’t change my mind. They shouldn’t

make contributions in someone else’s name, period, no matter

which party or which affiliation.

Ms. COOMER. I agree with that. I just, for my situation, I don’t

think it is an appropriate use of the fund.

Dr. DESJARLAIS. Okay, thank you, and I yield the balance of my

time to the chairman.

Mr. JORDAN. I thank the gentleman. I will be quick, too.

Mr. Bowman, in your testimony, you said, you asked your fellow

union members, do you think union officials use your regular dues

on politics. And your testimony reads, without exception, everyone

laughed and said, of course they do.

Mr. BOWMAN. That is correct.

Mr. JORDAN. So it is commonly understood that what they are

paying is being used for political activity.

Now, my concern is, do they know, do you think your fellow

union members are adequately informed of their rights that they

have that exist for them? And if so, how are they notified of those

rights?

Mr. BOWMAN. Personally, I do not believe they are adequately

notified. As I said——

Mr. JORDAN. You are, you have taken the time to research and

figure it out . But you don’t think most of them are?

Mr. BOWMAN. Well, this is a passion of mine, so yes, I am very

well aware of my Beck rights and the other rights that come with

it. But in a publication, by the way the publication of the UAW’s

magazine called Solidarity, is full, cover to cover, basically, of union

propaganda, all paid for with regular, legitimate union dues. And

I believe that should be omitted from the agency fee, because it is

full of political propaganda.

But there is a blurb in there, I don’t know how often it is in the

magazine, that you are able to exercise your Beck rights if you so

choose. So yes.

Mr. JORDAN. Ms. Waites, Ms. Coomer, would you say the same

thing, that you think, would you say most of your colleagues, fellow

union members, it would be your guess that they are not adequately informed or not well informed about their rights?

Ms. WAITES. Yes, definitely.

Ms. COOMER. I would have to say that that is the case. A lot of

the folks that I associate with that are union members are parents

like myself. And so no, they aren’t informed.

Mr. JORDAN. And Doctor, you would think, part of, if you are

going to join a union, and as we think about this area of the law,

doesn’t it make sense for people to fully understand what their

rights and privileges and rights are?

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. The rights have changed recently, because

Citizens United actually does allow, if you are a member, your dues

can be paid, can be used for political purposes.
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Mr. JORDAN. Let me ask you a specific question. In the first 2

weeks, and I understand it doesn’t apply to the folks here, it is

about Federal contractors, but I am just curious, when I go out and

tour a facility in our district, one thing I notice is the employer is

required to post all kinds of things, every OSHA standard, I have

had guys, contractors tell me the things they have to post, the law

requires them, for their employees to see, said in fact it is so much

they don’t even know if the employees just say, oh, forget it all. But

they are required to post all this.

And yet this administration, in its first 2 weeks in office, Executive Order 13496, revoked the requirement that Federal contractors

inform workers of their Beck rights in employment notices. Now,

why would, if we want employees to know their full rights, if we

want them to have the freedom to choose and know what their

money is being spent on, the rights they have, why would this administration in the first 2 weeks on the job issue that kind of Executive order?

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. I think you should ask the administration.

They might have thought it was too burdensome or ineffective.

Mr. JORDAN. Too burdensome to let—so your testimony is it is

too burdensome to let Federal employees know their rights?

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. It is my testimony you should ask the administration why they did it. If you want me to speculate, I will speculate.

Mr. JORDAN. No. But you have said, before asking the administration, you said it——

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. No, I said it after——

Mr. JORDAN. You said, it may be too burdensome. Too burdensome to let people know what their rights are under the law?

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. They may have thought it was ineffective.

Mr. JORDAN. Ineffective. Okay. I appreciate that.

I now yield to my good friend from Ohio, Mr. Kucinich.

Mr. KUCINICH. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

I came back to my desk to find this copy of this book that the

Chair of the committee gave to all of us, a book that was written

55 years ago called The Enemy Within. It talks about an investigation of the McClellan Committee.

We can’t be fighting battles that are 55 years old. We can’t be

doing that. And I want to say for the record, my Dad was a teamster. He was a 35-year member of Local 407. He was a teamster

during the time that Jimmy Hoffa was head of the teamsters, and

he loved Jimmy Hoffa. There is a reason why Hoffa’s picture, a portrait, is in the airport in Detroit, along with others, in a place of

honor. And that is because he defended workers.

Now, do I endorse anything that Mr. Hoffa did that was not

within the law? Of course not. But we have to stop fighting battles

that are 55 years old, and let’s get contemporary.

And I will say with respect to Robert Kennedy, his assassination

left a vacuum in American politics that still hasn’t been filled.

Let me tell you about ways in which unions have improved workers’ lives. A constituent of mine just sent this to me, and I thought

it was important enough to read it. Weekends, breaks at work, including lunch breaks, paid vacation, sick leave, Social Security,

minimum wage, Civil Rights Act, Title VII, which prohibits em-
74

ployer discrimination, 8-hour workday, overtime pay, child labor

laws, Occupational Safety and Health Act, 40-hour work week,

workers compensation, unemployment insurance, pensions, workplace safety standards and regulations, employer health care insurance, collective bargaining rights for employees, wrongful termination laws, Age Discrimination in Employment Act of 1967, whistleblower protection laws, Employee Polygraph Protection Act, veterans employment and training services, compensation increases

and evaluation raises, sexual harassment laws, Americans with

Disabilities Act, holiday pay, employer dental, life and vision insurance, privacy rights, pregnancy and parental leave, military leave,

the right to strike, public education for children, Equal Pay Acts

of 1963 and 2011, laws ending sweatshops in the United States.

This is just a partial list.

We are talking about a movement whose basis is social and economic justice. I don’t understand what this attack is going on in

this country, except it is about an effort, they call it right to work,

it is about an effort to create right to work for less. Right to work

for less. That is what this is all about. Right to less benefits.

Now, Americans might have different opinions about unions. But

I want to quote from a Labor Day speech, ‘‘On this day, dedicated

to American working men and women, may I tell you the vision I

have of a new administration and a new Congress, filled with new

Members dedicated to the values we honor today. Beginning in

January, American workers will once again be heeded. Their needs

and values will be acted upon in Washington. I will consult with

representatives of organized labor on those matters concerning the

welfare of working people of this Nation. As president of my union,

the Screen Actors Guild, I spent many hour with the late George

Meany, whose love of his country and belief in a strong defense

against all totalitarians is one of labor’s greatest legacies.’’

It goes on to say, ‘‘While I pledge to you in George Meany’s memory that the voice of the American worker will once again be heeded in Washington, and that the climate of fear that he spoke of will

no longer threaten workers and their families.’’ I would like unanimous consent to submit into the record the words of President Ronald Wilson Reagan.

Mr. JORDAN. Without objection.

[The information referred to follows:]
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Mr. KUCINICH. Thank you.

Now, in the time that I have left, I just have a question of the

Professor. We have Mr. Bowman and others stating that right to

work laws make unions stronger, result in more businesses choosing to settle into right to work States. But robust studies take into

account that other variables, such as cost of living differences and

economic conditions directly contradict those assertions. In fact,

studies you cited in your testimony show that right to work laws

lower wages, lower wages, for both union and non-union workers

by an average of $1,500 per year. And those studies show that the

rate of employer-sponsored health insurance is 2.6 percent lower.

Can you explain this, Professor, how this comes to be, and isn’t

in fact right to work destructive of the economic interests of working men and women?

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. Yes, Representative. As you may know, Indiana just recently passed a right to work law. So we have had this

debate actively undertaken in our State. I have been asked to comment on this several times. So I am pretty well versed on this.

And there have been numerous studies done. The one that I gave

you that I cited in there is the most conservative and probably the

best done study to date on this. And you are right that it shows

that workers, both union and non-union workers’ wages are $1,500

lower in right to work States, and also 3 percent, almost 3 percent

have less, workers have less health benefits, and almost 5 percent

less have pensions.

There actually are other studies, Marty Wilson in Notre Dame,

because it of course, this concerned the State of Indiana, he went

and compared just average compensation per non-farm worker between right to work States and non-right to work States. And he

found that actually, in right to work States, workers are paid on

average $7,835 less.

Mr. KUCINICH. My time is expired. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I

just wanted to point out this is about right to work for less.

Mr. JORDAN. Well, I would just say in response to my good

friend’s time and comments, my dad was a union worker as well,

30 years, International Union of Electrical Workers, worked for

General Motors and voted for Ronald Reagan. And if he were here,

I would bet he would say the fact that his union dues were being

used to help the guy who was running against Ronald Reagan was

something he didn’t appreciate. So that is what this is about. This

is about employees, union members, not having their money taken

from them and used against the very person they may want to see

in office representing their interests, their families, their community and frankly, the community they work for. So it goes both

ways, Mr. Kucinich.

Mr. KUCINICH. Would my friend yield?

Mr. JORDAN. I would be happy to.

Mr. KUCINICH. I would just like to say briefly, that I think the

record would show that there were in fact some unions who supported Ronald Reagan’s candidacy, proving my point. Thank you.

Mr. JORDAN. I now recognize the gentleman from Pennsylvania,

Mr. Kelly.

Mr. KELLY. I thank the chairman.
81

Let’s just have some agreement on a couple of things. First of all,

today’s hearing is about the right to choose, protecting union protecting union workers from forced political contributions. I don’t

think there is anybody on the panel that would disagree that every

American has the right to say yes and the freedom to say no. Is

there anybody that disagrees with that statement? All right.

Because then it calls to mind the fact that, and this keeps coming up, there is a term out there called hypocrisy. The behavior of

people who do things that they tell other people not to do. So we

say one thing and then we do another. So we kind of pick and

choose the times that we feel what we say is appropriate for us and

not appropriate for other people.

The fact that any worker, I don’t care who it is, every worker in

this country, every American has the right to his or her opinion

and ability to say yes or no to where their money should go. I don’t

think anybody should ever be forced to donate to a political campaign or a candidate. You should have the right to say where your

money goes. I don’t think there is any question about that. And if

anybody disagrees with that, I would like to have rebuttal on that,

because I think that is what this goes to the core of.

This is about worker rights, it is about American rights, this is

about what we do believe. So let me ask you, Mr. Bowman, in your

testimony you began talking about union political spending because

of a story you had read in your union’s newspaper.

Mr. BOWMAN. Yes.

Mr. KELLY. Can you expand on that a little bit?

Mr. BOWMAN. Sure. Thank you for giving me that opportunity.

I have always been an open political conservative inside my

union, which has led to a lot of harassment and persecution. But

over 13 years or so, as a union member, we are told who to vote

for. At our union meetings, our plant chairman points at all of us

and says, you all better be voting for Democrats. So over 13 years,

you get to the point where it really becomes quite burdensome.

In our local newsletter, called The Raw Facts, because of the

plan I work at is the Rawsonville Plant, there was an article in

there that said, Health Care Reform, What Would Jesus Do. Now,

I have to put this in context, I have studied at seminary and am

quite familiar with scripture. And in this article, it basically made

Jesus appear as if, according to scripture, that he was, number one,

a socialist, and number two, that he would approve of the Affordable Heath Care Act that was in discussion at that point.

I knew from my own study that they completely took it out of

context. So at that point, I stood up and I said, enough, I have to

start doing something. That is when I started getting the idea of

coming up with Union Conservatives and organizing conservatives

in the union to fight back against that.

Mr. KELLY. So tell me about the group, Union Conservatives,

that you founded. Tell me a little about that group and how that

group feels and the feeling that you are getting and the number of

people that are signing up on that.

Mr. BOWMAN. Well, the majority obviously are people who are of

the conservative political nature. I do have some Democrats who

are signed up that say they don’t necessarily believe in my political

affiliation; however, they do think that all union members should
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have the right to speak their mind without fear of harassment and

ridicule, which of course, on the assembly line, many people agree

with what I agree with, but they keep their heads down because

of the intimidation that goes into the union atmosphere.

Mr. KELLY. So when you are speaking about that, you are speaking about actually what you experience being part of the work

force?

Mr. BOWMAN. That is absolutely correct.

Mr. KELLY. So this isn’t anecdotal, this isn’t something that you

heard from someone else or something you think?

Mr. BOWMAN. No. This is my own story.

Mr. KELLY. This is what you see on the floor every day?

Mr. BOWMAN. This is my story.

Mr. KELLY. Okay, because my experience has been the same

way. I am an automobile dealer, and have spent a lot of time in

Lordstown with our UAW guys, in fact, we would go back and

forth, we would go to Lordstown and watch them build cars, then

they would come to the dealership to see how that relationship

worked. Because as a result, it comes down to, listen, we need

those guys to build great cars. I know you are a Ford guy and I

know you didn’t take the money in the bailout, so I am real happy

for that.

Mr. BOWMAN. Thank you for that.

Mr. KELLY. But I also know that America’s ability to build things

has never been questioned. We build great products.

Mr. BOWMAN. I am a very proud automobile worker and as my

testimony said, pro-union. But only in the context of what unions

were created to do, and that is just to represent their employees

in the realms of the workplace, not as a socioeconomic group or a

quasi-political party.

Mr. KELLY. And I appreciate that. Because my experience has

been exactly the same, as I said earlier. My dealership is located

about a half a mile away from AK Steel. And those fellows belong

to the UAW also. There is not a person I have ever talked to, and

it is conclusive, on both sides of the aisle, we are so much in favor,

we are all pro-worker people, we are all pro-labor, we want to see

people back to work.

But we also want to make sure that we protect the constitutional

rights that people have under the First Amendment. You can do

and say what you want when you want to say it, and nobody can

inhibit you from that. By the same token, nobody should ever force

you to give money to a political candidate you do not want to give

money to.

I thank you for your testimony, and I yield back my time, Mr.

Chairman.

Chairman ISSA [presiding]. The gentleman yields back.

I believe—that is not yet a vote, right? Good. In that case, Mr.

Clay, you get your full 5 minutes. The gentleman is recognized.

Mr. CLAY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, six bells indicate that the

House is in recess.

Let me ask Ms. Coomer, how did the State of Washington inform

caregivers that you were going to join SEIU, that you were going

to be in a union? How was that done?
83

Ms. COOMER. Actually, I wasn’t notified that I was going to be

joining the union. I was just notified that I needed to become an

individual provider.

Mr. CLAY. Okay, and then how did the process come about that

you joined SEIU?

Ms. COOMER. I did not know until I got my check and I saw that

union dues were being deducted.

Mr. CLAY. Okay. Then of course you probably inquired about

where your union dues were going?

Ms. COOMER. Yes.

Mr. CLAY. And you said in a statement that dues go to fund candidates that you would not normally support. Have you had any

contact with union officials to say, well, here is a list of candidates

that I would support?

Ms. COOMER. I contacted the union to find out about trying to divert my dues somewhere else, and had a really hard time getting

any kind of a response. They would refer me back to the bargaining

agreement, which I have tried to decipher for the last year, and

have not gotten a response from the union.

Mr. CLAY. Do you think that the rank and file’s opinions are really adhered to or listened to by union leadership as far as how they

select candidates they support?

Ms. COOMER. You know, I am not sure. All I know is that the

information and materials that I get don’t just have information in

regard to candidates, but it also has information and encourages us

to vote for certain initiatives or not vote for other initiatives or

laws that again I don’t always agree with.

Mr. CLAY. Thank you for that response.

Dr. Schmidt, you had something to add?

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. Just to kind of try to clarify. Once again, Ms.

Coomer knows her situation much better than I do, but I do know

a little bit about the law and what has happened in organizing this

situation. And what has happened nationwide, actually, in a variety of States, is home health care workers have, prior to the organization of State associations for them, they were independent contractors and they were actually prohibited from collective bargaining. So they would work and get compensated by the State and

they were paid very poorly.

And unions thought this was a problem, and it started in California, it went on to Illinois, I believe it was in Washington, too.

And what they said was, let’s organize a State entity that actually

employs these people. And as a result, they can be employees and

then they can collectively bargain. And I believe that is what was

done in Washington, so that when she became an independent

home health care worker, she was actually, I think, an employee

of the State.

Chairman ISSA. Doctor, I don’t mean to interrupt, but please

limit your hand motions. They are going out a long way.

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. The two clues to that are first of all, that the

union negotiates with the Governor, not with her daughter. So I

don’t see how the daughter can actually be the employer. Also that

she is exempted from Social Security. State employees, when I was

a State employee in Ohio, I was also exempted from Social Secu-
84

rity. And that is not common for State employees, but it does happen for State employees.

Now, I did want to, the representative down here, I can’t see his

name——

Mr. CLAY. No, now, let’s talk. Don’t worry about what he said.

Isn’t it true that when unions get involved in the political realm,

they are giving a voice to millions of working Americans on the

very activities that are important to the working families whom

they represent, issue such as, for example, health care, education,

labor standards, civil rights and workplace safety?

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. I believe that is true. And if you look historically, I mean, we could still have, child labor laws, we could still

have 60-hour work weeks. I love that little bumper sticker that

says, the weekend brought to you by the labor movement.

Mr. CLAY. Now, the primary responsibility of unions has been in

managing the employment relationship between workers and management, correct?

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. Yes.

Mr. CLAY. And you stated that Federal law also requires that the

union must fairly represent all employees in the bargaining unit,

whether the employee is a member of the union or not?

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. Yes.

Mr. CLAY. Can you explain the importance of the fair representation principle in labor management relations?

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. Yes. It actually goes back to our system of exclusive representation. We have set up, under our Federal labor

law, we have set up bargaining units like little electoral units. We

are the only people in the world to do this, other people do it differently. But we have a bargaining unit, and over a bargaining unit

we have an election. And if a majority vote for the union, everybody is represented by the union. And if a majority does not vote

for the union, nobody is represented by a union.

As a result, you can always have people that are unhappy with

the choice. It is a collective decision. And we did this because we

advocate democracy worldwide. And in the 1930’s, we have been,

you have seen that most recently, we invaded Iraq in part to bring

democracy there or whatever. We are very big on democracy.

And the idea was that if democracy was good for the government,

it could also be good for the workplace. And so we had the idea of

bringing industrial democracy to the workplace.

And that actually goes to the membership, too. The representative over here asked if people should ever have to support political

causes that they don’t believe in. And I agree in general that they

should not.

But the one qualification I would make is, when you are a member of an organization, sometimes you are going to influence that

organization and they will do what you want them to do, and sometimes somebody else will influence that organization and get them

to do what they want you to do.

Chairman ISSA. Will the gentleman wrap up? We are about a

minute overdue.

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. Okay, I am sorry. Mr. Bowman is concerned

because the organization of which he is a member does not always

do what he wants it to do. But if we said, organizations can’t do
85

anything unless they get the agreement of everybody within the organization, they would never do anything. And as a result, he has

the choice to either be a member, as he currently is, and sometimes

not be happy, or to be a non-member, in which case they will not

be able to charge him for that political activity.

Chairman ISSA. I thank the gentleman. We now go to the gentleman from Illinois, Mr. Walsh, for 5 minutes.

Mr. WALSH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and thank you to all the

witnesses for coming.

Let me apologize if I am redundant at all. Mr. Bowman, help me

connect some dots here. The Obama administration, as we know,

has taken actions over the last few years to strengthen union control over workers. They have done this primarily by weakening reporting requirements for those unions. These actions have combined to basically give unions the ability to spend members’ dues

without rank and file members knowing where that spending is

going. We also know that unions put about $1.4 billion into the 2010 elections. Silly stupid question, but let me ask it. Of that $1.4 billion, how do you think that money went as far as split between Republicans and Democrats? Do we know?

Mr. BOWMAN. I do not have that figure, Representative, so I am

not sure.

Mr. WALSH. What would you guess?

Mr. BOWMAN. My guesstimate would be, again, well over 90 percent of the contributions would go for one particular party over another, that is correct.

Mr. WALSH. And what party would that be?

Mr. BOWMAN. That would be the Democrat party.

Mr. WALSH. And I think that is probably a pretty safe guess.

Mr. BOWMAN. Yes.

Mr. WALSH. Why is that? And again, silly question number two,

if over 90 percent of that $1.4 billion is going to Democratic candidates and causes, are we to assume that 90 percent of union rank

and file are Democrats?

Mr. BOWMAN. Well, I know that not to be true. I think that the

unions now are becoming very prominent in the public sector, the

government sector, as opposed to the private sector. The Bureau of

Labor Statistics released their 2011 figures last month. The private

sector was at only 6.9 percent, I believe, of employees were in the

union membership. But it was much higher in the 30 percent range

of union members, 36 percent range of union members.

So the relationship between the union and their Democrat officials in the State is a cycle of dependency that is fed with taxpayer

dollars. So I believe that is where that comes from, all that money

is coming from taxpayer dollars.

Mr. WALSH. So then it leads us to the next question, which is,

again, if 90 percent of what union leadership is giving politically

goes to Democrats, and we know that the union rank and file is

not 90 percent Democrat, what is the, who is the Obama administration listening to, in your estimation? Union leadership or the

rank and file?

Mr. BOWMAN. Well, of course it is the union leadership.

Mr. WALSH. Why would that be, though?
86

Mr. BOWMAN. Because they control the money and control the

funds.

Mr. WALSH. So not necessarily the interests of the rank and file?

Mr. BOWMAN. That is correct. And we have talked about the difference between PAC funds and forced union dues in the difference.

My written testimony has many examples in the agency fee that

are very political activities but still included in that agency fee.

Mr. WALSH. One thing I have noticed a lot of the last year or so

when I have been at home is union rank and file members, trade

union guys, private sector union guys are pretty upset right now.

They are not working. Many are struggling financially, they are

losing their homes. They are upset with their leadership because

their leadership really sort of foisted this administration on them.

I am seeing a widening gulf.

Do you get any sense of, is there any groundswell among rank

and file who are more willing to publicly express how upset they

are with what their leadership is doing?

Mr. BOWMAN. Very much so. That is why my organization, Union

Conservatives, was started, because there are so many people who

are feeling left out of the activities of the union officials, and wanted to join an organization that actually mirrored their interests.

I can give you two examples recently. The Keystone Pipeline

issue, many union members are extremely upset. In fact, a labors

union, I believe, pulled out of the Blue Green Alliance because of

that, because so many jobs, potential jobs, were killed by the decision. And then also, so many union members were upset after October 2, 2010, when union officials rallied in Washington, DC, called

the One Nation Working Together Rally. And they found out only

afterward that they also rallied with the Communist Party USA,

the Socialist Party USA and the Democratic Socialists of American.

When it was reported afterward, so many union Members on both

sides of the aisle were very upset about it.

Mr. WALSH. Final question, Mr. Chairman. Is it safe to assume,

Mr. Bowman, that you see a widening gulf between union rank and

file and their leadership?

Mr. BOWMAN. Absolutely. I speak to a lot of groups. Even Tea

Party groups have a lot of union members in the Tea Party groups

as well.

Mr. WALSH. I will be dogged. Wow. Thank you, Mr. Bowman.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Chairman ISSA. Thank you.

We now go to the gentleman from Massachusetts, Mr. Lynch, for

5 minutes.

Mr. LYNCH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Just as a, I guess, general disclosure, I should disclose the fact

that I am a 30-year member of the Iron Works Union in Boston.

Chairman ISSA. I ask unanimous consent the man be given an

additional 30 seconds to explain his entire family lineage. [Laughter.]

Mr. LYNCH. Well, we will skip that. That is for another hearing.

But I am also a former union steward, former union president for

the Iron Workers Union, actually worked at the UAW plant in Framingham, Massachusetts.

Mr. BOWMAN. Welcome, brother.
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Mr. LYNCH. So Mr. Bowman, I certainly have some related experience with respect to your testimony.

And Ms. Coomer, the SEIU actually ran a candidate against me

in the last election. So we certainly have some empathy going

there, in spite of the fact that I had a very, very strong union voting record, as you might expect. Even when I was president of the

Iron Workers Union, I still strapped on a pair of work boots every

day and went out to the constructionsites. So I wasn’t a sit behind

the desk president, I was an iron worker, working on the job, driving a pickup truck. And in a very dangerous industry, I might add.

And I was thankful every single day that I went to work that I

had a union watching out for me. Because as a union steward and

a union president, I had more than enough occasions to sit in an

emergency room waiting for one of my co-workers to get patched

up or unfortunately, I went to far too many wakes and funerals for

my brothers and sisters who went out to work in the morning in

a very dangerous industry and did not come home. And that is a

strange, strange, it is bizarre, it is obscene in a way, that folks go

to work every day sometimes in dangerous industries, and because

of the lack of protections, they don’t come home.

That is one of the greatest gifts, I think, that my union gave to

me, was, they tried their best, in a very dangerous industry, to

make that job safe for me, so I could come home every day to my

family.

I just want to make a few observations. You would think from

the discussion here today that maybe 50 percent, 60 percent, 70

percent of today’s workers are unionized. But according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 88 percent of the workers who draw a salary or a wage in this country today are non-union. You have 11.8

percent of the workers, salaried workers and wage-earners in this

country, 11.8 percent work under a collective bargaining agreement.

In fairness, this committee has really tilted toward going after

union employees. This has not been an even-handed process.

I have before me a list of 16 hearings we have had here. We have

had probably, out of the 16, we have had hearings on questioning

the pay levels of Federal employees, looking at right-sizing the Federal work force, trying to get people out the door, questioning, we

had a hearing questioning the official time whether union stewards

in conducting their business, whether that was a good value for the

taxpayer.

We had a hearing entitled Postal Infrastructure: How Much Can

We Afford, Are Postal Work Force Costs Sustainable, because we

wanted to cut the postal workers, union workers wages. We had a

hearing on the Hatch Act, whether or not political action by public

workers should be sustained.

Chairman ISSA. Would the gentleman yield?

Mr. LYNCH. Not at this point, no, I only have 5 minutes.

So we have had—and I don’t believe, I honestly don’t believe that

the employers, the corporations, are going to be brought in here.

I don’t believe that. We have had 16 hearings on employees, and

busting unions. And we have never had a hearing on, you know,

don’t hold your breath to see Goldman Sachs come through that

door. Because in all the time I have been here, this House, the
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whole House of Representatives, think about Goldman Sachs, and

what role they played in this country’s economic crisis. Never came

through that door, not one hearing on Goldman Sachs. And yet we

go after the unions on a weekly basis here.

The other thing is, the last thing I want to say is about Citizens

United decision. Terrible decision, probably the worst decision in

my lifetime in the Supreme Court. And they equate corporations

with unions. The difference with corporations and unions is that

even in your case, the union’s ability to garner resources is limited

to passing the hat. They pass the hat among the employees, sometimes willingly, sometimes unwillingly, getting contributions, individual contributions.

But if you look on the corporate side of things, you have ExxonMobil making $30 billion, AT&T making $20 billion, Chevron

making $20 billion, JP Morgan $17 billion, Wal-Mart making $16

billion, and they can take that money without shareholder approval, without disclosure to the shareholders, and use that money

for political purposes. They can use the machinery of profit-making,

these corporations, these massive corporations, with impunity.

There are no questions being asked of them.

I appreciate your indulgence, Mr. Chairman, and I yield back.

Chairman ISSA. I thank the gentleman for yielding back his negative 50 seconds.

I might note for the record that Mr. Waxman was very good at

holding Hatch Act hearings and you did forget to mention Governor

Scott Walker, who is in fact an employer.

And with that, we go to the gentleman from South Carolina, once

an employer, I guess, of many of the members of his district attorney’s office, recognized for 5 minutes.

Mr. GOWDY. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I couldn’t help but think when Secretary Geithner from the

Treasury came that we had a glimpse of Wall Street, so I don’t

know whether the gentleman is counting that as a Goldman Sachs

visit or not.

Ms. Waites, you went through, and I tried to take notes, you

went through an incident that happened with respect to the Children’s Fund and what strikes me as tantamount to an involuntary

contribution. Could you go back, just take 30 seconds and go back

through that factual predicate for us one more time? What happened?

Ms. WAITES. In 2004, when I went to the delegate assembly, we

were told right off that it was non-negotiable, we had to make a

donation to the Children’s Fund in two separate fund that amounted $180. Which I finally did, and I procrastinated, because I

couldn’t figure out why it had to be two different payments, and

I couldn’t figure out why it wasn’t tax-deductible. But the name is

the Children’s Fund, it is the fund for children in public education.

So you assume it is for children in public education.

Mr. GOWDY. Who in the world could possibly be opposed to something called the Children’s Fund?

Ms. WAITES. If you ask a teacher to give money, a teacher may

have two dollars in her purse and if you ask for that two dollars,

that teacher is going to give a child the money. That is just what

we do.
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Mr. GOWDY. Are you familiar with the work of the Children’s

Fund?

Ms. WAITES. I was not until the last day of the assembly, when

they announced that the money that had been raised through the

Children’s Fund would go to the campaign. In 2004 it was John

Kerry, in 2008 it was Obama. And that was the very last day.

Now, I found out what the nature of the Children’s fund was in

the women’s bathroom on a break when two ladies from California

told me. I asked them if they were required to give, because everyone, you were very pressured into donating. And they said no, it

was a political fund, and that is how I originally found out about

it, was from some other lady.

Mr. GOWDY. We may have a clip, Mr. Chairman, of an ad run

by the Children’s Fund. Let’s see if we have one here.

[Video shown.]

Mr. GOWDY. Wow. I didn’t see a word about children or education.

Ms. WAITES. Yes, if you are going to have a political fund, name

it a political fund, especially when you are in an education field.

People will give to children for any type of education purpose. I

speculated, NEA gives teacher grants, and I originally thought,

okay, maybe it will go to teacher grants. And then I thought, well,

maybe it will go to underprivileged children or children in high

poverty areas. And Children’s Fund is a children’s fund, it

shouldn’t be a political fund.

Mr. GOWDY. And you didn’t know it was going to go for an attack

ad in a partisan race?

Ms. WAITES. No, sir.

Mr. GOWDY. Now, something in your original opening statement

led me to believe that there was not only a component of

involuntariness to it, but that there was perhaps some shenanigans

with travel money?

Ms. WAITES. They took dues from BCEA members and they included the amount of the donation in 2008 into our travel money.

Because when I kept insisting to have the money back, I was told

to stop insisting because the amount was included in my travel

money that was separate from my travel money. Which infuriated

me even more, they used our BCEA dues to contribute.

Mr. GOWDY. Professor Dau-Schmidt, I was just a country prosecutor, I never got into FEC law. Is that legal, what she just described?

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. I am a labor and employment law professor.

Mr. GOWDY. Oh, but you have an idea, don’t you?

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. Well, I would give you my opinion that I find

that disturbing, too, frankly.

Mr. GOWDY. I didn’t ask whether you found it disturbing, I asked

whether you found it legal or not.

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. That I don’t have an opinion on. I don’t know,

I don’t know that law. As I understand, she did file a complaint

that was denied. She is a State employee, so she is governed by

State law, so I can’t tell you what the State law is on her objecting.

But I think she has a legitimate complaint there, that if they put

forward that fund in that way that she should expect it to go for,

it should be clear whether it is for politics or not.
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I suppose they could make the argument that this guy was

against children somehow, and so therefore, this was the best way

to use that money. But I think she has a legitimate complaint, and

I would be interested to see why her complaint was dismissed.

Mr. GOWDY. I am afraid I am out of time, Mr. Chairman.

Chairman ISSA. The gentleman is correct, his time is expired.

We now go to the gentleman from Illinois, Mr. Davis, who is next

for 5 minutes.

Mr. DAVIS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

While I can’t say that my work was as dangerous as that of Mr.

Lynch, I can say that I was a proud union delegate, member of the

Chicago Teachers Union, chairman of the Professional Problems

Committee during the early days of my life, when I was about 23

years old. And I enjoyed the work tremendously.

I think that those of us who are concerned with unions’ political

advocacy should also take a good look at corporate America. According to the Center for Responsive Politics, the Chamber of Commerce, which is funded by corporate America, is one of the top

sources for political spending. Harvard law Professor Benjamin

Sachs commented on the Chamber’s spending in a 2012 paper. He

noted that the Chamber, which is funded by corporate donations,

spent more than $32 million on electioneering communications during the 2010 election season, approximately 94 percent of which

was on behalf of Republican candidates.

Professor Dau-Schmidt, now that corporations are free to use

their general treasuries to fund political activities, would you agree

that corporations have the financial capability to vastly outmatch

that of individuals and unions?

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. I think that is true, and I think that is evident in the upcoming election. The statistics that you cited from

Professor Sachs’ article and the five highest spending non-priority

organizations, including the Chamber of Commerce, $32 million in

the 2010 elections, four of the five all supported Republican candidates.

Mr. DAVIS. I have always believed that fair is fair. Unfortunately, it is difficult to get a handle on what the actual scope of

corporate political influence really is. While there are a lot of

checks on union political spending, there don’t appear to be any

real checks on corporate America.

Federal law requires unions to file a detailed report with the Department of Labor, disclosing all of their political spending. Professor, do have corporations any similar duty that you are aware

of to disclose their spending for political purposes to their shareholders or to the public?

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. I know of no restraints like that, and they

also don’t have to let people opt out. And just think about how popular that would be. If you did allow an opt-out, they would have

to refund a portion, a proportionate share of what they spend on

politics to their shareholders. They would set up mutual funds that

got these refunds, they would be dissenter mutual funds. Those

mutual funds would earn more money than similarly situated mutual funds. They would be very popular.
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So I think there is a real demand out there for dissenters not to

have their money. My savings for my pension spent on political

purposes that I oppose.

Mr. DAVIS. Thank you very much. And I think the Los Angeles

Times article pretty much came to the same conclusion. And it said

that ‘‘Despite mounting calls for greater transparency, only a few

of the country’s 75 leading energy, health care and financial services corporations fully disclose political spending. Groups such as

the Chamber, some of which spend millions of dollars on elections,

are not required to reveal their financial supporters. And companies are not required to report their donations to those groups.’’

‘‘What information is publicly available suggests that substantial

Corporate political spending remains in the dark, leading to an incomplete and at times misleading picture of companies’ efforts to

influence legislation and elections.’’

Professor, given the lack of transparency and disclosure policies

and practices of some corporations, do we even know how corporations are spending shareholder funds to exercise political influence?

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. I don’t believe we do.

Mr. DAVIS. Well, thank you very much. I think it is clear that

there is great disparity between what unions and individuals are

able to spend and what corporate America is able to spend to influence. I thank you, Mr. Chairman, and yield back the balance of my

time.

Chairman ISSA. I thank the gentleman.

We now go to the gentleman from Michigan, Mr. Walberg, who

also hails from an area to the south of Ypsilanti. Do you include

any part of Ann Arbor and Ypsilanti?

Mr. WALBERG. Well, we don’t include Ann Arbor as Ypsilanti.

Chairman ISSA. I always look at them as the twin cities.

Mr. WALBERG. I have a quarter of Ann Arbor in my district.

Chairman ISSA. You do. Mr. Bowman would like to talk to you.

The gentleman is recognized.

Mr. WALBERG. I have hade the privilege of walking in the Saline

Parade with Mr. Bowman, if I remember correctly.

Mr. BOWMAN. That is correct.

Mr. WALBERG. Who surprised me out of my socks, as it were,

that you were a proud UAW member working for a Republican candidate.

Mr. BOWMAN. That is correct.

Mr. WALBERG. And it was a delight t talk with you, and I have

tried to matriculate that information into my understanding since

then.

Mr. BOWMAN. I would like to talk to you after this meeting.

Mr. WALBERG. Delighted to see you here and appreciate your testimony.

I apologize for not being here for all the other testimonies. I have

had a chance during the intervening time to read them. Members

of Congress are not unionized, so our work rules don’t allow us necessarily to deal with being in two places at the same time and often

we have that situation.

I was a United Steelworker for a while in my life at Number Two

Electric Furnace, South Works, U.S. Steel, south side of Chicago,

same place my dad was a union worker and helped organize the
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union at that plant early in his career in the early 1940’s. The opportunity that he proudly wore his union pin, those little pins they

used to wear, attached to his lunch bucket as well as his hat and

his coat, and would come home with those. By the time he finished

his career as a machinist tool and diemaker, he no longer was a

member of the union, worked for companies and shops that weren’t

unionized, because he felt it went away.

An example was given even in my first week at U.S. Steel South

Works when I was told by the Union to stop working so hard, quit

sweeping underneath the furnace so hard and find a box and crawl

up and go to sleep. I understood that was not the work rules and

the working condition that my dad worked for, to make sure that

there was safety, that you did come home for a weekend of relaxation. I was interested to hear the statement, this weekend brought

to you by the labor union.

Ms. Coomer, I am sure that they would not go along with a statement that could be made, you too can be a union caregiver for your

child, like it or not. I am sure that would not be the situation that

you would desire to see as an ad. I applaud you for what you are

doing for your child. And sadly, some of that opportunity has been

taken away from you as a result of a union.

But let me go back to Mr. Bowman. I have heard with some reverence talk about the Black Lake Facility. Describe that a little bit

more. You mentioned it in your testimony, but describe that facility

and why a lot of my union friends would talk with some reverence

as to what goes on there. What does take place there?

Mr. BOWMAN. Well, the UAW has a facility called the Black Lake

Facility in the upper Lower Peninsula of Michigan, almost to the

Mackinaw Bridge, as a matter of fact.

Mr. WALBERG. Beautiful area.

Mr. BOWMAN. Beautiful grounds, it has an 18 hole golf course,

quite highly rated, from what I understand, all owned by the

union, all paid for with regular union dues. They did this as an investment and from what I understand, they have been trying to

sell it but have chosen not to do that because of the deduction, or

the loss of property value.

But at the Black Lake facility, it is supposed to be a facility for

‘‘education.’’ And I use this quote mark because I have never been

afforded, even after 15 years, of going to the Black Lake facility.

Only those who are very involved in the union political side are invited to go to the Black Lake facility numerous times. And they

have classes there, 1-week seminars on grievance handling and the

history of unions and all these different kinds of classes that are

available.

Mr. WALBERG. Upgrading your skills as an employee and all

that?

Mr. BOWMAN. That is correct. But unfortunately, as I have been

told numerous times, people come back and say that it really is an

opportunity for the union to indoctrinate on the fact that the Republican party has been the party who has over time done everything against the middle class, against the working people.

Mr. WALBERG. They would actually say that?

Mr. BOWMAN. They would actually use those words, yes, absolutely.
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Mr. WALBERG. With your dues dollars paying for that?

Mr. BOWMAN. Regular dues are paid for this facility. It is not

subtracted from the agency fee, as is any of the publications or the

salaries of the officials that engage in these activities.

Mr. WALBERG. Is there a publication that your dues help fund

called Solidarity?

Mr. BOWMAN. Yes, there is.

Mr. WALBERG. Are there any political statements in Solidarity

that you would have concerns with as a union employee?

Mr. BOWMAN. Extremely. Yes. Very often in every issue.

Mr. WALBERG. So your forced dues pay for Solidarity printing,

against your viewpoints and a thousand others potentially that you

have listed today?

Chairman ISSA. Time is expired, the gentleman may answer.

Mr. BOWMAN. Yes. And unfortunately Solidarity magazine, the

publication and the wages for the union workers who put this together are not reduced from the agency fee. They consider that legitimate union purpose.

Chairman ISSA. I thank the gentleman.

The gentleman from Massachusetts, Mr. Tierney, is recognized

for 5 minutes.

Mr. TIERNEY. Thank you.

Doctor, let me start here. I think in this hearing we want to

make sure that individual union members are not being disadvantaged inappropriately, that their rights are being protected. So I

want to just walk through, again, the National Labor Relations Act

allows for people to organize, form a union and to collectively bargain, is that correct?

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. Yes.

Mr. TIERNEY. And then a later amendment, I think it was about

1947, indicated that States had the right to opt to be right to work

States.

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. Right.

Mr. TIERNEY. Then there was case law that indicates if that occurs, and a contract provision is put in, people that do not want

to be paying union dues can at least make sure that if they are obligated to pay those union dues, none of it goes toward political

uses, is that correct?

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. That is true. The statement actually uses the

term membership. It allows union security agreements that require

membership. But the way the Supreme Court has interpreted that

is that you can’t actually require someone to join a union, and you

can only require them to pay an agency fee.

Mr. TIERNEY. So if that law is in fact enforced, then I think that

we have pretty much protected those individuals from what they

would otherwise object. The question for some of these folks here

might be whether or not it was enforced properly or applied properly in their position. I think that is a case by case. I do note on

Ms. Waites that when her case went to the FEC, it sort of was resolved, because it seemed to be a misunderstanding between Ms.

Waites, Ms. Fox and Ms. Hunter.

And you never did voluntarily, Ms. Waites, want your money to

be used for the political purpose. You knew, I guess from the document that went out that day, you knew the NEA Fund for Children
94

in Public Education had those uses that it had, and you didn’t

want your money to go there, and somebody else put some travel

money that you had toward it. So that is that issue, right? Okay.

So feeling fairly comfortable that the law allows for protection

against what everybody here seems to want to complain about it,

let me take it to a broader point, Doctor. I think most of us want

a fair political system and we wouldn’t want anybody to be overadvantaged against anybody else. When you look at the Citizens

United case, and you understand the impact, I think it is Jacob

Hacker, a friend from Yale, who said in this case, first, people with

a lot of money, they had the advantage, they could hire lobbyists,

then they could give a lot more in political contributions than the

average citizen, regular family.

And now, and this is Citizens United, they are going to be able

to buy attitude and spend all they want. Sometimes their shareholders might even in fact be pension funds or other organizations

that are populated by people who, some of the policies the corporations espouse, they work against. Is that fair?

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. That is absolutely correct. And I have to

admit, I am very concerned about it, for the future of our country

and for my kids’ future.

Mr. TIERNEY. I, in fair disclosure, everybody wants disclosure, I

was the president of the chamber of commerce in my community.

But we disassociated ourselves from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce that we regularly saw working against our interests, always

championing tax loopholes and things that favor corporations, taking jobs overseas and on and on and on. And not doing things that

we really thought in our local communities would be helpful, supporting education, supporting better roads and things of that nature.

And always generally saw union members and other people that

were working non-management, and small businesses, have a lot in

common on that basis. I think one thing they have in common is

that Citizens United, the way it is crafted right now, could work

greatly to their disadvantage on that.

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. I believe that is true.

Mr. TIERNEY. Do you believe it would be useful to have a law

that allowed for the same kind of protections for shareholders that

the law currently allows for union members or non-union members

who have to pay an agency fee?

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. I think it would be very useful. As I said before, I think to opt out would be very popular with investors. I

don’t invest in a company because I want them to represent my political views. I invest in a company because I want a secure return

in the future. And that is what people expect to get out of investment. So when the Supreme Court politicized that act through Citizens United, they created a huge problem. They created a problem

not only in private relationships, where employers set up pensions,

but especially in a relationship like mine, where the State sets up

a pension and requires me to participate in it. Because there you

have clear State compulsion for me to participate in what is basically political voice.
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Mr. TIERNEY. Mr. Bowman, would you favor or oppose laws that

applied the same protections to shareholders that are available to

employees?

Mr. BOWMAN. I think it is comparing apples to oranges, because

shareholders can choose not to invest in the company. Union workers have to as a condition of employment pay dues to the union.

Mr. TIERNEY. That is not true in a right to work State, is it?

Mr. BOWMAN. It is not true in a right to work State.

Mr. TIERNEY. They can voluntarily opt out.

Mr. BOWMAN. Yes, they can.

Mr. TIERNEY. So if you are a shareholder, you have money in a

mutual fund, how likely do you think it is that you know exactly

where those funds are being invested, and then what that corporation is doing with your money?

Mr. BOWMAN. I think it is due diligence. They need to find out

exactly where, and then they can choose to invest elsewhere.

Mr. TIERNEY. As I guess you think Ms. Waites should have done.

Mr. BOWMAN. I don’t know that situation.

Mr. TIERNEY. Yield back.

Chairman ISSA. I thank the gentleman.

We now go to the gentleman from Oklahoma, Mr. Lankford, for

5 minutes.

Mr. LANKFORD. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. This is an interesting

series of conversations about the agency fees and opting out and

such, and providing those types of protections. I understand the

statement that we have laws on the books that handle this.

Of the individuals that are here, do you think these Beck rights,

these opt-out provisions were enough for you in your specific situation? Were you able to opt out and to say, Ms. Waites, you can

start and we can go across the panel.

Ms. WAITES. I was not able to opt out. When I asked that the

money be returned, I was refused.

Mr. LANKFORD. Okay, so these specific opt-out provisions did not

work for you?

Ms. WAITES. Right.

Mr. LANKFORD. Okay, thank you. Ms. Coomer.

Ms. COOMER. When I made the request, basically I was told that

to be a ‘‘non-member union person’’ I still had to pay the equivalent

fees, equal to the union dues. Then I had to go through this big,

long process. It had to be a religious reason that I had to prove

that I wanted to divert a certain portion to a non-profit or a different organization, that the union agreed to allow me to donate or

divert that money to.

Mr. LANKFORD. So a fairly lengthy process to do that, fairly

bulky process?

Ms. COOMER. Right.

Mr. LANKFORD. And you still had to pay the agency fee?

Ms. COOMER. Still had to pay, yes.

Mr. LANKFORD. So if you want to just personally donate to somebody else and say, I am not going to pay the agency dues, don’t put

any of my money down for political, I want to personally contribute

to who I want to contribute to, that is not a possibility. So somewhere in your agency fees was going to be contributions directed

through the union.
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Ms. COOMER. Right. And then they want quarterly reports, showing, I had to prove to them that that portion I diverted was going

to where they had agreed was an appropriate place for it to go to.

Mr. LANKFORD. Okay.

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. As I mentioned before, I believe both Ms.

Waites and Ms. Coomer are public employees, and as a result, they

would be governed by the law in their States. Actually the law,

they would have an opt-out, they wouldn’t be eligible for Beck

rights. But they would be eligible for some kind of opt-out from the

law in the States.

And Ms. Coomer, I am not familiar with Washington’s law. But

it sound very interesting where they allow them to opt out, but

they have to give to a charity of their choice, so as not to encourage

people to opt out. In other words, they still have to support the

public wheel in some way. Now, Mr. Bowman——

Mr. LANKFORD. Wait. I am going to let Mr. Bowman answer.

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. Well, Mr. Bowman——

Mr. LANKFORD. Hold on.

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT [continuing]. Is eligible but he has to——

Chairman ISSA. The gentleman controls his own time. Go ahead,

Mr. Lankford.

Mr. LANKFORD. The statement that I am making is, were the

Beck rights, did they apply. And your statement is, no, this is a

State issue, so they don’t apply on it. Mr. Bowman, you can answer

the question.

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. For State employees, I am not eligible for

Beck, either, because I am a State employee.

Ms. COOMER. I am not a State employee, according to the State

of Washington.

Mr. LANKFORD. Mr. Bowman.

Mr. BOWMAN. Okay, thank you. First of all, I have not exercised

my Beck rights, because I am trying to effect change while as a

member, an active member of the union. And my testimony says

there is a lot of fear that goes in with union members by exercising

their Beck rights. Specifically because they have to resign their

union membership first. And when you are on the shop floor and

people know that you have exercised your rights, there is harassment, there is persecution, there is ridicule from your fellow workers, along with the union officials themselves.

Now, I think that alone speaks very highly of making the Beck

decision the default position for all union workers up front, and

then only those who want to pay over and above can choose to do

so.

Mr. LANKFORD. Right. And there are individuals, yourself included, that want to stay involved in the union. I have some folks

in Oklahoma City, in Oklahoma, we are a right to work State.

There are some fantastic people that are union members, who are

very engaged, whether they be firefighters or police officers or all

kinds of different unions there, I have no issue with that, and for

the collective bargaining, for the organization, and for what they

want to be able to do, to be able to negotiate together. That is not

the issue.

The issue comes down to the accountability side of it. An example of this would be the ICAP audits, to where audits are done by
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the Federal Government, of going down to the communities, the

local side. But as of 2012, according to the Obama administration,

they are going to do zero audits for the international unions. Does

that bother anyone, that the new decision is, if they are a small

union in a local area, they are going to have transparency, but the

larger the union is, the less transparency they are going to have?

Mr. BOWMAN. I think that is incredible. I had not heard that. I

find it quite upsetting.

Mr. LANKFORD. That is from the Office of Labor Management

Standards, just to say that for fiscal year 2012, the quote there is,

if you get a chance to read it, there will be zero ICAP audits. So

that office has been defunded and put down on it.

So the issue here is not whether you want to be union or nonunion. That should be completely voluntary. But it should also be

transparent. Everything should be open, everyone should be held

to the same account. And there should be the opportunity for members of the union to also be engaged, and to not be excluded from

that.

With that, I would yield back.

Chairman ISSA. I thank the gentleman.

We now go to the gentleman from Connecticut, Mr. Murphy, for

5 minutes.

Mr. MURPHY. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

In Mr. Bowman’s testimony, he suggests that the political speech

of unions is essentially equated to what he calls an offensive and

radical left-wing political action. We are used to hyperbole here,

but this is certainly parroted by much of the talk we hear about

what unions are doing in the political context today. I think it

stands behind a lot of the attacks we have seen on labor unions,

this idea that labor unions are speaking in some radical way.

And Mr. Kucinich did a little bit of this, but I do think it is important to in some detailed way go back over the record of the political action of labor. I won’t claim that labor has been responsible

for every great social or workplace safety advancement in this Nation. But they have been a pretty integral pat. There was a time

when there were little kids working in factories throughout this

country, there was a time when the average adult was working 61

hours a week. And in large part because of union political action,

we passed the Fair Labor Standards Act. There was a time in this

country where workers were getting paid cents on the hour, weren’t

getting paid enough to put a roof over their head or food on the

table. And in large part because of labor political action, we got the

minimum wage.

There was a time when if you got injured at work, you would lose

your job, and the only way that you could recover any damages or

any lost wages was by suing your employer and racking up expensive legal fees. In part because of labor political action, we got

workers compensation law.

And a lot fo people say, that is prior history, that is all about

what happened 50 years ago, 75 years ago. Well, just about a decade ago, it wasn’t foreign that if you had a newborn child or a sick

relative, and you had to take some time off work, you couldn’t get

your job back. And in large part because of labor political action,

we got the Family and Medical Leave Act.
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You can disagree with all those things. You can say that we

shouldn’t have minimum wage, we shouldn’t have the Family Medical Leave Act. But I don’t think that any of those acts are considered radical today. I don’t think that much of what labor is advocating for is considered extreme today. And I guess it leads me to

a few simple questions to the professor. We have heard a lot about

the free rider phenomenon, in the sense that if you are not paying

dues in a right to work State, you still get the benefit of the contract that the labor union negotiated. And I think that is a real

problem.

But what we don’t talk a lot about is the free rider syndrome in

which workers who aren’t paying dues to a labor union also get the

benefit of all of the social change, the very non-extreme advocacy

that has led to these acts. And so Professor, my question is this.

Do non-paying dues members in this country get the protections afforded to them under the Fair Labor Standards Act?

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. Yes, they do.

Mr. MURPHY. Do non-dues paying members in this country get

the protections afforded to them by Federal minimum wage?

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. Yes.

Mr. MURPHY. How about workers compensation law?

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. Yes.

Mr. MURPHY. And the Family Medical Leave Act?

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. Yes.

Mr. MURPHY. Listen, we can disagree about the particular actions that labor unions engage in in the political context. That is

why we have the protections that allow individual workers to opt

out. I think folks on our side have done a pretty good job of explaining those protections. But the notion that there is some radical agenda that labor is perpetuating in the halls of Congress or

in State legislatures I don’t think is backed up by the facts. I think

the idea that going back through the history of social change in

this country that we haven’t been benefited, workers haven’t been

benefited, whether you are a dues-paying member of a union or

not, by fair labor standards, minimum wage, workers compensation, medical and family leave and dozens of other pieces of legislation is a rewrite of what has actually been happening when labor

unions come and advocate on behalf of their Members in the U.S.

Congress.

With that, I yield back my time.

Chairman ISSA. The gentleman yields back.

With that, we go to the gentleman from North Carolina, Mr.

McHenry, for 5 minutes.

Mr. MCHENRY. I thank the chairman. And I know this is not

about a question of right to work laws in individual States. This

hearing is not about that. But I want to thank my colleagues on

the other side of the aisle for their advocacy against right to work

laws in their respective States. I want to thank them for that, because in North Carolina, as a right to work State, it helps us economically. I certainly appreciate their willingness to advocate for

closed shops for unions. I certainly appreciate their willingness to

advocate for laws that drive up the cost of doing business in their

respective States, and I certainly appreciate their advocacy for

that.
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So I just want to take a moment to sincerely thank them, not

just on my behalf, but on behalf of the folks in western North Carolina that want more jobs and want more economic growth.

Now, we did hear a lot of testimony about labor practices in the

1920’s. We had a lot of questions and comments about that. And

certainly, unions had their place and they had their time. But we

also have international competitiveness issues. And we have unions

that are negotiating to keep their dues and to keep their income

stream going, while at the same time cutting employees, cutting

pensions, raising the cost of health care for their union members.

So their advocacy is, let’s just say they are trying to keep their

money flowing to them.

But that is neither here nor there. So one of my colleagues said

that basically the unions pass the hat. They pass the hat to get

union membership. Mr. Bowman, do you put your dues in a hat or

is it deducted from your paycheck?

Mr. BOWMAN. It is deducted from my paycheck.

Mr. MCHENRY. Ms. Coomer.

Ms. COOMER. It is deducted from the paycheck.

Ms. WAITES. It is deducted from my paycheck.

Mr. MCHENRY. I just want to be clear about that.

Now, is there any question about how your dues are divvied up?

Do you have a vote on that, Ms. Waites?

Ms. WAITES. No, sir, we do not.

Ms. COOMER. No.

Mr. BOWMAN. No, sir.

Mr. MCHENRY. All right. This is interesting to me. Ms. Coomer,

I appreciate your testimony, and for making the trip here. How old

is your daughter?

Ms. COOMER. Twenty-one.

Mr. MCHENRY. In your testimony you outline the fact that you

basically are being paid by the State to be, or your are paid by the

State to take care of your daughter.

Ms. COOMER. Right.

Mr. MCHENRY. If you didn’t do that, some other individual would

do that?

Ms. COOMER. Would need to do that, yes.

Mr. MCHENRY. So you got a notice when this happened, I mean,

this is a State regulation, a State law, in the construct of how you

are taking care of your daughter?

Ms. COOMER. Actually, she got the notice.

Mr. MCHENRY. Oh, she got the notice.

Ms. COOMER. That her family provider could no longer provide

care for her through an agency, that they had to transfer over to

the unionized IP system if they wanted to continue providing care.

Mr. MCHENRY. Okay. And so could you have said, no thank you,

I don’t want to be a member of the union?

Ms. COOMER. I could have refused to sign up as an individual

provider, yes, and then I would not have been able to continue providing for her Medicaid Personal Care.

Mr. MCHENRY. So you would not be able to take care of your

daughter?

Ms. COOMER. Right.

Mr. MCHENRY. That is a horrible choice. And I am sorry.
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Ms. COOMER. Exactly. And I don’t know a parent who made the

decision not to make that move, because of that very reason.

Mr. MCHENRY. So not only do you not have a choice about being

a member of the union, you don’t have a choice about where those

dues even go?

Ms. COOMER. Correct.

Mr. MCHENRY. This is really the crux of this discussion today.

You are being forced, money is being taken out of your pocket.

Now, there is a comparison to corporations. With a corporation,

if you are an investor, you can simply not invest, right? I guess

conceptually, you don’t have to take care of your daughter.

Ms. COOMER. I suppose.

Mr. MCHENRY. But it is an illegitimate choice set here, a comparison between investing in a corporation and an individual providing care for their child.

Now, I just wanted to make that point here. My colleague from

South Carolina always asks great questions. I know I only have a

few additional seconds.

Chairman ISSA. Would the gentleman yield?

Mr. MCHENRY. I would be happy to yield to the chairman.

Chairman ISSA. Just one question. Did you get a pay increase

when you were involuntarily converted in status and put into the

union?

Ms. COOMER. No.

Chairman ISSA. Did you get a pay decrease by having the same

amount of money but less of it net?

Ms. COOMER. Right. I got a pay decrease, decreased benefits, and

I was no longer able to cover my children, my dependents, on the

health insurance coverage.

Chairman ISSA. So because of the union’s political activism, they

able to take you from being out of the union, receiving X dollars

to take care of your adult child, to put you into a union where you

got less net dollars to do that service, but they got dues. That was

the only change you saw?

Ms. COOMER. Correct, other than some of the decreases in benefits and not being able to cover my other children, dependents.

They have no dependent coverage, which I had before, when I was

not a union member.

Chairman ISSA. If I wasn’t a Member of Congress, I would say

you got you know what out of this. But I am not going to go there.

I thank the gentleman for yielding. I yield back.

And the gentleman’s time is now expired. We now go to the

former chairman of the full committee, the Honorable Edolphus

Towns, for his insightful questions.

Mr. TOWNS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. You sound

like my mother. [Laughter.]

Chairman ISSA. God bless her for bringing you to us.

Mr. TOWNS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.

Let me begin by first of all, I have a statement for the record,

I ask unanimous consent, of Mr. Robert Hahn, member of Local

514 of Wisconsin. I would like to ask permission to insert it into

the record.

Chairman ISSA. Without objection, so ordered.

Mr. TOWNS. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
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Let me say, just yesterday, less than 24 hour ago, this committee

conducted a business meeting in which our objective was to take

money out of the pockets of Federal workers to reduce the national

deficit. There was no, let me emphasize, no efforts, no efforts whatsoever, to get corporations to shoulder the same burden.

Today, despite its title, this hearing again focuses on the worker,

except that now we are looking to put further restrictions on the

rights of those workers who are unionized and who are working

hard to live the American dream. All over this country, and of

course right here in the capital, we are witnessing a sustained

campaign against American workers and the unions who represent

them. These campaigns are aimed at silencing the voices of unions

and giving more power to the big corporations over things like reasonable wages and benefits and safe working conditions.

Let me begin by saying to you, Mr. Bowman and of course, Ms.

Waites, do you feel there is an attack on the unions? Do you feel

there is an attack on unions?

Ms. WAITES. No, sir. I don’t feel that this is an attack on unions.

Mr. TOWNS. But you don’t feel there is an attack on unions in

general, either?

Ms. WAITES. I think we are more in terms of unions making political contributions without any consult with their membership.

Mr. TOWNS. How about you, Mr. Bowman?

Mr. BOWMAN. I agree completely with what she is saying. This

is not an attack on unions, on collective bargaining rights at all.

It is a meeting to hear discussion on unions using our regular dues

for political spending.

Mr. TOWNS. Professor, do you want to say something?

Mr. DAU-SCHMIDT. Living in one of the front line States, I would

have to say there is a systematic attack on unions. My collective

bargaining rights were taken away unilaterally by the Governor of

Indiana in 2006, and then the Republicans in the State proceeded

to limit collective bargaining rights for teachers, who were the only

remaining public sector employees who have any collective bargaining rights at all. Once they were done with that, they moved

on to right to work legislation, because that was the way they could

weaken private sector unions.

And this is all part, I think, of a political act on their part. They

are trying to undermine people who have been traditional political

opponents of theirs and supporters of the Democratic party. So it

does not surprise me at all that most union campaign contributions

go to Democratic candidates.

In Indiana, I can guarantee you, the unions are very upset with

the Republicans, because they have so tried to undermine union

power. And in fact, there is an organization in Indiana called the

Lunch Pail Republicans, who are conservative union members who

generally do not support Democratic candidates, but they actively

campaigned against the Governor and his position and right to

work, and they are threatening to field candidates against all the

Republicans who voted for right to work. And it looks like they are

going to be fairly effective at it.

So there are conservative union activists out there who are very

upset with the attack that has been made on unions.
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Mr. TOWNS. Let me just say that I think you need to be careful.

Because when you look at the improvements that have been made

in the workplace, a lot of them came about because of unions. Even

in situations where people were not even unionized, that based on

the activity of the union that made the workplace safe.

I think we need to sort of analyze that and look at it. Even if

there is one thing that you dislike, let’s look at the 99 you should

like. And of course, I can remember when people would work 60,

65 hours a week without any overtime. I am old enough to remember that. And of course, they just were paid by the hour and that

was it, and paid very little.

So I look at what is happening in corporate America. I think that

we need to be really careful, and I think some of my colleagues on

this side mentioned the fact that in terms of what is going on with

corporate America.

So I say to you, Mr. Bowman and Ms. Coomer and Ms. Waites,

you need to be careful. You need to be careful. Because if not, you

might come back a few years from now and start talking about how

life is so miserable as a result of your not having that protection.

I yield back.

Chairman ISSA. The gentleman yields back.

I want to thank all our witnesses for being here today. This was

the first of a series of hearings. As a result, you probably went

through some of the growing pains that come with opening up a

new subject. I would like to thank all four of you. I think you presented your positions extremely well.

Certainly, you can tell that we are divided here on the dais. I

think the important thing here today is that the issues you brought

before us and any additional comments you may want to bring to

the committee, I would ask that you try to do it in the next few

days, we will include in the record.

If there are no further comments by any of the panelists, I would

ask unanimous consent that the committee majority staff report be

placed in the record at this time. Without objection, so ordered.

[The information referred to follows:]
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Chairman ISSA. And again, thank you very much. You are an important part of democracy, all of you. This is a process in which we

are going to look, as a committee, at the law as it has changed

under the Citizens United decision, to try to find the right way to

get openness and transparency and ultimately come to grips with

the fact that the law is what the Supreme Court says it is.

I want to thank you. We stand adjourned.

[Whereupon, at 12:35 p.m., the committee was adjourned.]

[The prepared statement of Hon. Edolphus Towns follows:]
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