How very peculiar - TeaPublicans hiding behind the shadow of FDR on collective bargaining for Public Employee Unions!

Franklin D. Roosevelt supported the rights of Federal Employees to collectively bargain versus the TeaPublican insidious lie; another case of the truth cleverly reshaped: "FDR opposed Public Employee Unions."

FDR definitively supported the advent of public employee unions, however FDR DID NOT SUPPORT THE RIGHT TO STRIKE FOR FEDERAL EMPOLYEES, which is a separate matter and distinction. To use FDR to support the usurpation of collective bargaining by Gov. Scott Walker of Wisconsin is in bold error; a purposeful dissimulation of the actual facts.

FDR's Support for Public Employee Unions:

"Reading your letter (Mr. Steward, Federation of Federal Employees) of July 14, 1937, I (FDR) was especially interested in the timeliness of your remark that the manner in which the activities of your organization have been carried on during the past two decades 'has been in complete consonance with the best traditions of public employee relationships.' Organizations of Government employees have a logical place in Government affairs.

"The desire of Government employees for fair and adequate pay, reasonable hours of work, safe and suitable working conditions, development of opportunities for advancement, facilities for fair and impartial consideration and review of grievances, and other objectives of a proper employee relations policy, is basically no different from that of employees in private industry. ORGANIZATION ON THEIR PART TO PRESENT THEIR VIEWS ON SUCH MATTERS IS BOTH NATURAL AND LOGICAL, but meticulous attention should be paid to the special relationships and obligations of public servants to the public itself and to the Government."

(Break)

"I (FDR) congratulate the National Federation of Federal Employees (on) the twentieth anniversary of its founding and trust that the convention will, in every way, be successful."

(emphasis added)

Who were the National Federation of Federal Employees?

A union representing federal employees since 1917:

"NFFE was officially created at a labor convention in Washington, D.C. on September 17, 1917. It formed as an affiliate of the AFL and was at the time the federal employees union, representing several trades and industries. NFFE and other unions were able to form after 1912, when Congress passed the Lloyd-Lafollette Act to overturn Theodore Roosevelt's previous executive order. Roosevelt's mandate, frequently referred to as the 'gag rule' had previously prevented unionized activity."

Teddy Roosevelt "Gag Rule" Removed by Congress

To wit:

"Congress passed the Lloyd-La Follette Act (§6, 37 Stat. 555, 5 U.S.C. § 7511) on August 24, 1912, declaring that 'the right of persons employed in the civil service of the United States, either individually or collectively, to petition Congress or any member thereof or to furnish information to either House of Congress or to any committee thereof, shall not be denied or interfered with.'

"The Lloyd-La Follette Act provided a significant impetus to the formation federal employees' unions. In 1916, the American Federation of Labor (AFL) acted to bring the various local unions together to form a single national union. The National Federation of Federal Employees was founded in Washington, D.C., on September 17, 1917. In 1918, it became the first labor union to win the legal right to represent federal workers."

Source: Wikipedia on National Federation of Federal Employees

Original.