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.

Who Assigned Gentleman Joe (Haveman) TeaPublican Slop Jar Duty?

Getting Joe Haveman R-Holland to carry the TeaPublican slop jar is a real feat of denigration. Joe is a good guy; a congenial straight arrow. Now he's labeled himself as a kill-the-teachers-association-by-any means-possible meanie - The kind of kid who loves to be the heavy on the top in a brutal pig pile on the school yard.

Haveman is one of many ethnic Dutch-Hollanders-in the Holland area-who are the decedents of highly religious/ conservative immigrants to the area mid to late 19th Century. In earlier times when they were the broken English speaking common labor, they were for unions and for collective action. Over time, however that changed.

"How strong the opposition to union membership was in the Christian Reformed Church is evident from the fact that, despite the decision of 1916, synods of the Christian Reformed Church were forced to face the issue again and again until the relatively late date of 1954, when the matter was finally decided. Even at that late date, A SYNODICAL STUDY COMMITTEE RECOMMENDED THAT SYNOD DECLARE MEMBERSHIP IN THE CIO-AFL SINFUL. But, as Swierenga relates in (his book) Dutch Chicago, "so many church members in Chicago, Patterson, Detroit, and other big cities belonged to these unions that the synod rejected the committee report"
(Robert P. Swierenga, Dutch Chicago: A History of the Hollanders in the Windy City, Eerdmans, 2002,pp. 644, 645)

It is well to remember that there is also this historic, signal labor incident to recall:

"The good beginning of the Christian Reformed Church regarding labor union membership was in Chicago, always a stronghold of the Christian Reformed Church. IN 1886, ALL THREE HUNDRED DUTCH REFORMED WORKERS AT THE PULLMAN WORKS IN ROSELAND CROSSED PICKET LINES TO HELP BREAK THE STRIKE"
(Robert P. Swierenga,  pp. 640, 641).
(emphasis added -  See related article)

Sympathy for the working man was replaced by the clannishness and stick together efforts that worked to the advantage of many of the Dutch who become middle class successes such as Haveman - a project manager for a large construction firm prior to election to the Michigan House of Representatives.

What was done today, September 15, 2011 by the passage of Haveman's bill to curtail the ability of the teachers professional association to have access to payroll deduction of association dues is but one of many recent and so-to come bills passed to "pig pile" on the Michigan Education Association in an attempt to quell their ability to participate in the right to regress of grievances and the privileges accorded them in the signing of legislation by Gov. George Romney, giving educators a fair and responsible voice in their profession, the terms of employment and professional improvement so necessary to a progressive and effective teaching cadre and excellence for students.

In carrying the unsavory slop jar for the Mackinac Center and other teacher haters such as Betsy DeVos, Haveman has lowered his image. Many of us were convinced that a man like Joe Haveman might be the re-visitation of the kind of statesman we once had in Western Michigan, a Paul Henry. Joe may repent. But having led the charge for the Out-of-State Corporatists owing A.L.E.C. Joe has sold his honor for the miserable job of slop jar duty.

The hope of the Kill-the-M.E.A. crowd is that teachers will be silenced and their influence will be diluted by any means legislated, to the point that they will have no voice in Michigan lawmaking and elections, thus be at the mercy of the TeaPublican marauders who are "sacking" the state of its ability to provide service and education for the children of our future.

A Teapartisan crowd of rowdies are using government to push highly partisan advantages: Their M.O. - take from others all they can.

The list to "take from" is extensive: Nurses, Firefighters, Local Police, Social Workers, the Poor, State Classified Workers, Michigan State Police, M-DOT personnel, the retired, Teachers and Public School Employees, and many, many more.

Original.

The lesson for today is the American pension system: What to look forward to when you retire.

This text is drawn from the government rule book, with its contradictory and often-overlapping laws relating to pensions.

Here are the highlights: 

• For the first time, the percentage of workers who will receive a fixed monthly pension is steadily declining.
• Women who retire from jobs in businesses receive smaller pensions than men.
• The percentage of workers who will receive reduced pension benefits is growing. And half of all workers have no pension plan at all.
• Corporations removed $21 billion from their employees' pension plans during the 1980s. Overall, nearly 2,000 corporations dipped into employee pension funds for at least $1 million each.
• Conscientious workers who establish their own individual retirement accounts - believing them to be insured by the federal government - one day may discover to their dismay that many are not.
• Workers in the private sector receive far smaller pensions than workers in local, state and federal governments, which now employ 17 percent of the American workforce.
• And the people who made all this possible - members of Congress - will continue to receive the best pensions of all.

Label this pension chaos.
Then understand that, barring a massive revision of the rule book by Congress, these conditions will continue to deteriorate.

In the meantime, watch for the coming war between those who work for government and those who don't.
It will come when workers in private industry realize how much power public-employee pension funds wield.

This Analysis by Donald L. Barlett and James B. Steele


Original Post.