Washington, DC (August 10, 2005) – The National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation recently joined the battle to keep private airport security screeners free from compulsory unionism by filing an amicus curiae (friend of the court) brief with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB). Union lawyers are attempting to persuade the federal labor board into taking the controversial step of allowing the forced unionization of screeners.
The brief responded to a June ruling by the NLRB to reconsider a decision by one of the agency’s Regional Directors to apply the National Labor Relations Act to private airport screeners working for a firm called Firstline Transportation Security operating at the Kansas City International Airport.
In creating the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) in response to the September 11th terrorist attacks, the federal government also created a pilot program involving private airport security screeners at five airports throughout the country. All other airport screeners are federal employees, and TSA officials have, citing national security concerns, exercised their discretion not to grant union officials monopoly bargaining power over any of these federal employees.
“This new union scheme is really about raising more forced union dues revenues,” said Foundation Vice President Stefan Gleason. “Aside from violating workers’ freedom of association, history tells us that interjecting forced unionism into such sensitive areas could have severe ramifications for Americans.”
Foundation attorneys argue that granting the Security, Police and Firefighters Professionals of America (SPFPA) union officials the special privilege to force the airport screeners into union collectives and, ultimately, to collect compulsory union dues, would both undermine national security by destabilizing security screeners’ work environment and infringe on workers’ freedoms. The Foundation points out in its brief that since wages, training, supervision, and working conditions of private screeners are overseen by TSA officials, no traditional “collective bargaining” could take place.
Additionally, the brief lays out the heightened possibility of national security breaches, such as illegal strikes and the potential for terrorist infiltration of the union. Sixty years ago, the courts and Congress learned that Communist operatives had infiltrated numerous unions and manipulated those organizations for subversive purposes – including orchestrating strikes against defense-related plants at the behest of the Communist Party. More recently, Senator John Kyl (R-AZ) cited concerns about “an increasing number of instances” where American institutions are being infiltrated by radical Islamic forces.
The brief also documents that government union officials have a long history of ignoring strike prohibitions and engaging in illegal strikes with tragic consequences. For instance, firefighter union strikes have resulted in dozens of deaths, strikes ordered by teacher union officials have led to hundreds of thousands of students being forced out of classes, and illegal so-called “blue flu” job actions (where employees simultaneously call in sick) orchestrated by police union officials have endangered lives.
The National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation is a nonprofit, charitable organization providing free legal aid to employees whose human or civil rights have been violated by compulsory unionism abuses. The Foundation, which can be contacted toll-free at 1-800-336-3600, assists thousands of employees in about 200 cases nationwide per year.
