Pottstown, PA (December 21, 2005) – With free legal assistance from National Right to Work Legal Defense Foundation attorneys, two local workers filed federal charges against their employer, the International Chemical Workers Union Council (ICWUC), and its Local 619 chapter, for having them fired in retaliation for returning to work during a union-ordered strike.

David Cameron and Walter Reigner, chemical workers at the Cabot Supermetals factory in Boyertown, were fired in November as part of a union-negotiated strike settlement between Cabot and ICWUC union officials. In the agreement, union officials explicitly demanded that Cameron and Reigner, in addition to two other similarly-situated employees, be discharged for exercising their legal right to resign their formal union memberships and continue working during the strike.

As a result of union officials’ retaliatory demands against the workers who resigned from the union and disagreed with union officials’ dictates, Cabot fired the four employees and handed their jobs over to less skilled and less senior workers. Cameron and Reigner’s Foundation-assisted charges against the ICWUC unions and Cabot Supermetals seek reinstatement and back pay.

“In a shameless unlawful act of retribution, four loyal employees are out on the street,” said Foundation Vice President Stefan Gleason. “Union officials are attempting to drive four families into financial straits in order to send a message to all other employees that they had better toe the union line.”

Cameron, Reigner, and their two colleagues exercised their right under the U.S. Supreme Court decision in Patternmakers v. NLRB to resign from formal union membership and return to work during a strike. The firings violated the National Labor Relations Act and the duty of fair representation which are supposed to protect employees who exercise their right to refrain from collective union activity without retaliation or coercion.

The National Labor Relations Board will now review the unfair labor practice charges brought against Cabot and the ICWUC union, an affiliate of the United Food and Commercial Workers union, and decide whether to issue a formal complaint.

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.