Michigan's Proposal 2 Takes Back Power From Big Unions
Champions of small and responsible government looking for some good news in this year's election results need look no further than the state of Michigan.
Though a majority of voters sided with Democrats by re-electing President Obama and sending Democrat Debbie Stabenow back to the Senate, they also rejected by 58% a ballot proposal (Proposal 2) that would have enshrined collective bargaining in the state constitution.
Michigan isn't an outlier in this regard. In progressive states like Wisconsin, Democratic voters this year also showed a willingness to split their tickets. Wisconsin re-elected Obama and gave their open Senate seat to a Democrat, barely half a year after Governor Walker survived his union-led recall by almost 10 points.
In other words, voting Democrat isn't synonymous with voting union, and organized labor is hurting as a result.
Labor staked almost $23 million on the constitutional amendment in Michigan. They fully intended to build on its success by exporting the concept to some of the other 18 states that have a ballot process for amending their constitution.
AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka said as much to the New York Times, explaining that success in Michigan would spur "efforts like that in other states to prevent future attacks on collective bargaining, like those in Wisconsin."
Trumka was right about labor's "prevent" defense: Proposal 2 would have given every union bargaining agreement in the public sector the power of the constitution and thus the ability to supersede laws created by reform-minded governors.
Michigan's attorney general estimated that, if the amendment passed, it would have overruled in whole or part 18 sections of Michigan's constitution and 170 laws. (A repeal of these laws would have cost the state $1.6 billion a year in projected savings.)
But today, both the Wisconsin recall and Michigan's union overreach have been dealt resounding defeats, and the symbolic importance of these losses can't be understated. Michigan has the fifth-highest percentage of union members in the country and was the birthplace of the United Auto Workers union; Wisconsin was the first state in the nation to allow government employees to collectively bargain.
These defeats are happening in territory that should be a union stronghold. But, unfortunately for unions, Democrat voters don't look like they used to.
For instance, there's a voting segment that may prefer higher taxes, but also prefers teacher accountability and a legislature that works for the people instead of the unions. These are households that might support the right to unionize, but also support an employee's right to use their paycheck as they choose and an elected representative's ability to make laws.
That's not a liberal or conservative value, a point that was proven in Wisconsin earlier this year. Given the opportunity to withhold membership dues from their union, a majority decided to keep the money themselves. AFSCME, Wisconsin's largest government union, lost more than half of its membership in a single year.
Voters are coming around to the same viewpoint of President Franklin Roosevelt, that "collective bargaining, as usually understood, cannot be transplanted into the public service."
Because of its heavy manufacturing economy, the Midwest has been the traditional bastion for organized labor. But as industries moved to southern states and the economy changed, union membership dropped and their power waned.
Today, in Wisconsin and newly right-to-work Indiana, the Midwest is now a hotbed for labor reform. And in Michigan, Proposal 2's defeat shows that momentum is with the reformers, both Republicans and Democrats who are willing to split their tickets and vote for workers, job creators and taxpayers instead of union special interests.
• Vernuccio is director of labor policy for Michigan's Mackinac Center for Public Policy. |
