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In the recent presidential and congressional elections, special interest groups spent tens of millions of dollars to influence the outcomes. Among the leading big spenders were the nation’s major labor unions, who expect a payback now that many of their favored candidates have won.
For decades union membership has been on the decline. In 1945, more than one out of every three workers in the United States was a union member. By the early 1980s, that number had decreased to barely 20 percent of the work force. In 2007, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that union membership, nationwide, was down to 12 percent of employed wage and salary workers. Union membership is highest and has been growing in government sector employments, where it represents about 40 percent of the work force. In the private sector, labor unions have continued to slide dramatically, with union membership down to 7.5 percent of industrial workers. (Among those working in the financial sector it is only 2 percent of salaried employees). Outside of government, and a handful of private sector employments such as transportation and utilities (22 percent of employees), telecommunications (19.7 percent) and construction (14 percent), union membership and therefore union power and influence have been diminishing for half a century. To save themselves from economic oblivion in many parts of the market, the major labor unions want the Congress to pass, and the new president to sign, the Employee Free Choice Act. It would allow unions to organize and impose union membership on firms and industries without winning a secret ballot among the company and industry workers. Union representatives and supporters would merely have to persuade – some would say, intimidate – workers on the shop or office floor to sign a card saying they approve of having a union shop. If a majority of the workers in the firm signed this card under the public pressure of union advocates, that company would soon find itself a union shop with the usual rigid union rules and restrictions controlling hiring and firing, wages, and work conditions. Private sector employers fear that this would reduce their production flexibility and market competitiveness in a global economy where innovative change requires constant adaptation to match supply-side rivals both at home and abroad. The leading labor unions see their revival in the private workplace through the Employee Free Choice Act, insisting that this is the only way that the "real" interests of the workers can be represented in negotiating with employers. However, the long decline in union membership in the private sector strongly suggests that in the eyes of the vast majority of workers, imposed union membership actually reduces choice and opportunity for employment in the economy. Real employee free choice means allowing individuals the liberty to enter into their own employment contracts without mandatory union membership and dues. Thus, the unions have worked day and night to get those likely to vote their way elected to Congress and the presidency. In this year’s Congressional and presidential election cycle, the leading labor unions expended more than $61 million in campaign contributions. Democratic candidates received $55.7 million, with only $5 million going to Republicans running for office. Around $10.3 million was spent by the major unions on the presidential candidates beginning with the primary elections, with $10.1 million of that sum contributed to Democratic candidates this year. As shown in Table 1, labor unions have expended over $646.8 million in election campaign contributions during 1990-2008, with $595.4 million of that total received by Democratic candidates for federal political office. | Labor Union Campaign Expenditures, 1990-2008 | | (Millions of Dollars) | | | Total Contributions | Donations to Democrats
| Donations to Republicans | | 2008 | 61.0 | 55.7 | 5.0 | | 2006 | 66.4 | 57.6 | 8.2 | | 2004 | 61.5 | 53.6 | 7.7 | | 2002 | 96.7 | 90.0 | 6.4 | | 2000 | 90.1 | 84.9 | 5.0 | | 1998 | 60.9 | 55.8 | 4.8 | | 1996 | 64.9 | 60.6 | 4.1 | | 1994 | 51.0 | 48.9 | 2.0 | | 1992 | 52.9 | 50.0 | 2.7 | | 1990 | 41.4 | 38.3 | 3.0 | | Total | 646.8 | 595.4 | 48.9 | | Source: Opensecrets.org |
Table 2 shows that over the last ten years, the leading labor unions have spent an additional $343.9 million on lobbying activity in Washington, D.C. | Leading Labor Union Lobby Expenditures 1998-2008 | | (Millions of Dollars) | | 2008 | 29.3 | | 2007 | 44.5 | | 2006 | 32.2 | | 2005 | 35.4 | | 2004 | 32.2 | | 2003 | 31.7 | | 2002 | 29.2 | | 2001 | 28.8 | | 2000 | 27.8 | | 1999 | 26.3 | | 1998 | 26.5 | | Total | 343.9 | Now after relatively long years in the political desert of limited legislative power, the Congressional and presidential friends of big labor hold both of these branches of government in their hand The current economic crisis may delay when crucial labor union issues come up for passage and implementation in 2009. But after spending nearly $1 billion on campaign contributions and lobbying efforts since 1998, big labor will be expecting payback for all they have done to help put the Democrats fully back in charge of U.S. government decision-making.
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Has to do with Corporations whether chartered or unchartered.
Consequently, I believe that our current pathetic political state can be corrected by various causes of action in the State courts (mandamus, abuse of process, conspiracy to commit treason by intentionally attempting to destroy our Constitutional blueprint of dual sovereignty between each the 50 States and the United States (the proper moniker for the federal government), etc.) to force the states to take back (exercising) their sovereign status and cease and desist paying and collecting Chapter 21 taxes and any other federal taxes. The next nut to crack will be the same for all the state chartered corporations and unincorporated private business.
There exists some other interesting fallout from this. One of the most interesting is drawn from the fact that federal instrumentalities do not have voting representation in Congress. While the House has sitting representation from said instrumentalities which may enter into discussion, they have no voting rights. On the other hand, said instrumentalities have no representation in the Senate at all. That seems to me to void ALL legislation passed by Congress for as far back as each of the 50 States have been engaged in the unconstitutional behavior of paying the federal employer excise tax and collecting the federal employee tax as set out in the IRC, Chapter 21. Research may take this Union State Constitutional divergence all the way back to the mid 1930’s. The Union States can't have it both ways. Either they are Constitution Sovereign Union States or they take the position of their actins losing their sovereignty as a appendage to the federal Government. If they reverse there position by not being an appendage to the federal government, the income tax and any bailaout burden placed on the citizens of the 50 Union States goes away or the last 3 score and 9 years of federal legislation disappeapers because the senate had no Constitutional sitting representives. However, no matter; reducing federal code to a manageable size would be a welcome occasion to most of us. Many other ramifications present themselves as well; such as the rejection of the application of the patriot act, the real ID, eminent domain taking, etal.
Another fallout of the 50 States paying and collecting the FICA taxes is that the FICA tax is is not only the conduit through which federal law seeps into the states, it also the conduit through which the federal income tax enforcement seeps into the states. The same is true for Union State chartered corporations. If labor unions had been doing their jobs over the last 3 score and 9 years, they would have kept the fascist income tax burden off the entire 50 Union State labor force. While this seems unfathomable, once the aforementioned work is complete, any reader will be able to connect the dots for a complete understanding of the real law as written by Congress associated with the draconian income tax. That understanding will intellectually simulate a mental Jack-in-the-box. But I can't help citing the labor unions as sharing in the blame for such a travesty.