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Right-to-Work in Oklahoma Would Impact All Workers
Photos by Bob Wood, IAM Judy Calhoun knows why a right-to-work law would be wrong for Oklahoma. “Right-to-work brings in low-paying jobs, and it kills the bargaining power of workers,” says Calhoun, president of the UAW Community Action Program in Oklahoma and also financial secretary of UAW Local 1999 at the GM assembly plant in Oklahoma City. Frank Janowsky, from UAW Local 952 at the Boeing plant in Tulsa, says right-to-work will lower wages and decrease benefits if it comes to Oklahoma. “I get very passionate about this,” he says. “It’s a direct attack on us.” Alarmed UAW members in Oklahoma are gearing up for a referendum on right-to-work that could happen in mid-August or alternatively during the general election in 2002. “Whether they are Republicans or Democrats, everyone in our plants is concerned,” says Judy Calhoun. To show their concern, over 3,000 Oklahomans marched past the governor’s mansion in mid- March to the state capitol where they participated in the largest labor rally in the history of the state. A broad coalition including church leaders, community activists, and union leaders turned out to stand up for the right of Oklahomans to free collective bargaining. Many people misunderstand the meaning of right-to-work. “That name is such a lie,” says Calhoun. “They should call it right to starve.”
These laws forbid employers and unions from negotiating union security agreements. Without union security agreements, bargaining power is weakened, and the costs of union gains are not fairly shared. Unions are required to represent everyone in a covered bargaining unit. So non-members accept negotiated wages, benefits, and demand the union defend their rights under grievance and arbitration proceedings. But under right-to-work, they don’t have to pay dues if they decide not to. This erodes the bargaining power of unions, and over time the wages and benefits of all workers also erode. The pro-right-to-work forces claim that becoming a right-to-work state would make Oklahoma more attractive to businesses seeking to expand. But from 1998-1999, Oklahoma, which posted the sixth best record in the country for bringing in new businesses, attracted manufacturing jobs faster than nearby right-to-work states like Texas, Louisiana, Kansas and Arkansas. Oklahoma workers point to operations that have moved to their state from right-to-work states: Seaboard brought a 700-job pork processing plant from Kansas. Texas-based Southwest Airlines plans to locate a new telecommunications center in Oklahoma City, among many examples. The right-to-work forces have been unable so far to cite a single example
of a company that won’t move to Oklahoma because it doesn’t
have right-to-work. In recent years the once Democratic state has become a Republican stronghold. George W. Bush carried it handily, as did his father in 1988 and 1992, and Sen. Robert Dole in 1996. The last remaining center of Democratic influence has been the state legislature, but Oklahoma Democratic legislators are divided into three camps: Dixiecrats, moderates and progressives. For the last 12 years, Democrats in the state legislature have killed right-to-work legislation. But this year, they split as key Democratic leaders decided to support a referendum on the issue. This year a coalition of 18 Republicans and 13 Democrats in the Oklahoma Senate overruled 17 pro-worker, progressive Democrats to put the issue on the ballot over the objections of Oklahoma unions. A similar split pushed the referendum through the Oklahoma house.
Voter registration drives are underway, and workers are being showered with literature that explains the issue. But it’s going to take a strong coalition effort that reaches beyond organized workers because today less than 9 percent of the Oklahoma work force is organized into unions--significantly below the national average. The Oklahoma AFL-CIO has affiliates with 80,000 members, and the UAW has over 9,000 active and retired members. The implications of losing the right-to-work fight in Oklahoma are sobering. Losing would encourage the enemies of high wages and good benefits to conduct legislative and referendum campaigns in other states. But the workers of Oklahoma are determined to hold the line. “We will not allow our wages to be cut along with less health care for our families,” says Jimmy C. Curry, president of the Oklahoma State AFL-CIO.
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In
1964 Oklahomans defeated another referendum on right-to-work. But Oklahoma
has changed greatly since then, and so Oklahoma workers and their allies
are preparing for a tough campaign.