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“PUBLIC SAFETY EMPLOYER-EMPLOYEE COOPERATION ACT OF 2007” mentioning the U.S. Dept of Labor was published in the Extensions of Remarks section on pages E1551-E1552 on July 18, 2007.
The publication is reproduced in full below:
PUBLIC SAFETY EMPLOYER-EMPLOYEE COOPERATION ACT OF 2007
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speech of
HON. BILL SALI
of idaho
in the house of representatives
Tuesday, July 17, 2007
Mr. SALI. Madam Speaker, yesterday, the House voted on a measure that would require public sector employees at the State and local level to set up a system of monopoly bargaining. H.R. 980, the Public Safety Employer-Employee Cooperation Act, is well-intended, as are most bills that come before this body. Yet its effects would be profoundly negative, both on fire and police departments nationwide and on the way Congress operates with respect to our most fundamental allegiance, the Federal Constitution.
As we all know, the tenth amendment to the Constitution states, ``The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved for the States respectively, or to the people.'' Yet with H.R. 980, Congress is plainly overriding carefully crafted State labor laws with a single stroke. This bill dictates to States how they must deal with unionization issues, which is a serious abridgement of the role of Congress envisioned by our Founders.
We took an oath here, Madam Speaker--an oath to uphold a Constitution that does not give us the power to ride roughshod over States whenever it strikes our fancy.
Moreover, the practical effect of this legislation would be disastrous. As the International Chiefs of Police have noted, ``By mandating a `one-size fits all' approach to labor-management relations, H.R. 980 ignores the fact that every jurisdiction has unique needs and therefore requires the freedom to manage its public safety workforce in the manner that they have determined to be the most effective.''
Worse yet, H.R. 980 would give the Federal Labor Relations Board the responsibility of overseeing labor-management laws in virtually every jurisdiction in the Nation, from municipalities to counties to States.
Not only is Congress extending its meddling arms into matters reserved by the Constitution for the States, but now, some of my friends across the aisle want to cut funding for the only Federal agency that reviews union abuses. As John Fund put it in the Wall Street Journal, ``The new Democratic Congress has finally found a government agency whose budget it wants to cut: an obscure Labor Department office that monitors the compliance of unions with federal law.''
Allow me to quote Mr. Fund at some length:
In the past six years, the Office of Labor Management Standards, or OLMS, has helped secure the convictions of 775 corrupt union officials and court-ordered restitution to union members of over $70 million in dues. The House is set to vote Thursday on a proposal to chop 20% from the OLMS budget. Every other Labor Department enforcement agency is due for a budget increase, and overall the Congress has added
$935 million to the Bush administration's budget request for Labor. The only office the Democrats want to cut back is the one engaged in union oversight . . . GOP Rep. John Kline of Minnesota will offer an amendment Thursday to restore $3 million of the $11 million planned cutback in OLMS's budget, so its budget would merely be restored to its 2007 level. Whatever sums are spent on union disclosure reports appear to be a good investment. Unions held $22 billion in assets in 2005, and you'd think that a modest enforcement budget, representing less than 0.003% of that amount shouldn't be the only target for cuts by budget appropriators.
Madam Speaker, allowing workers to determine whether or not they wish to join unions is consistent with the American principle of personal freedom and self-determination. A Federal law concerning public sector union membership that would render State laws irrelevant is unconstitutional, reckless, and unnecessary. And reducing funding for the one Federal agency that pursues notorious union corruption is incomprehensible in its own right--but especially coming from a new majority that heralds its own allegiance to the highest ethical standards.
These things must not be allowed. These are matters of ``liberty and justice for all'' we must not take lightly.
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