Midwest Unions' Desperate Last Stand

[Geee]

American Spectator:

The voters of Wisconsin and California spoke loud and clear. They are tired of the special privileges and lavish benefits given to government unions and paid for by taxpayers. Apparently unions in Michigan did not get the message.

Last Wednesday, supporters of the so-called "Protect Our Jobs" Constitutional Amendment (POJA) submitted 684,286 petition signatures to the Michigan Department of State -- more than double the amount needed to put the measure on the ballot in November.

If passed, the Amendment would enshrine collective bargaining in the Michigan Constitution.

POJA would effectively destroy any chance for Michigan to give workers the right to say no to a union and still keep their job -- the main benefit of a right-to-work law. The proposal is already being billed as an anti-right-to-work measure, but the major impact would be the reversal of reforms to government union privileges. These reforms have helped Michigan turn the corner after a decade of economic malaise.

Supporters of the amendment say it is needed to help the middle class. In reality it will only help the roughly three percent of the Michigan population who are government union members, but will be paid for by everyone else.

The Amendment would make unions a super-legislature leaving them more powerful than the people's elected representatives. It would remove the governor and the Legislatures' (aka the voters') ability to place any limits on government unions' power except for strike clauses. POJA would mean Michigan could not continue, and would never achieve, the type of reforms that have saved Michigan taxpayers billions of dollars and turned states like Wisconsin around.

UAW member and President of Union Conservatives, Terry Bowman, calls POJA "an extreme measure that is unprecedented in labor history."

He cautions "by submitting signatures to forever change Michigan's constitution, union bosses have said that they are better equipped than the duly elected legislature to handle the economic future of the state of Michigan. …. They obviously believe that a union boss like Jimmy Hoffa or Bob King should have more control over the state's economy than the Michigan legislature and Governor."