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More than 1,000 leading academics announce support for the Employee Free Choice Act

 

Scholars across the country are calling for passage of the Employee Free Choice Act, in letters to Congress, symposiums, rallies, and roundtables starting this week. They will discuss how labor law has weakened over the last several decades, and why it is more important than ever to return to workers the freedom to form unions through the Employee Free Choice Act and to create an economy that works for everyone.

 

Over 1,000 scholars from disciplines that run the gamut from economics to sociology have signed a letter expressing their support for the legislation, calling it critical for lifting our economy out of the recession, and protecting our democratic values. The letter will be delivered to members of congress and can be read here and the signatories can be seen here

 

In addition, more than one hundred fifty historians have signed another letter in support of the bill through the Labor and Working Class History Association. It will also be sent to Congress this week and can be found here.

 

“Our nation’s scholars fully understand the implications for our democracy and our economy when corporate power brokers can deprive working people of the right to freely organize a union,” says AFL-CIO President John Sweeney. “America’s workers welcome their support for this crucial legislation which stands to help turn the tide for our nation’s future.”

 

“We, the undersigned historians, feel a special obligation to speak out on behalf of the Employee Free Choice Act. In our courses, we describe how freedom of association became a prized American right and how, for working people, freedom of association became a reality when the National Labor Relations Act of 1935 granted them a protected right to organize and bargain collectively through representatives of their own choosing. Students know this. It’s in the New Deal chapter of every textbook. So for them, it comes as a shock to discover when they enter the working world that they don’t dare exercise the rights the law says they have,” wrote David Brody, History Professor Emeritus at University of California, Davis in an open letter to Congress that will accompany the historians’ petition.

 

At events nationwide, academics will speak to why a robust labor movement is a fundamental cornerstone of our democracy and will discuss what the historical consequences have been when working people did not have a voice at the workplace. They will also join working people to speak to the process of forming a union, and how corporations have undermined working peoples’ rights over the last seventy years.

 

Events have already happened in many states, such as Nebraska and Indiana, where professors delivered petitions to elected leaders, and will continue in cities like Little Rock, Arkansas, Chapel Hill, North Carolina and Philadelphia.