Republicans Working To Guarantee Right To Secret Ballot Elections

Columbia, SC – March 10, 2010 – South Carolina’s Republican Senators are pushing a bill on the State Senate floor that guarantees a worker’s right to a secret ballot election in the workplace, but liberal Democrats have been working to block that right. Will they continue their fight to deny workers of their rights to secret ballot elections today?

H.3305, introduced by Rep. Eric Bedingfield, is a constitutional amendment that would guarantee a worker’s right to voting by secret ballot during union organization. The legislation is a reaction to the deceptively named federal “Employee Free Choice Act,” which would strip workers of their right to vote for unionization by secret ballot, opening them up to intimidation and harassment by unions. The legislation is being pushed on the federal level by union bosses and their liberal allies in Congress.

In arguing for the constitutional amendment, Senate President Pro Tempore Glenn McConnell (R-Charleston) said “I don’t know of anything more basic to the essence of our nation than the right to a secret ballot election.”

Just last week Jim Albaugh, chief executive of Boeing Commercial Airplanes, told the Seattle Times “The overriding factor was not the business climate. And it was not the wages we are paying today. It was that we can’t afford to have a work stoppage every three years. And we can’t afford to continue the rate of escalation of wages.”

Senate Majority Leader Harvey Peeler (R-Cherokee) is the lead sponsor of a Senate companion bill. ” Boeing’s decision to expand its facility near Charleston serves as a reminder why we must protect our tough right-to-work laws. We are sending a strong message to the world: We want your business, and we’re committed to getting it. I want to continue sending that message by defending workers’ rights to secret ballots when deciding whether to unionize,” said Senator Peeler.

Peeler continued, “We’ve seen what happens when unions control the economy. It’s called Detroit. And we’ve seen what happens when unions fail. Congress bails them out on the backs of hardworking taxpayers. It’s unfortunate that the Democrats can’t see this clear fact.”

The Democrats argue that the bill is unconstitutional, but Senate President Pro Tempore argues otherwise. “The fourteenth amendment of the United States constitution creates a floor for protections. It does not prevent South Carolina from reaching for the stars in protecting our citizens. In fact, it lets us give our citizens more freedoms than guaranteed by the federal government. We have soldiers fighting overseas to grant others rights that are being filibustered at home.”

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