Contracts Are Worth Defending, Even with No-Strike Clauses
I’m pretty sure the tens of thousands of union activists who serve on negotiating teams would say that the core of “contract unionism” is achieving a fair contract. The idea of regularly staging work stoppages to resolve grievances would seem hopelessly unworkable to most union members.
Strikes are to be used when all other options have failed and the union has a viable strategy for winning one. Giving up the right to strike over issues subject to grievance arbitration is a trade most members gladly make in return for a fair contract.
But not all union contracts have a clause barring strikes during the life of the contract.
The Teamsters have maintained sympathy strike rights, and have used them as recently as November to defend standards at US Foods’ warehouse and trucking depots across the country.
Diligent readers will recall a Steward’s Corner column by labor lawyer Robert Schwartz that described no-strike clauses that don’t prohibit workers from refusing to cross other unions’ picket lines. That legal right has been upheld by the federal Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, and West Coast unions, including the California Nurses and Longshore Union (ILWU), have used this power.
The longshore union in particular has maintained the sympathy strike in its arsenal, using it to honor picket lines that community allies establish. More unions could seek to renegotiate their no-strike clauses this way, to allow for short solidarity strikes.
CONTRACTS PROTECT
Aronowitz also seems to have some misconceptions about union contracts. He says, “Workers agree to suspend most of their demands till the contract ends, sometimes as long as six years.” Most union contracts are for three or four years, and temporarily suspending the right to strike over a set of demands is not tantamount to suspending the demands altogether.
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With the unfortunate exception of some SEIU contracts that restrict informational pickets and other forms of employer disparagement, most union contracts do not restrict workers from continuing to campaign for their demands.
Aronowitz says “the union is responsible for enforcing the contract, including disciplining workers.” In fact, the union’s job is to police the employer. It is not true the union’s duty is to discipline workers—indeed, unions are legally responsible for defending workers from unfair discipline.
“When management violates the agreement, workers have no recourse but arbitration, which is weighted toward employers,” according to Arono-witz. Arbitration is the primary form of leverage unions use to enforce contracts, but it doesn’t have to be the only one. Workers can organize campaigns to support their grievances (short of striking). In many cases, that’s far more effective than relying solely on arbitration (see A Troublemaker’s Handbook 2).
And labor arbitration is not “weighted toward employers.” Unions win plenty of arbitration cases; if that weren’t the case employers wouldn’t fight union organizing campaigns practically to the death or lock workers out to force concessions.
True enough, the power to maintain and improve union contracts depends on the existence of other grassroots movements, like Occupy, aimed at overhauling the country’s broader social contract. Where union contracts impede unions from coordinating with such movements, such impediments can and should be removed, but not at the expense of collective bargaining as a whole.
If and when union members vote to strike in solidarity with an Occupy action, or any other action, it won’t be because they’ve rejected “contract unionism.” It will be because they’ve recognized that their own stake in the struggle for justice requires nothing less.
Guillermo Perez is a labor educator and activist in Pittsburgh and a member of Steelworkers Local 3657. He serves on the executive committees of Labor Notes and the Association for Union Democracy.
