Lincoln, Darwin, EFCA and Obama
As I write this, it is February 12, 2009. It is the 200th anniversary of the
birth of Abraham Lincoln, perhaps our greatest president and a personal hero of
our current president.
It is also the 200th anniversary of the birth of Charles Darwin, the famous
British naturalist whose findings are still controversial 150 years after they
were published.
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Any discussion of Lincoln must begin with slavery. No, I will not take a cheap
shot and say that EFCA is a “return to slavery.” It is not. It is, however, a sensitive issue that takes on some of the emotion
that accompanied arguments about abolition in the years before Lincoln’s election. The South made arguments that slavery was actually an integral part
of the fabric of America and its constitutional freedoms. Without slavery, they
argued, there would be no freedom.
Unions are making arguments in defense of the institution of unionism much like
the arguments in favor of what the South called its “peculiar institution.” Proponents of the EFCA argue that the fabric of the American workplace is tied
up in unionism and employees banding together to defend themselves against the
evil companies that hired them. If you are against unions you are either
unpatriotic, stupid, or both. Emotion, not reason, rules the day.
Lincoln, when it came to slavery, was considered an abolitionist by the South
and a slavery sympathizer by the Abolitionists. He allowed his realism,
however, to drive his decisions. What we need is a little realism in the debate
over the EFCA, not emotional arguments bordering on religious fervor.
That’s where Darwin comes in. Whether you accept his theories or not, you have to
agree with some of his findings on natural selection. Basically, Darwin said
that as conditions change in the environment, plants and animals must adapt or
become extinct. For example, if the climate gets colder, certain animals must
develop thicker fur (or retain more fat), and those animals with those traits
to begin with are more likely to survive and mate. Their offspring will inherit
those traits, and maybe a slight change in their DNA will make their fur even
thicker than their parents’.
Unions, like plants and animals, must likewise adapt to changing conditions or
become extinct. If employees are less inclined to join unions, there has to be
a reason why. Yes, unions say employer intimidation is the reason, but unions
thrived during the most violent anti-union behavior by employers. Employees do
not respond well to threats, regardless what the unions say. No, the problem is
unionism itself.
The reason for the decline in unionization is that many unions have failed to
adapt to changing laws, employee attitudes, and social attitudes. Instead of
making changes to their organizational DNA, unions want Congress and the
President to change the conditions. In other words, change the rules for
selecting unions to make it easier for unions. But doesn’t that come at the expense of employee free choice and secret ballot elections?
I believe Lincoln would have opposed EFCA because it violates democratic
principles contained in the Declaration of Independence, which he quoted in the
Gettysburg Address. Darwin would neither oppose nor favor the EFCA; he would
say that adaptation is the most reliable method of survival, rather than
changing the world for all the other species that have managed to adapt.
President Obama needs to understand both Lincoln and Darwin in deciding what to
do if EFCA lands on his desk. The president of the SEIU has made it clear that
he believes his union got Obama elected, and the President “owes him.” He will be under a lot of pressure to sign whatever Congress passes. Any chance
he has of modifying the EFCA comes during the legislative phase. He needs to
convince his party, like Lincoln, that there are better ways of dealing with
the problem of union decline, assuming it is a problem in the first place.
It is almost time for me to give my presentation on EFCA. If the law changes by
passage of EFCA, employers may have to spend a great deal of time educating its
supervisors and employees on the pitfalls of unionization. Employers will need
to “adapt” if they are to survive. Darwin would have understood that, as would Lincoln.
So, maybe this is a good way to celebrate their dual birthdays.
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