Ronald Trowbridge has an excellent op-ed in Saturday's Houston Chronicle about the corrosive effects on forced unionism in the workplace.

Some years ago, I crossed a faculty picket line at a large university — the only faculty member out of several hundred professors to cross. Every fiber in my body opposed the strike, and I was pathologically unable to not cross. The nightmare that followed was the most stressful experience in my life, save for the cancer and death of my wife.

What happened?

As for my professorial friends, Frank screamed to me down the pathway filled with students, "You a******!" Walter said he was going to take a picture of my crossing the line and show it to people, hoping that I would get hurt.

Donald said to me in the crowded faculty lunchroom, "There's Trowbridge. No, he's not a scab; he's an oozing, running sore." Laughter erupted. Sheila called me a "scab," with a scowling, mean face. She really meant it.

Jay, my telephone mate and one I had taken in as a guest at my summer cottage, was so red-faced with anger at me that he yelled, "That's it, Trowbridge, I am never again going to answer your telephone!"

All this over an illegal strike. But for forced unionism proponents, what's legal, or just, or fair is irrelevant. It's all about some mindless, don't-question-your-peers sense of "solidarity."

And as Trowbridge warns, the so-called Employee Free Choice Act (a.k.a. the Card Check Forced Unionism Bill) will further increase workplace hostility by pitting union partisans against their co-workers by eliminating the protection of the secret ballot and incentivizing intimidation against workers by union goons.

A recent ruling by a National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) administrative law judge upheld the right of employees to sign a union decertification petition in the midst of a debilitating strike. More importantly, the ruling also endorsed the employer's refusal to hand over non-striking workers' home addresses and other personal information to union officials bent on harassment and intimidation.

On the advice of Foundation staff attorneys, a substantial majority (77 percent) of non-striking employees at a Tenneco facility in Grass Lakes, Michigan signed a petition in favor of union decertification. Unwilling to relinquish their stranglehold on workplace representation, United Auto Workers (UAW) Local 660 officials filed a complaint with the NLRB, arguing that non-striking employees favored decertification only because of Tenneco's unfair labor practices. The NLRB judge rejected these claims and concluded that the UAW's objections to the decertification process were entirely without merit.

More significant, however, was the stern rebuke delivered to UAW officials for demanding Tenneco hand over the non-striking workers' personal contact information, including home addresses. Union officials claimed they needed the employees' home addresses to "communicate" the benefits of membership directly, but the judge decided that the threat of union intimidation justified Tenneco's decision to withold personal information from UAW militants.

The judge noted that the union's rationale for acquiring the employees' home addresses was suspect, as " . . . the Union had other viable means of communicating with the replacements short of having access to their homes." He also recognized that union operatives had exhibited a pattern of harassment, having previously " . . . traveled to the personal residence of two members, whose address they certainly had access to, and staged a protest of their stance on the strike." The judge further noted the UAW's "venomous" and "disrespectful" attitude towards non-striking workers. So much for fair representation.

Full text of the NLRB ruling is available here. It's a long decision, but you'll find the judge's response to union demands for employees' personal information on pages 62-65. His assesment of the decertification petition's legality is available on pages 74-79.

Strike-related violence is an under-reported aspect of compulsory unionization, and the UAW has a long history of harassment and abuse. In fact, Freedom@Work recently exposed a similar campaign of intimidation against non-striking workers at a Volvo auto plant in Pulaski County, Virginia.

That's what one person commented on YouTube about our latest video. Though sad, the sentiment is indicative of the mind set that led to such hostility against the employees in the video that simply exercised their Right to Work.

Unfortunately, history shows that it gets even worse.

A new buzz word paid union operatives throw around when they decide to strike against a facility they have absolutely nothing to do with is that they're simply holding an "informational" picket. As in this instance in Tennessee, union officials hold such pickets for pretty much any reason under the sun, but usually for simply being non-union.

This, no doubt, leaves employees forced to foot the bill for this activity scratching their heads. Why are they forced to pay the salaries of paid union professionals to picket facilities that they don't even work at?

Here's some recent "informational picketing" out of Albany, New York:

Following up on last week's post, Stan Greer of the National Institute for Labor Relations Research spoke out last week against a recent executive order in Colorado extending union monopoly bargaining over state employees. (NRTW Foundation Vice President and Legal Director Raymond J. LaJeunesse, Jr. spoke at the event.)

According to an article in the Denver Business Journal:

Greer also said that even if legislators approve a law prohibiting
government workers from striking -- and Ritter signs it -- 48 percent
of public sector strikes are technically illegal, meaning that
legislation is not an effective deterrent against strikes.

"By all economic measures, Colorado would be better off without
forced dues and fees and everyone would be better off with right to
work laws."

How true- if strike prohibitions work, how did union officials shut down New York City just before Christmas in 2005" They didn't seem to mind the illegality of that strike. The imposition of forced union dues has also prompted state employees in Washington and Maine to fight back.

Following up with Justin’s post on an ugly Teamsters picket in Somerville, Massachusetts, today’s news stories report that 10 Teamsters thugs were arrested during the mess.

The Somerville News has the story:

10 Teamsters were arrested “for rude, offensive and threatening conduct,” according to police.

The owner of Russell Disposal, Charles Carneglia, explained that he feared for his safety after Teamsters militants harassed him when he entered the facility:

…when Carneglia walked to front gate the Teamsters would begin taunting and catcalling him. “Ya piece of s**t,” yelled one picketer Thursday afternoon. “You’re a criminal.”

After the incident last week, Local 25 chief Sean O’Brien was apparently “too busy” to address repeated press inquires. Unable to answer for the Teamsters union notorious and thuggish actions, it’s no wonder this union boss went into hiding.

Labor union officials enjoy many extraordinary powers and immunities created by legislatures and the courts, including the powers to shake down workers for forced dues payments and even to wage campaigns of violent retaliation against nonunion employees.

Sadly, union violence is protected by judicial decree under the federal Hobbs Act. Meanwhile, many states similarly restrict the authority of law enforcement to enforce laws during strikes. As a result, thousands of incidents of violent assaults by union militants have gone unpunished.

A prime example today -- the Indianapolis Business Journal chronicled union violence directed at nonunion workers a Hilton construction site:

“Pickets…slashed 14 tires, cut a telephone line to a trailer and put glue in locks late last week…. The superintendent, Kim Lackey, also said the union-based picket line hurled racial and sexual slurs at the construction workers, many of whom were minorities and women.”

But despite this thuggery and property destruction, law enforcement was AWOL:

“...if violence occurred on the picket line, police should have made arrests.”

Union officials enjoy numerous exemptions and special privileges – and workers pay a high price which sometimes includes their lives. To read the full list of Big Labor’s Top Ten Special Privileges, click here.

Laborers International Union of North America (LIUNA) Local 91 is no stranger when it comes to using threats, coercion and intimidation on the picket line.

But despite court appearances, federal investigations and even beatings throughout the 1990s, Local 91 union officials have brought out their newest scare-tactic weapon…a 10-ft inflatable rat, paid for in full with $4,000 of union dues, much of which is taken from workers as a condition of employment.

(Photo by Charles Lewis/Buffalo News)

The rat, union officials claim, is a peaceful message to workers who choose not to toe the union line.

According to The Buffalo News, most agree that the giant rat planted outside a Holiday Inn at a Niagara Falls construction site is a not-so-subtle sign of some of this LIUNA Local’s violent past. The giant rat is inflated for about four hours every morning, and during that time, Local 91 picketers intimidate truck drivers entering the site.

In fact, one Local 91 operative, Michael Godzisz, even tried to justify the intimidation:

The picketing laborers also stop construction vehicles as they enter the site but do so for only three of five minutes at a time, he said.

And the union local’s business manager supported the bullying tactic:

“We can’t hold them up, and if we keep walking they can’t run us over,” said Rob Connolly, Local 91’s business manager. “After about five minutes, we let them go out of courtesy.” [Emphasis added]

Despite LIUNA Local 91’s claim to reform and anger management control, the use of the giant rat is just another type of terror used to intimidate those employees who refuse to walk off the job. In fact, other locals have used the rat trap up and down the east coast.

But giving truckers a “courtesy” to get through the picket line leaves you questioning: what exactly happens after the five minute window is up"

As more details emerge about the proposed deal between GM and the UAW hierarchy, which involves a two-tiered wage structure, this sentence jumped off the page:

In a side-letter to the contract, GM and the UAW also identified 3,126 jobs now outsourced to non-union companies that could be transferred to UAW-represented companies at the lower wage rates.

In other words, UAW officials are willing to sell out these employees on wages so long as they can count them within UAW ranks, and force employees in non-Right to Work states to pay dues or be fired. Some deal.

Pennsylvania Turnpike employees should watch the Teamsters union-Turnpike Commission talks closely as another union-ordered statewide strike looms.

Why" Past experience shows that Teamster union bosses tried to block Turnpike employees from exercising their constitutional rights to refrain from formal union membership and cut off compulsory dues unrelated to monopoly bargaining.

In recent months, the National Right to Work Foundation helped 28 Pennsylvania Turnpike employees file separate federal civil rights lawsuits against Teamsters union locals 77 and 250, the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission, and two Turnpike Commission officers for illegally seizing union dues from the employees’ paychecks.

The breakthrough came for the Turnpike employees when a federal judge ruled that Local 77’s union policy prohibiting employees from resigning from membership (so-called "maintenance of membership" clauses) likely violates First Amendment.

The federal judge enjoined the Teamsters union locals and the PTC from seizing the forced dues from the employees’ paychecks. But most importantly, the judge found that union officials’ actions demonstrated a “real or immediate danger to their First Amendment rights.”

Union officials commonly use the "maintenance of membership" clauses to trap workers in union ranks. And you can bet that as Teamsters union officials sit at the table with PTC officials, they’ll be pushing for this clause to stay so that union bosses can thwart any employee effort to reclaim forced dues.