Washington Post: Labor in Fighting Trim

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/09/02/AR2007090200955.html

By E. J. Dionne Jr.
Monday, September 3, 2007; Page A15

The American labor movement is divided on which candidate to support for president. Its membership is at one of its low ebbs in our history. And yet the nation's unions are more politically influential today than they were in the movement's heyday in the 1950s.

Organized labor's clout is reflected in a Democratic presidential race in which every candidate is seeking labor's blessing. No Democrat is criticizing unions as "a special interest," a common line of attack from moderate and neoliberal Democrats in the 1980s.

Having played a major role in the Democrats' 2006 victory, labor has real influence in the new Congress. In the vote earlier this year on labor's central legislative demand -- changing federal law to allow for a "card check" system to make it easier for unions to organize -- only two House Democrats split from the union cause.

The 2006 results also put to rest anxieties that the defection of seven unions from the AFL-CIO to form the new Change to Win federation would weaken labor's effectiveness on Election Day.

Labor's political gains have occurred in the face of a steady decline in its private-sector role. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 24 percent of the American work force was unionized in 1973 and unionization rates were roughly equal in the public and private sectors. The latest figures, for 2006, show a decline in unionization to 12 percent of the workforce and a radical shift in labor's composition: Now only 7 percent of private-sector workers belong to unions, compared with 36 percent in the public sector.

The shift in labor's base and the overall drop in membership may be central to both the growing political sophistication and influence of the unions. The public-sector unions, with an obvious interest in the outcome of elections, have developed highly effective political operations. This is true of the teachers and nurses, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), the police and firefighters, and the Service Employees International Union (SEIU).

FULL story at link.