January 19, 2014
George Will took a strong stand against freedom of contract in his column today. Usually freedom of contract is viewed as a pillar of a market economy, but Will apparently objects to this freedom when used by workers.
The specific context is the issue of whether public sector workers can sign a contract that requires all the workers who receive the benefit of union representation to share in the cost of this representation. Under the law, if a union represents a bargaining unit, then it must represent every worker in the unit, regardless of whether the worker supports the union or not. This means that the union not only secures the same wages and benefits for all workers in the unit, it also must represent all workers in any grievance or disciplinary action taken by the employer, even if a specific worker does not support the union.
Since the law requires unions to represent all workers, they have often sought contracts that require all the workers in a bargaining unit to pay a fee to cover the cost of this representation, even though they still have the option not to join the union. It is this contract requirement that draws Will’s ire, claiming that it violates the first amendment rights of workers who do not support the union.
It is worth putting Will’s complaint here in a larger context. If a worker is employed by Koch Industries, Will would certainly argue that the Koch brothers could take the gains from their stock in the company and use it for supporting right-wing political candidates or whatever purpose they want. He would even argue that the company could directly spend its profits on supporting right-wing candidates, as allowed under the Citizens United Supreme Court ruling. In fact, he would say that Koch could require the worker to attend a right-wing rally and yell support for their causes as a condition of employment.
Will would say that none of these actions by the Koch brothers violate first amendment rights because the worker has the option not to work for Koch Industries. For some bizarre reason he is unwilling to apply the same logic in the context of contractual obligations put in place by fellow employees.
In others words, Will is fine with any conditions that employers want to impose as a condition of employment, but somehow sees it as a first amendment violation if co-workers sign a contract that imposes conditions of employment. This is denying workers the right to freedom of contract.
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