Collective Conscious

Benen:

On Thurs­day, the newly-​​elected Repub­li­can gov­er­nor said he would refuse to nego­ti­ate with unions, and on Fri­day, Walker said he’s con­tacted the Wis­con­sin National Guard, mak­ing sure they’re pre­pared to respond to a pro­tracted labor dis­pute, doing some of the jobs union mem­bers cur­rently do.

Even by GOP stan­dards, the scope of Walker’s union-​​busting efforts is strik­ing. We’re talk­ing about a gov­er­nor effec­tively strip­ping nearly all gov­ern­ment work­ers of their col­lec­tive bar­gain­ing rights, and then try­ing to break the backs of unions themselves.

This is security-​​statism at its finest: using the mil­i­tary to replace civil­ian employ­ees in order to dimin­ish the bar­gain­ing power of the work­ing class. Pres­i­dent Rea­gan invented the tac­tic in 1981 to crip­ple the labor move­ment dur­ing the infa­mous air traf­fic con­trollers’ strike:

Aug. 5, 1981: Most strik­ing air-​​traffic con­trollers are fired. Rea­gan bans them from ever being rehired by the FAA. They are ini­tially replaced by con­trollers, super­vi­sors and staff per­son­nel not par­tic­i­pat­ing in the strike and in some cases, by mil­i­tary controllers.

In both cases the employ­ment of mil­i­tary force to under­mine the legit­i­mate bar­gain­ing power of labor unions is a gross vio­la­tion of work­ers’ rights. It dis­plays the will­ing­ness of the security-​​statist right to deploy force as a means to deprive work­ing civil­ians of their fair share.