The 40th annual convention of the American Legislative Exchange Council, known as ALEC, began Wednesday at the Palmer House Hotel in downtown Chicago (keynote speaker: former Gov Jeb Bush of Florida), but a day earlier, 40 union members, community activists, and people who want to protect the environment showed up to protest the group’s corporate-based agenda, including the privatization of public schools, The Nation reports. Some protesters were even arrested.
CHICAGO (Aug. 6)—Demonstrators at the 40th ALEC convention in Chicago (Flickr/Mikasi)
ALEC is now known to back a predominantly right-wing agenda—for example, the group has pushed laws similar to Florida’s Stand Your Ground law, which helped free George Zimmerman even after he admitted killing unarmed Trayvon Martin, in several states. Other laws pushed by the group would repeal the minimum wage, make collective bargaining by unions illegal, and institute other labor laws that favor corporation shareholders.
Although our emphasis is on education, charter school laws and other corporate reform efforts don’t really occupy a lot of ALEC’s time, since the organization’s work in promoting a business-friendly agenda will have a much stronger effect on its corporate members’ bottom lines. Many of their bills simply die, but the group has a history of great persistence, leading to passage, in at least some states, of its legislation.
At this moment, the watchdog ALEC Exposed has documented at least 177 bills modeled after samples written by ALEC in state legislatures around the country. One bill introduced in Maryland, the Right-to-Work law (HB 318) was given an “unfavorable report” by the Economic Matters committee and its progress halted back in February. This bill is typical of those proposed by ALEC.
The federal Taft-Hartley Act of 1947 banned the employment practice known as “closed shops.” Before the act, owners and managers of “closed shops” had agreed to hire only the members of a particular union. But while the act banned “closed” shops, it allowed “union shops,” which are places of employment that require employees to join a union within a certain number of days after being hired. This Maryland legislation, had it become law, would have banned union shops as well.
Right-to-work laws like Maryland’s halted HB 318 are on the books in 24 states: Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Michigan, Mississippi, Nebraska, Nevada, North Carolina, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia, and Wyoming. In these states, employees cannot be forced to join a union, but in the other states, they can. Not being able to force employees to join a union makes unions weaker, in general, and that is the heart of ALEC’s agenda.
One bill in Illinois, known as HB 182, would have changed the Open Meetings laws, making it illegal not to release the minutes from union bargaining sessions to the public. That is, ALEC wanted to change Illinois’s sunshine laws to make it so minutes of negotiating sessions had to be revealed to the public.
The bill, which doesn’t appear to be moving in Illinois, since it was re-referred to the House Rules Committee in March after first-year Rep Jeanne M Ives, Republican of Wheaton, introduced it in January, is based on ALEC’s model sunshine law legislation. The re-referral to the Rules Committee under Rule 19(a), in Illinois General Assembly parlance, means the deadline for passing the bill came and went or the legislative session simply ended. The bill has been cleared off the calendar for now, but it may be kicked out by the Rules Committee, reintroduced next session, or sent to a special session. The latter choice is not likely in this case.
Ms Ives is a graduate of West Point Military Academy and has an admirable military record, having served as a platoon leader in the US Army and as the headquarters detachment commander for transportation units in Germany. She now serves on the Appropriations Committee for Elementary and Secondary Education, the International Trade and Commerce Committee, the Labor and Commerce Committee, and the Biotechnology Committee.
A very funny video has been published by the Center for Media and Democracy, comparing the usual way of getting a bill passed to the way they say ALEC gets a bill passed into law, here.