Executive Session
Floor Speech
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Mr. DURBIN. Mr. President, if you take a look at the history of this great Nation, at least in my lifetime, you cannot miss what happened to America immediately after World War II. Veterans came back from that war, thousands of them, and they were greeted with the GI bill, which opened the door for them to buy homes, start businesses, start an education, and find good jobs.
It may have been one of the most amazing, progressive, positive things we have ever done in our Nation's history: to take a war effort and bring it home to create an economic effort in America. Businesses were springing up in every direction. Workers were finding jobs and building homes. It was a wonderful time in our Nation's history.
Parallel to that GI bill and economic development was the rise of unionism in America. More and more workers were able to go into their workplace and bargain collectively for the basics that people need: safety in the workplace, a living wage. So if you work 40 hours a week, you can make enough money to take care of yourself and raise a family, retirement benefits, health care benefits. These all came about at that same period of time after World War II. The rise of the American economy, with the returning veterans, and the rise in the number of people who were belonging to labor unions, in parallel, brought the middle class into reality in America.
It was a positive force across our Nation. I know a little bit about it with my own personal family experience. My mother, my father, my two brothers, and I worked for a railroad in east St. Louis, IL. Dad was a labor organizer. He was not a high-ranking official, but he was a proud member of the Brotherhood of Railway Clerks; mom the same. I worked various times in summer jobs at that same railroad. I knew I was going to get not a lavish salary but a decent salary for my work and have good conditions because that union had sat down and bargained so I would be recognized as an employee and protected in terms of the work I did. It made sure I was fairly paid.
The same thing was true of many other families, union families, all across America. My mom and dad made it to the 8th grade. They sent their boys on to high school and to college and I managed to finish law school. It was the American dream, and American unions played a big role in realizing that dream.
Now what has happened? Fewer and fewer Americans belong to labor unions. Fewer and fewer Americans are able to bargain collectively for decent wages and working conditions and the basic benefits we would expect. What did we see happening across America as a result of that trend? A growing disparity in terms of the wages earned by working people and the amount of money being paid to those who were the officers of corporations. That disparity has reached shocking, if not disgraceful, levels, where people who are at the highest rungs of corporate America are drawing salaries and bonuses dramatically higher than the people who work for them, who actually are productive and doing a good day's work.
Many of us believe there is an imbalance here. It is an imbalance that has been created deliberately over the years. As business interests have had more power in Washington, they have made it increasingly difficult for workers to exercise their rights in their workplaces to organize and speak for themselves. The agency that is supposed to be the referee in this battle is the National Labor Relations Board. They look for unfair practices by either the workers attempting to organize or the business which is being organized. They basically stand by a principle which we all respect; that is, if a majority of the workers want to bargain collectively, they should have the right to do that, to organize in a union, if they wish it.
But we know what happens. When organizers come to many businesses--not all of them but many of them--and try to speak to the employees and tell them: Here is what we can offer for you if you will join our union, if you will join with your other coworkers in bargaining together, many times they are not only shunned, they are sent away. If they are fortunate enough to come up with a majority of workers who want to move toward unionizing, they find themselves facing legal battles, one after the other, going on for literally years, until you literally wear out the people who are trying to organize that plant.
Complicit in that many times has been the National Labor Relations Board. Without effective and forceful enforcement of the laws that exist, without a sense of urgency in decisionmaking, this agency has allowed so many workers in America to fall by the wayside and not have a chance to stand for themselves. Occasionally, it reaches outrageous levels. We saw that in the case of Lilly Ledbetter, a person who was in a management position, incidentally, at a tire manufacturer down in Alabama. She was being discriminated against in the workplace. The laws could not protect her--at least they did not protect her--and she took her case to court. The Supreme Court of the United States threw her case out, even though she clearly had been discriminated against. We had to change the law in America because discrimination does take place in the workplace and because we say in this country people should be treated fairly.
Now the unions come to us and say: We want to change the way we organize the workplace. They put together the Employee Free Choice Act. That is their term for the legislation that has been offered. It offers a new alternative to gauging whether a majority truly wants to organize a workplace. That bill has been considered in the other body. It has not been called in this body, and it is unlikely it will ever be called or passed in its original form. But many of us realize it is only fair to make some changes in the way these workplaces are organized, so if a majority of workers truly do want to organize, they have that right, they are not harassed and intimidated, threatened and fired because they are exercising their right under the law to consider belonging to a union or voting in favor of belonging to a union.
Part of this whole discussion relates to the National Labor Relations Board. Before the Senate today is the nomination of Craig Becker from the State of Illinois to be a member of the National Labor Relations Board. You have just heard Senator McCain come and talk about Mr. Becker's activities. Senator McCain is my friend. He and I see America and perhaps the world in slightly different perspectives from time to time, and we certainly do in this case.
The Senator from Arizona was critical of Mr. Becker, saying, well, he was an active organizer for the Service Employees International Union. That is a fact. The fact is, he worked for them in an effort to try to organize workplaces, and in many respects he was successful. That was his job. It was nothing illegal. It was an honorable, legal effort on his part to give voice to employees who otherwise did not have one. Some of the service employee unions, incidentally, represent people with very modest jobs, people who may be doing custodial work or basic maintenance work or who are overlooked in many organizing efforts. So Mr. Becker was fighting for them. He was fighting to give folks who otherwise would not have a chance at least a voice, if not a fighting chance, to be treated with some dignity in the workplace.
Right now, we know what the facts are when it comes to the National Labor Relations Board. If you are in the process of organizing a workplace, and there is a violation of the law, the National Labor Relations Board will take 2 years before they make a decision on a violation of the labor laws--2 years. Well, things change in 2 years, and the owners of businesses know that. So making a violation and waiting 2 years buys them the time to try to change the sentiment in the workplace. It takes 1 year from actually having an organizing petition that is signed before the National Labor Relations Board makes its decision.
Craig Becker knows that. He comes before us because we believe and the President believes he would be a good person on the National Labor Relations Board. It is hard to look at his background and say he is not qualified. He clearly is qualified.
We know the National Labor Relations Board administers the primary law governing labor relations in the private sector. It normally has five Members. It currently has only two sitting members, and it is often deadlocked on issues. It has led to many legal questions being raised about the validity of the Board's decisions.
Craig Becker is an accomplished lawyer and academic. As associate general counsel for the Service Employees International Union, Craig Becker worked to protect the rights of workers to organize. He has argued labor and employment law cases at most levels of the Federal court system, including in the Supreme Court of the United States. Is there anyone who questions this man is qualified for this job? He taught labor law at UCLA, the University of Chicago, and Georgetown University. His research and academic work is well respected and cited by many others in the field.
He was first nominated to fill one of the three openings at the NLRB in July 2009. He was renominated by President Obama just last month. Both last year and last month, the HELP Committee--which is chaired by my friend, Senator Tom Harkin of Iowa, who will be on the floor with the ranking minority member, Senator Enzi--approved his nomination. Since he was nominated, Mr. Becker has responded to over 300 written questions from Republican Senators--more than nearly any other nominee. I do not know how many questions are asked of Supreme Court nominees, but when you ask 300 questions, it is pretty clear it goes beyond needing some information. The idea is to try to trip up the nominee or ask so many questions you will wear them out. He has met personally with every interested Senator who has wanted to ask him his own personal views. He has addressed the concerns of Senators in congressional hearings--only the second time an NLRB nominee, incidentally, had a second hearing in the last 25 years.
Throughout this process, Mr. Becker has stated his belief that Congress creates labor laws, not the NLRB. I guess there is a parallel to this whole argument about judicial activism, where the argument is being made on the Republican side that if Mr. Becker is brought to the National Labor Relations Board, he is going to make the law. He said, clearly, he will not, his job is to basically interpret the law as written and to implement the law as Congress has passed it. He said, repeatedly, if confirmed, he will apply the law fairly and impartially.
Confirming Craig Becker will allow the NLRB to move forward with its congressionally mandated duties, and I am certainly going to support his confirmation.
I struggle when I hear my Republican colleagues say: Well, it is not fair. When a Democrat is elected President, he might appoint someone to the National Labor Relations Board who is more friendly to the labor unions than a Republican appointee. Is that a stunning revelation to anyone? What we are looking for are honest people who have no prejudice against either side and who will try to make the system work and make the National Labor Relations Board work.
When I look at some of the statistics about what is going on--the number of contested decisions issued by the National Labor Relations Board, on a 4-year average, is 426; and the time it takes them, the processing time from charge to Board decision is 782 days, more than 2 years--it tells me they have broken down in terms of their basic responsibility under the law.
If we keep it at two members, and people can question the validity of any of their decisions, then those who want to make sure the National Labor Relations Board is not an effective working force in our government may have their way. I hope they do not. I certainly hope we will reach a point where we will approve this man who has stood before the HELP Committee and this Senate on two separate occasions, answering all the questions that have been offered. He comes with solid credentials, in terms of his legal knowledge as well as his life experience. He is a person who I know has worked hard to help those less fortunate who are looking for a chance for a living wage and decent working conditions.
Are we going to say anyone who comes to the National Labor Relations Board who has worked for a labor union is disqualified? Is that the position being taken by some? I hope not. That is fundamentally unfair. It is akin to saying anyone who owned a business could not be a member of the National Labor Relations Board. I would not agree with that.
I think we need fairness and balance and impartiality. I think Craig Becker will bring that. So I hope my colleagues will join me in supporting his nomination.
I yield the floor.
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