EFCA WITHOUT CARD CHECK?…. In recent weeks, the prospects for passing the Employee Free Choice Act have faded considerably. The measure enjoys the support of a Senate majority, but to overcome a filibuster, proponents have looked for 60 votes and come up short. Arlen Specter’s decision to oppose the measure, despite having supported it in the past, likely sealed EFCA’s fate.
But there’s renewed hope that something similar to EFCA might still have a shot, and a renewed push for a compromise measure is generating some attention in the Senate.
The controversial “card check” provision in the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA) may be dropped in a compromise, one of the bill’s Democratic sponsors in the Senate said Monday.
“Compromises are going to be made,” Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) told Bloomberg News. “It [the bill] probably won’t be card-check because too many people are opposed to it now.”
The legislation, prized by organized labor groups, has faltered in recent months after Democratic Sens. Arlen Specter (Pa.) and Blanche Lincoln (Ark.) announced they wouldn’t support it. Labor groups have hoped they might sway Specter, who switched parties to run for reelection as a Democrat in Pennsylvania.
Harkin hoped a compromise might win “the grudging support of labor and maybe the grudging support of some businesses,” according to Finance and Commerce.
What would an EFCA-like bill look like without card check? As regular readers know, in the January issue of the Washington Monthly, T.A. Frank sketched out how and why this could work.
