►  In today's Yakima H-R -- Hospital workers begin picketing -- Employees of Yakima Regional Medical and Cardiac Center conduct informational picketing in an effort to make their case with the public and the hospital for a new contract. About 350 technical, service and maintenance workers (SEIU 1199NW) have been working without a contract since October.

►  In today's Olympian -- Downtown, west Olympia post offices may consolidate -- The U.S. Postal Service is looking at merging the offices' operations in a cost-cutting move.

National news:  

►  Today from AP -- Nearly 5 million are getting unemployment benefits -- The number of laid-off workers receiving benefits has jumped to an all-time high while new jobless claims remain well above 600,000. Both figures were worse than expected and new projections from the Federal Reserve show unemployment rising for the rest of this year.

►  At AFL-CIO Now -- 14,000 insured Americans losing health coverage every day -- Nearly 100,000 a week lost their health insurance during December and January according to a forthcoming analysis. 

►  From AP -- Nurses' unions to combine -- The California Nurses Association, representing 75,000 registered nurses in five states, is joining with two other nurses unions to create a 150,000-member advocacy association. It is more of an amalgamation than a merger, because the three unions will maintain their identities, but the new group is intended to give union-represented nurses a national voice and more organizing strength.

►  From AP -- UAW agrees to cuts in overtime, bonuses, raises -- The deal with Detroit's three automakers limits overtime, changes work rules, cuts lump-sum cash bonuses and gets rid of cost-of-living pay raises to help reduce the companies' labor costs, say sources.

►  In today's Spokesman-review -- Social Security requires no fixin' (Froma Harrop column) -- The CBO says it can pay all scheduled benefits into 2049. Sure, you want every entitlement to be funded into the next millennium, but 40 years of solvency sounds pretty darn good these days.

In response, the Washington State Labor Council has prepared a legal analysis which, "with all due respect," finds Mr. Even’s informal opinion to be "flawed and incorrect for several reasons."  

The Worker Privacy Act would allow workers in Washington state to choose whether or not to participate in employer communication on issues of individual conscience, including politics, religion, charitable giving, and unionization. Read more about it here, but at its heart the bill says that just because someone is your employee doesn’t mean you can force them, against their will and under threat of punishment or firing, to listen to you browbeat them on private personal matters. No one should be forced to check their right to privacy or their First Amendment rights at their employer's door.

For those of you with normal attention spans, the long and the short of the dueling analyses, is that Mr. Even says the legislation "would prohibit employers from communicating with employees concerning 'labor or other mutual aid organizations'." The WSLC analysis counters that the Worker Privacy Act "contains no ban on employer speech either directly through its provisions or indirectly through its enforcement scheme... It is the act of discharging or disciplining or threatening to do so—not employer speech—which is banned."

In other words, if employers want to tell their workers how to vote, where to worship, who should get their charitable contributions, and yes, whether they should support unionization, they can still do so under the Worker Privacy Act. They just can’t force their employees -– under threat of losing their family’s livelihoods -– to sit there and listen by mandating their attendance at such meetings.

It should surprise no one that the office of this particular attorney general, a Republican with very close ties to the business lobbying groups that oppose the Worker Privacy Act, should come up with an informal opinion that agrees with those groups' objections. It's even less of a surprise that the aspect of the Worker Privacy Act that Rob McKenna's office targets is the one regarding workers' right to privacy on whether they want to unionize. 

McKenna has some personal experience in that area, having aggressively opposed unionization of non-attorney support staff in his office's Consumer Protection and Labor and Industries divisions. The Washington Federation of State Employees reported that McKenna's "long and very vigorous opposition... shows an anti-worker sentiment and an anti-union attitude."

Are we suggesting that partisan and ideological forces (gasp) might be behind the "informal opinion" dated Tuesday, unveiled Tuesday by the Association of Washington Business and distributed Tuesday by Republican legislative staff?  

Um... yes.

If Washington had a Democratic attorney general who was more sympathetic to the rights of working people he would have a different opinion.

Like Attorney General Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut, who told the state Judiciary Committee on March 14, 2007, " I have reviewed the case law regarding preemption of state laws by the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA)... Since state laws are presumed to be constitutional, and no cases specifically preempt captive audience state laws, the General Assembly should not withhold approval of this proposed legislation because of preemption concerns...I will vigorously defend the law against any challenge based on federal preemption."

Fred Feinstein knows a little something about this, having served as General Counsel of the National Labor Relations Board from 1994 to 1999. He says, "I believe a state is not preempted from providing protection to employees who choose not to listen to an employer's views on unionization," Feinstein said.

"Protecting employees from being compelled to listen to political speech, including views about unionization, falls within the language of Garmon that permits state regulation of activity touching upon 'deeply rooted local concerns.' In my view a court asked to consider the question would hold that the legislation is not preempted."

So what we have here is, literally, a difference of opinion. One opinion sides with the privacy and free-speech rights of workers, and the other aims to protect employers' ability to force -- not communicate, but FORCE -- their opinions regarding matters of individual conscience upon their employees under threat of discipline or firing.

The Washington State Labor Council continues to urge legislators to support and advance the Worker Privacy Act. And so should you. Click here to do so.