Union democracy goes on trial

[IndianaGreen]

Union democracy goes on trial

Carl Finamore, a delegate to the San Francisco Labor Council, reports on SEIU's legal effort to bury an upstart health care workers union.

March 24, 2010

GOING TO court can make anyone nervous. But in civil court, where breach of contract disputes are normally settled, the stakes are not quite as high as in criminal court. You can't be thrown in jail. That's a plus.

Still, there are disadvantages for defendants in civil cases. There are no public defenders, so all expenses are borne by the accused. While the outcome of any legal proceeding is uncertain, civil court defendants are acutely aware from the very beginning that they are stuck with the costs of litigation.

I thought about this as I prepared to attend the opening of a civil trial on March 22 in San Francisco federal court, where one of the oldest and largest unions in America is suing individual leaders of one of the nation's youngest unions.

The 1.8 million-member Service Employees International Union (SEIU) has already spent, according to critics, an estimated $10 million to sue 26 individuals who are former officers, organizers and staffers of what was once SEIU's third largest chapter, the California-based United Healthcare Workers West (UHW).

The trial comes one year after SEIU officials from Washington, D.C., seized control of UHW in what's widely understood as a political coup. For several years, the 150,000-member UHW had been voicing criticism of SEIU's top-down style of leadership that was increasingly stripping members of their democratic rights and undermining workers' wages and benefits.

http://socialistworker.org/2010/03/24/union-democracy-on-trial