Wedged between Tuesday’s intrigue in the health-care debate and the spectacle of a Supreme Court confirmation hearing, striker-replacement legislation long sought by organized labor all but expired in the Senate.
A bill that would bar employers from permanently replacing workers who strike seeking economic benefits failed a key procedural test, despite an seemingly ample Democratic majority in the Senate and a Democratic president who vowed to sign the “Workplace Fairness Act.”
On a 53-47 vote Democrats came up seven votes short of the 60 required to end a Republican filibuster and move the bill to the floor. Six Democrats defected.
The bill now appears doomed for this year.
That vote raised a flurry of questions about the power of organized labor in the Democratic Party, questions similar to those raised in last year’s fight over the North American Free Trade Agreement, which labor opposed and the White House supported.
In defeat, voices in organized labor played down the linkage between the votes and the Clinton administration’s role in both of them.
“Striker replacement is an issue that’s been around, and the positions are well-established and dug in,” said Thomas Donahue, secretary-treasurer of the AFL-CIO. “These are hard votes to move.”
Donahue generally gave the Clinton administration passing grades for lobbying senators to support the bill.
But some voices in the labor community and Democratic Party questioned the administration’s commitment, particularly in light of the intense lobbying effort put forth by the White House last year for NAFTA, which organized labor opposed.
“There’s a big difference between making a few phone calls and putting in the kind of aggressive lobbying that was really needed in order for this (striker replacement) to pass,” said Gaye Williams, a Teamsters spokeswoman.
“Labor was looking for the effort from the White House, and it’s just not there,” a senior Democratic Party official said earlier this week.
Other Democrats suggested the fate of the striker-replacement bill had little to do with the effectiveness of White House arm-twisting. They argue that it reflected the diminished influence of organized labor on Democratic politics and changing demographics, including population shifts toward traditionally non-union suburbia in the South and Sun Belt.
“Nobody’s particularly afraid of these (union) guys anymore,” said one Democratic staffer on a Senate committee. “We haven’t seen anybody pay a price for backing NAFTA, have we?”
On Tuesday, six Southern Democrats joined 41 Republicans in defeating the cloture motion.
Notably, Sen. Sam Nunn of Georgia reversed his earlier support of the bill, and Harlan Mathews of Tennessee, who was appointed to fill the seat of Vice President Al Gore and is retiring this year, also voted against the legislation as did Dale Bumpers and David Pryor, Democratic senators from Clinton’s home state of Arkansas.
Three Republicans-Sens. Alfonse D’Amato of New York, Mark Hatfield of Oregon and Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania-voted with the majority of the Democrats.
Patrick Griffin, the administration’s congressional liaison, insisted the White House had been “energetic” in boosting the legislation.
“The president worked very hard,” Griffin said Tuesday. “I don’t know what else he could have done.”
However, Sen. Howard Metzenbaum (D-Ohio), who sponsored the bill, was cryptic in his assessment of the White House effort.
“I am told phone calls have been made,” Metzenbaum said. “Of course, I wouldn’t hear about them myself.”
Last winter, Clinton basked in praise from Republicans and conservative Democrats for his Herculean efforts in getting the trade agreement through Congress.
Through personal contact and the generous disposition of federal dollars, Clinton cobbled together a GOP-dominated majority in both houses of Congress, finding just enough Democrats to obtain passage.
