THE CHANGING OF THE GUARD - REPUBLICANS TAKE ON LABOR AND THE USE OF MANDATORY DUES OR FEES FOR POLITICAL PURPOSES

The union practice of using mandatory member dues and non-member Sees for political purposes lies at the intersection of campaign finance re form and traditional labor law. In this Essay, Representative Joe Knol lenberg describes the Supreme Court's approach to the practice in Comm unications workers of America v. Beck and the Republican efforts in Co ngress since 1994 to strengthen this decision. He advocates the enactm ent of the Worker Paycheck Fairness Act or comparable legislation empo wering union members and non-members to decide individually if their d ues or fees can be used by the union for political or other purposes n ot germane to collective bargaining.