Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, May 18, 1994 TAG: 9405180083
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: B8 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: Medium
The Workplace Fairness Act, at the top of organized labor's legislative agenda, is facing a threatened filibuster in the Senate.
``It's time for members of the United States Senate to answer a simple question: Which side are you on?'' AFL-CIO President Lane Kirkland said at a rally on the Capitol steps. The gathering, sponsored by the Service Employees International Union, drew several hundred people, most of whom were attending the union's annual legislative conference.
``A minority of United States senators are determined to dispose of this'' legislation, said John Sweeney, union president.
Opponents also are turning up the heat to kill the legislation. The National Right to Work Committee is furiously lobbying against the bill and in favor of a filibuster. The group has called a news conference for Friday in which actor Charlton Heston will speak out against the proposal.
``We're doing all we can possibly do to fight this bill,'' said Martin Fox, National Right to Work Committee spokesman. ``If legislation is going to wreck the nation's economy and wreck state right-to-work laws, you kill it any way you can.''
The striker-replacement legislation passed the House last spring and has cleared a Senate committee. But the threat of a filibuster, in which opponents make long speeches to obstruct the passage of legislation, has stalled Senate action. Proponents have said they are as many as five votes short of the 60 required to end a filibuster.
Unions have grumbled that President Clinton isn't working hard enough for the legislation. He has endorsed it, but labor leaders want him to support it as aggressively as he did the North American Free Trade Agreement, which unions strongly opposed.
by CNB