(CNSNews.com) - The right to a secret ballot in union elections will likely be up for a vote in five states in 2010, as lawmakers and activists are preparing to fend off a bill in Congress backed by organized labor that would make it easier to establish unions by replacing secret-ballot elections with a “card check” system.
 
Efforts to gather signatures began Tuesday in Arizona, Arkansas and Missouri for state initiatives to enact a constitutional amendment.  The amendment simply says: “The right of individuals to vote by secret ballot is fundamental. Where state or federal law requires elections for public office or public votes on initiatives or referenda, or designations or authorizations of employee representation, the right of individuals to vote by secret ballot shall be guaranteed.”
 
The Utah and Nevada state legislatures, meanwhile, will be considering the constitutional amendment.
 
“Missouri is an independent bellwether state,” said Republican Missouri state Sen. John Loudon, who is leading the effort in his state where 157,000 signatures are needed to place the measure on the ballot. “We are the show-me state and don’t adopt crazy laws and we are sometimes slow to adopt good ones. This is one right independent Missourians don’t want taken away.”
 
Utah state Rep. Carl Wimmer, a Republican, said he is confident of the bill’s passage through the legislature. But he left open the possibility of using a petition.
 
“If we can’t get this through the legislature, we will take this right to the people,” Wimmer said.
 
The effort at the state level is in response to the Employee Free Choice Act, a bill backed by congressional Democrats. If passed, this bill would allow secret-ballot elections in union organizing to be replaced with a system in which union organizers ask workers to sign a card, and once a majority signs the union is recognized.
 
Opponents of the act say it opens the door for union organizers to pressure and intimidate employees.
 
The card-check bill in Congress also establishes federal arbitration rules, an issue not addressed by the state initiatives.
 
“This is a rifle shot aimed at the very worst part of this bill,” said former U.S. Rep. Ernest Istook of Oklahoma, national chairman of the Save Our Secret Ballot initiative that is overseeing the state efforts. “This is to protect workers and the general public from an outrage Congress is trying to push on them.”
 
“This is not a freedom issue. This is a civil rights issue,” Istook said. “It’s fine for someone to come to you and try to persuade you. It is wrong for someone to say you have got to make a decision now.”
 
The AFL-CIO, a labor advocacy group backing the legislation, could not be reached for comment Tuesday. However, the organization’s blog called the card check law, “the real patriot act,” charged that opponents of the legislation were “un-American,” and said the intimidation comes from employers.
 
On Dec. 26, the blog said, “Workers [are] so intimidated by employers, they become scared of voting in a ballot for a union so they vote against the union or don’t vote at all, fearing they if they do, they’ll lose their job.”
 
Even if the EFCA becomes law at the federal level, states that pass an amendment protecting the secret ballot would be shielded from the provision scrapping the secret ballot for card check, said Clinton Bolick of the Goldwater Institute, who is the author of the amendment. He said the U.S. Supreme Court has consistently held that states can grant additional individual rights.
 
“The federal Constitution is a floor, not a ceiling for individual rights,” Bolick said. “The right to a secret ballot is very widely recognized.”
 
Sydney Hay, president of the Arizona Mining Association, previously led a successful petition to pass a state constitutional amendment requiring two-thirds vote in the state legislature to increase taxes. In Arizona, 230,000 signatures will be required to place the measure on the ballot, Hay said.
 
In Arkansas, 80,000 signatures are needed for the measure to go to the voters, said Arkansas state Sen. Gil Baker, a Republican.
 
“Arkansans are independent minded,” Baker said. “The secret ballot, for Arkansans is important.”
 
As for why these five states were chosen, Istook said, “We had to start somewhere. We couldn’t do all 50 states.”