WASHINGTON — In the Ozark Mountain town of Rogers, Ark., more than 250 business owners gathered for lunch at a construction company last month to focus on what they saw as a major threat -- a proposal in Congress to make it easier to form labor unions.
At each place setting, attendees found pre-stamped postcards and pre-written letters to be sent to Arkansas' U.S. senators, Democrats Mark Pryor and Blanche Lincoln, who had supported the labor bill in the past. After lunch, the business owners were ushered to computers to send e-mail messages as well.
Five days later came the good news: Two Senate votes had been stripped from the pro-union bill. Lincoln said she would oppose it outright, while Pryor declared the current version "dead" and said he would look for compromises.
Today, thanks to those and other defections, key components of the bill are in serious jeopardy. And the legislation has produced one of the biggest surprises in Washington since Democrats swept the White House and Congress: The nation's labor unions, which organized so effectively last year to help elect President Obama, have been outmaneuvered so far on their top priority by their opponents in the business community.
"We were outspent, outhustled and outorganized," said one chagrined union advisor who was not authorized to speak by name.
"The legislation is severely challenged," said John Wilhelm, hospitality president of Unite Here -- the textile, hotel and culinary workers' union. "The unified business community has been so strident about the issue, they have effectively achieved solidarity among Republican senators."
The labor movement, somewhat divided, he said, has let Democratic support drift away.
No legislation is more important to the unions than the Employee Free Choice Act, which would ease the rules for forming bargaining units and, union leaders believe, help the depleted labor movement gain new members. Under its core provisions, unions could start a new bargaining unit at a company if a majority of workers simply signed cards requesting one, a process known as "card check."
The new system would eliminate the company's option to call for secret ballot elections, which union officials have long argued give companies the ability to manipulate and intimidate workers before a unionization vote.
Businesses fear that card check would leave workers vulnerable to coercion by union officials.
