The natural inclination of many Americans is to “throw the baby out with the bathwater.”  That is, for most of us, if something is not working perfectly or properly, it is best to do away with everything, than figure a way to fix it.  No more obvious example exists than that of unions.  Clearly, unions in this nation do not work perfectly but America’s natural inclination to blame unions for all misfortunes is both misguided and dangerous.  In cities throughout the United States, the air can get quite polluted, yet we do not stop breathing because the air is vile; we instead try to clean it.  Likewise, eliminating unions in this country is much like holding ones breath, indefinitely. 

Teacher unions will serve as a good case study in which to illustrate the utility and further indispensable role unions play in workers’ lives.  First, teacher unions, like all organizations run and created by humans, are imperfect.  I will not defend them as perfect institutions devoid of corruption or inefficiency.  These are all realities of businesses, unions, political parties, even Church groups. Therefore, to use these moments of weakness, these anomalies of imperfection as reasons why unions should be done away with misses the point entirely.

Second, teacher unions are often viewed as extreme.  As the Daily News reported in a May 10 editorial entitled, “Can’t Teach? So What. Terrible Teachers Get Jobs for Life in N.Y.C,” various teachers in NYC are allowed to continue teaching despite apparent inabilities to teach.  They cited three examples of incompetence which were based on classroom management and teacher errors.  Based on these examples as well as a study made that said at least 10% of NYC teachers are “incompetent,” the Daily News concluded it was reprehensible that in the past several years only five teachers have been let go after arbitration.  Or another editorial only a day earlier entitled, “UFT pact protects even sexual predators,” Implies that union lawyers defended sexual predators at all costs. 

In both these cases, and countless like them in every newspaper, magazine across the country, unions, in this particular case, a teacher union, are under attack for defending their membership, even under what appear to be absurd situations like sexual predators or incompetent teachers.  However, on two counts, critics fail to see the point.  First, unions are meant to be extreme defenders of their membership, even under circumstances that appear from the outside, irrational, such as child abuse.  Yet, such “irrational” defenders exist in countless other parts of our society: The ACLU is often criticized for defending free speech to extremes (such as Nazi marches) or even public defenders are commissioned to defend their clients at all costs, even when all signs point to guilt.  Our very system of freedom requires this type of impartial defense.

Second, what about the defense of those employees that are wrongfully accused or need strong defenders.  Are we to believe that all or even any employers are so altruistic as to treat employees as fairly as possible?  We need only take a simple look at American labor history ranging from Coeur d’Alene, Phelps Dodge, Triangle Shirt-Waist or countless other strikes and employee exploitations to see that our corporate side is anything but altruistic and just.  And as a teacher in NYC public schools for the past three years, my own experience and those of my colleagues reject the assertion of the Daily News that our administrations are so benign.  In a meeting last May, my principal cried, “We have a far stronger business ethic in education now.  That’s just the way it is, so if you don’t like it you can go elsewhere.”  And constant attacks trying to have teachers teach longer, expend more of their own resources, and even watch their health benefits on such important coverage as cancer treatments, dwindle. 

We often forget that unions are not just defending those we have already prejudged, but unions are there to protect employees who on their own do not have the power to negotiate with an employer.  After all, for nearly three years, the teacher, fire fighter, and police officer unions, arguably three of the most vital organizations in NYC, operated without contracts.  In the teacher case alone, that represents 80,000 employees.  Imagine each teacher negotiating with the DOE, when 80,000 can’t get a contract. 

Of course, with the recent Teacher Contract, many decree that unions are either slaves to the selfish agendas of their leaders or too powerless to do anything anyway.  In the first case, I would apply the imperfection principle I pointed out earlier. Furthermore, my experiences with the UFT, SEIU, and UFT have all opened my eyes to good leaders in troubling binds.  In defense of the contract negotiated in Fall 2005, UFT leaders pointed out that they were in a difficult position considering their membership might argue for fairer contracts, but only half would actually be willing to strike to get it.  In my own experiences in schools, this is right on target.

All in all, Americans have the tendency to look at unions as inefficient or corrupt organizations that do relatively little in today’s corporate-dominated world.  Unions are inefficient – by definition.  They must stand in the way of corporate efficiency because Justice, in many cases requires it.  Firing a human being because his bulletin board was not up in time or because she was unable to make 10,000 widgets in a 12 hour workday is unreasonable and should not be allowed without some real defense. 

But unions, generally, do much more than we think.  They are defenders of employees everywhere and they are only as strong as the resolve of their members and the support of the public.  We need unions, in particular teacher unions, to defend against encroachments, to defend under any circumstances.  Someone needs to be fighting for workers.  And when all these encroachments seem suffocating, someone needs to make it just a little easier to breathe.