Excerpts
JIM LEHRER (Newshour Editor): Majority Republicans approved a bill to strip most collective bargaining rights from public employees. Democrats had boycotted the Senate for three weeks to prevent a quorum and thus block action. But Republicans finally got around that obstacle with a simple procedural move.
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JIM LEHRER: A short time later, the Republican-controlled state Assembly also passed the bill, over the complaints of Democrats.
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JIM LEHRER: The measure now goes to Walker, who says he will sign it as soon as he can, legally.
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JIM LEHRER: What was this simple procedural move that was used last night by the Senate?
FREDERICA FREYBERG, Wisconsin Public Television: Well, what the Senate did was they called a conference committee of six members of the Senate and the Assembly. Only one was a Democrat, that being in the Assembly.
And this conference committee then passed this amended version of this bill. And under this conference committee, they were able to pass it, over the objections of that Democrat, and then send it directly to the Senate floor. And they said they were able to do this because they were in special session and had good cause.
Now, the Democrats are crying foul, saying that there wasn't adequate notification of this meeting, and so they're saying that it's a violation of the open meetings law. But the Republicans say that it's been all squared with all of their legal authorities, and that under this rule of good cause in a special session, they were able to strip the appropriations out of the original bill and then vote this through, and basically then taking the collective bargaining language and passing that last night and then again today in the Assembly.
JIM LEHRER: By taking the appropriations out, that meant that they didn't need -- they did not need a quorum required when it was in that, correct?
FREDERICA FREYBERG: That's -- that's -- that's what they're saying.
The Democrats reject that and suggest that they may well, in fact, go to court over that, over of the language in the bill, because the governor had been saying all along that this was a fiscal bill. And so the collective bargaining needed to stay in it. And the Senate originally had said that, because it was a fiscal bill, they need the Democrats to be there for the quorum.
But now, apparently, it has to do with appropriations in the bill, as opposed to anything that had fiscal consequence, because, of course, the collective bargaining language in the bill does have fiscal consequence in part because under this bill employees, state employees, local employees, school employees, are required to pay more for their health-care contributions and for their pension contributions.
JIM LEHRER: But, as you say, this is probably going to be sorted out in somebody's courtroom; is that correct?
Republicans; sneaky, underhanded, anti-little-guy, and anti-union. Typical 'we are going to get our way no matter what' attitude.
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"In Wisconsin Battle on Unions, State Democrats See a Gift" by MONICA DAVEY and A. G. SULZBERGER, New York Times 3/10/2011
Excerpts
After nearly a month of angry demonstrations and procedural maneuvering in the State Capitol here, Gov. Scott Walker won his battle on Thursday to cut bargaining rights for most government workers in Wisconsin.
But his victory, after the State Assembly passed the bill, also carries risks for the state’s Republicans who swept into power last November.
Democratic-leaning voters appeared energized by the battle over collective bargaining on a national stage. The fight has already spurred a list of potential recall elections for state lawmakers this spring. Protesters are planning more large demonstrations this weekend.
“From a policy perspective, this is terrible,” said Mike Tate, the leader of the Democratic Party of Wisconsin.
“But from a political perspective, he could not have handed us a bigger gift,” Mr. Tate said of the governor.
In the last 24 hours, he added, the state party had received $360,000 in contributions and volunteers have streamed into offices where signatures were being collected for recall bids.
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The Democrats fumed that the Republicans had ended the episode in less than a day, with the Democrats still out of town, by forcing a rewritten bill that needed no quorum through the Senate on Wednesday night and the Assembly on Thursday. Though the outcome of the vote was all but certain, each side made its case one more time in the final hours of debate.
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