More than 120 Penn State student activists, professors, union representatives and community members congregated Friday at Old Main to urge Penn State President Graham Spanier and Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., to support the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA).
The act, proposed in Congress earlier this month, will help workers more easily form unions, gain health insurance, ensure job security and allow for stricter punishments for employers and unions in violation of labor laws, members of the United Students Against Sweatshops (USAS) said.
"It would punish both companies and unions so when they violate labor laws, you wouldn't just get a slap on the wrist anymore," USAS member Chris Stevens said. "It would also make sure that union contracts get negotiated instead of just stalled."
Stevens (sophomore-anthropology) said the act would require a neutral third party be hired to settle disputes if a union and its employer fail to reach a contract agreement in an allotted amount of time.
Michael Fedor, director of the Central Pennsylvania branch of the AFL-CIO, said the current climate in the workplace for those who can't unionize is unacceptable.
"It is a travesty what is currently going on in this country," he said. "If you stand up in the workplace for your rights, you are routinely fired, routinely harassed or routinely punished."
Paul Clark, head of Penn State's department of labor studies and employment relations, agreed.
"We have seen the middle class decline," Clark said. "If the EFCA is passed ... that will begin to restore the balance of power between employers and unions."
Clark, one of six people who addressed the crowd from the Old Main steps, added the EFCA is designed to strengthen current laws.
"This law empowers workers and closes the loophole," he said to the crowd. "Employers are pulling out all the stops to keep this law from going into action because of this."
After the rally, more than 50 people began chanting and paraded into Old Main to hand-deliver petitions to Spanier.
The petitions, which were collected during the rally, urged the university to "proactively show its support of the Employee Free Choice Act and its desire to see reform in labor law."
Spanier was not available to receive the petitions, but a voice in the crowd, assuming that the university president was available, yelled to the group to "just walk all the way to the back and go right into [Spanier's] office. Then he'll listen."
The protesters did not go into Spanier's office, but decided to stand outside of it and sing songs about Penn State and the power of unions.
USAS members said they plan to deliver similar petitions to Specter, who currently opposes the act, to inform the senator of the current community acceptance of the act.
"We will be mailing the petitions to Specter and hope that the community will continue to support the Employee Free Choice Act," Stevens said. "This is our first time working on the issue so close to home. We want to ensure that everyone has equal rights to unionize."
A Penn State spokesperson could not be reached for comment.
