By Dan McCue
Staff Writer

Longtime labor lawyers J. Hagood Tighe and Michael D. Carrouth, of the Columbia, S.C., law firm Fisher & Phillips LLP, said they’ve seen their share of union organizing efforts in the state and have concluded that labor movements simply don’t speak to conditions in the state.

Companies typically hire the firm to represent them before federal regulators can file charges that allege they violated the National Labor Relations Act, the law establishing the ground rules both employers and their workers must follow after a union-organizing effort begins.

“Studies have repeatedly concluded that South Carolina is the least-unionized state in the union, and I think that largely has to do with its longstanding effort to benefit from business development and growth,” Tighe said.

“It’s hard to get a foothold in a place where people are doing everything they can to be more attractive to business rather than less,” he added.

But that hasn’t diminished the labor movement’s hopes of establishing a larger presence in the Palmetto State. Since 2004, 25 different organizing efforts have taken place in South Carolina, although only 10 resulted in a union being ratified by eligible employees.

The most recent union victory occurred in North Charleston in April, when employees of Veolia Transportation Inc., a public transportation company, voted to join the Amalgamated Transit Union, Local 610.

The victory may be something less than it appears, however, as only two employees voted on the matter, both in favor of being unionized. The most significant recent union victory in the state occurred in June 2005, when 409 of 506 eligible employees of Wackenhut Services Inc. of Aiken voted to join United Professional Pro-Force of Savannah River.

Recent union successes, large and small, also have to be interpreted in the light of other business developments in the state over the past decade, Carrouth said.

These include the closure of a number of unionized facilities, including the Mack Truck facility in Fairfield County and the La-Z-Boy facility in Florence, and the inability of other unionized workers to secure new contracts, as has happened at Giant Cement in Summerville.

They also include the decade-long surge in foreign investment in the state, beginning with the opening of the BMW Manufacturing Co. plant in Spartanburg. The plant currently employs 4,500 workers and thus far has been immune to organizing efforts, Tighe said.

Carrouth believes the inability of unions to gain traction in the state in the past has made workers wary of embracing them in the present, and will prevent them from doing so in all but isolated cases in the future.

He also believes unions aren’t trying as hard to be a force in manufacturing because that type of employer has proven more likely to move the business overseas to enhance its profitability.

“What we’re seeing now is a real push to be a force in more service-oriented industries, like hospitality,” Carrouth said. “Jobs that aren’t as readily transferable to China or another country.”

Tighe also believes the volume of the rhetoric of the “Change To Win” movement, started by unions that have splintered from the AFL-CIO, is making it appear that unions are making more inroads in American society than they really are.

“Change to Win is a symptom of their declining influence and their related concerns over continuing to be of service to their current members,” he said. “Are they being effective? I think the answer is no.

“For instance, at the Mercedes plant in Vance, Ala., the United Auto Workers have made four separate attempts since 1999 to organize the facility, and in each case they were unsuccessful,” he said.

Now a machinists union is trying to succeed where the UAW failed, but the two labor organizations are arguing over whose rights are triumphant.

“I can’t imagine that would improve the odds of union success at the plant,” Tighe said. “After all, how can they work out a deal with management when they can’t even work out a dispute amongst themselves?”

Both attorneys believe South Carolina employers are somewhat at an advantage against unionizing because the state is small, its industrial base is solid and relationships between employers and workers is typically closer than at companies in more urbanized states.

“One of the hallmarks of business development in South Carolina has been its success in fostering small businesses and enticing the kind of large companies to the state that continue to think small and consistently show they value their employees,” Carrouth said.

“Poor communications in a facility, which leads to workers not feeling involved in the important decisions made by their employer, is the leading cause of unionizing efforts. If you don’t have a good employee relations program in place, you’re only asking for trouble.”

Dan McCue is a staff writer for the Business Journal. E-mail him at dmccue@charlestonbusiness.com.

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