Inside the Beltway

But “in the early part of the last century, pay was inequitable, working conditions were unhealthful and workers had no rights to grievance or bargain.”

Today, the need for unionization “has diminished substantially as employers- particularly manufacturers - foster positive employee relations and understand that these relationships should be conducted in a spirit of mutual respect and fairness.”

Mr. Timmons’ letter follows the recently introduced Employee Free Choice Act, which he calls “one of the most direct threats to economic growth and job retention and creation,” including barring employees from using secret ballot voting when deciding whether to join a union.

QUOTE OF THE WEEK

“I’ve lived through ‘64, ‘74 and ‘92. In ‘64 we were beaten so badly people talked about whether the party had a future. By ‘66, Lyndon Johnson had gone so far to the left and spilt the Democratic Party and we gained 47 House seats and picked up a bunch of governorships and Senate seats. Since 1968 you have not elected an overt liberal in 40 years. In ‘74 to ‘76, we had Watergate and a bad recession and then a Reagan-Ford nomination fight. In that period, only 17 percent of the country identified itself as Republican and yet four years later, Reagan won a smashing victory and Carter collapsed under a bad economy. In ‘92, Bush, having thrown away the fiscal conservatives by raising taxes, lost the three-way race and, two years later, we gained the House for the first time in 40 years and kept it. I know how fast the country can switch.”

- Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, reminding Newsweek’s Eleanor Clift that the nation’s political landscape can change at the drop of a dime

• John McCaslin can be reached at 202/636-3284 or e-mail John McCaslin.