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“We’re Players in the Game”: The Influence of Teachers Unions on Education Policy

In February 2018, the public school teachers of West Virginia decided that they were fed

up. They were tired of their state being ranked third to last in terms of teacher pay, they were

tired of education funding being first on the chopping block when their Republican-controlled

legislature came looking for budget cuts. So the teachers did something that they had not done

since 1990: they went on strike, eventually securing a five percent pay raise for all West Virginia

public employees, a number five times the amount originally proposed by the West Virginia

legislature (Hefling). Faced with their own tax-cutting vultures and low pay, teachers in Arizona

followed suit. Then came strikes in Oklahoma and Colorado, and closer to my home, teachers

struck in Los Angeles, and then Oakland. These union actions came in the face of the Supreme

Court ruling in ​Janus v. AFSCME ​(2018), which promised to gut union power by deeming the

collection of non-member fees unconstitutional, cutting off a vital source of union revenue.

For decades, pundits and academics alike have foretold the end of union power, thus

leading to the death of unions. Union membership ​has ​declined greatly in the past few decades,

with only 7 percent of private sector workers being governed by collective agreements, down

from a third in the 1950s (Compa). The ​Janus​ ruling was supposed to be the final blow: no

longer are unions able to charge non-members fees for representing them in collective

bargaining, a loss of vital revenue that, it was predicted, would ultimately lessen their influence

across the board, including in the political sector (Hefling and Leonor). But for teachers unions,

that did not happen. During the 2018 midterm cycle, the first election since the June 2018

Supreme Court ruling, roughly 100,000 more National Education Association (NEA) members

participated in “some kind of campaign activity, like phone banking or knocking on doors” than

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had participated in similar actions during the 2016 presidential election, and the American

Federation of Teachers (AFT) also reported a large uptick in political actions from their members

(Emma and Leonor). (The National Education Association, or the NEA, and the American

Federation of Teachers, or AFT, are the two federal-level teachers unions). Although it is

possible that longer term, the political clout of teachers unions will take a hit by the Supreme

Court’s ruling in ​Janus​, it is doubtful that it will drop to the miniscule levels predicted by experts

immediately following the ruling.

Reading the news of the West Virginia strike was the first time that I had been exposed to

any union activity. Full stop. I attended elementary and middle school in Kansas, a state not

exactly known for its union-friendly legislature, and although I have a couple of aunts and uncles

who are members of their respective unions, they are not particularly active. Strikes, to me, were

something that I learned about in history class, not something that could have immediate impact

on my life.

When I read about teachers taking control of their own working conditions, I was

inspired by their bravery. These men and women were putting it all on the line to bring about

better working conditions, risking their jobs in the process. In fact, in West Virginia, the catalyst

of this wave of labor action, it is actually illegal for teachers to strike, per their collective

bargaining agreement—but because of the scale of the action, there was no realistic legal

recourse for those who wished to pursue it (Quinn). Although I have long considered a career in

education policy, I had never considered the role that organized labor played in its formulation or

application. Seeing these strikes happen around the country not only refocused my intellectual

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interests towards labor relations, but also helped me form the basis of my senior project question:

How do teachers unions influence education policy?

The massive power that teachers unions possess in the legislative process is exemplified

in the 2002 Florida gubernatorial campaign. In Jeb Bush’s first term as governor, he instituted a

host of union-opposed education reforms, including a vigorous teacher accountability program

and three different school voucher programs. When it came time for Bush to run for reelection,

the Florida Education Association sought a candidate who would work to ​completely roll back

the Bush reforms, and found one in Bill McBride, a Tampa lawyer and political unknown. The

FEA essentially bankrolled McBride’s campaign, spending $3 million on advertisements to

ensure his nomination over the Democratic favorite, former Clinton administration attorney

general Janet Reno. His campaign director was the FEA’s director of government relations, and

his communications director was the FEA’s own communications director. Both salaries were

paid by the union, rather than by the McBride campaign. Incredibly, the FEA was considered to

be a relatively weak teachers union at the time, given to Florida’s restriction on union collection

of agency fees—the same fees that the ​Janus r​ uling outlawed (Moe,​ Special,​ 296). If a ​weak

state-level teachers union has the connections and funds to completely hijack a major state’s

primary election, consider what a more powerful teachers union could accomplish—or what they

could ​prevent​ from being accomplished.

Unique to the national organization of teachers unions is that there are two—the NEA

and the AFT. The two have never consolidated, despite that being the overwhelming trend in

national-level unions. Considering the difference in origin of the two unions, it is

comprehensible that they have never merged. The NEA was founded in 1857 by a group of

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academic elites and administrators to address the increasing centralization of public education

and lack of recognition of teaching as a profession (Ladd). It continued to function mostly as a

professional organization until the onset of collective bargaining in the public sector in the early

1960s. The AFT was founded in 1916, at the tail end of the Progressive Era, with “the expressed

intent of representing the interests of classroom teachers in bargaining negotiations” (Tucker).

Despite the AFT’s relatively early founding, collective bargaining by teachers unions did not

begin in earnest until the early 1960s, with the help of a pivotal election in New York City.

Although the 1950s were a banner decade for private-sector unions, with more than a

third of the private labor force being governed by collective agreements, public employees

lagged far behind their private peers in terms of collective bargaining rights. This changed in

1960 when the Democratic governor of Wisconsin, Gaylord Nelson, signed a bill into law

securing collective bargaining rights for his state’s employees. This legislation had a domino

effect on legislatures across the country, and today, 31 states grant public workers collective

bargaining rights (Compa). In 1961, right on the heels of this sea change in state legislation, the

AFT won a major New York City representation election. The AFT treated this victory as an

electoral mandate and began a scramble to organize teachers in other cities, hoping to

consolidate influence and serve as these teachers’ representatives in collective bargaining. This

flurry of action by the rival union forced the NEA to either get in the game or lose its

constituency. According to Dr. Terry Moe, professor of political science at Stanford University,

“[t]he early years of NEA-AFT competition brought thousands of districts under union control,

with the NEA winning the lion’s share and maintaining its position of leadership—but now as a

union rather than a professional association” (Moe, “A Union”). Today, the combined

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membership of the two unions is greater than any other public sector union, and they generally

play three roles: as legal representation for members in bargaining, as a professional organization

for teachers, and as a political organization lobbying and advocating for both their own interests

and those of the teachers’ whom they represent (Strunk and Cowen).

Teachers unions take on a uniquely powerful dual role in the formation of education

policy, forming it both from the bottom up, through collective bargaining, and from the top

down, through “political activities that give them unrivaled influence over the laws and

regulations imposed on public education by government” (Moe, “A Union”).

Although much of the research surrounding the “power” of teachers unions has centered

on their role in the collective bargaining process, this definition is necessarily limited due to the

inconsistencies in collective bargaining rights across state lines (Hartney). The right to unionize

is broadly recognized as being protected by the First Amendment, but the right to collectively

bargain has its basis in state constitutions and legislation, meaning that policies governing

collective bargaining vary greatly across state lines—in some states, bargaining is limited to

basic issues such as insurance, benefits, and sick leave, whereas others permit much wider

bargaining leeway (“Teacher’s Unions/Collective Bargaining”). Issues included in collective

bargaining agreements do not just vary widely ​between​ states, but between districts ​within​ those

states, given that collective bargaining is mainly an internal local union function (Strunk and

Cowen). As Dr. Brenda Dietrich, former superintendent of USD 437 in Topeka, Kansas, and

current representative in the Kansas House of Representative, explains, “Collective bargaining is

a local activity constrained by geographical and community boundaries, while political activity

at the Capitol is state-wide and has broader impact.” Because of these discrepancies, a more

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comprehensive view of the political power of teachers unions must move beyond collective

bargaining and toward the power unions hold in the legislative process, especially at the state

level (Hartney and Flavin).

Like other interest groups, the political power of teachers unions at both the federal and

state level is better measured by what they prevent from occurring than what they accomplish. In

one oft-cited passage about the role of interest groups in the legislative process, Dartmouth

political science professor Ronald G. Shaiko claims, “For more organized interests in

Washington, having nothing happen is a winning proposition… The deck is stacked severely

against those interests who wish to change public policy.” This is a feature, rather than a bug, of

a checks and balances heavy legislative system that promotes a cautious—not to say overly

careful and time-consuming—approach to legislating. This negative definition of power is

exemplified in a 2007 NEA campaign in South Dakota to defeat Ballot Measure 10, which would

have heavily restricted political contributions of government contractors or the use of tax money

for lobbying or campaigns. The NEA poured more than $1 million into its South Dakota affiliate

to buy TV ads in opposition to the measure. Predictably, the measure failed (Antonucci).

Teachers unions’ reasoning in preserving the status quo goes beyond ease, however: in

the current political power distribution, they undoubtedly hold the upper hand. In 1976, the NEA

issued its first political endorsement ever, in support of the Carter-Mondale presidential ticket. In

return, Carter fulfilled the NEA’s biggest political priority: the creation of a cabinet-level

Department of Education (Broder). A few years later, Walter Mondale discussed with a reporter

the vital lesson he learned. “[I]f you want to go somewhere in national politics these days,” said

the Vice President, “you better get the NEA behind you” (Hartney). Decades later, this mostly

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remains true: the NEA and the AFT possess the political firepower to make or break the

campaigns of their choosing, as shown in the example from Florida. In fact, when the total

political contributions of the NEA and AFT are combined, teachers unions were the largest

contributor to national campaigns on the interval between 1989 and 2009 (Moe, ​Special Interest​,

278) and this money is not going to education-related political interests alone—the NEA is the

largest single entity involved in efforts to defeat tax cuts and supporting attempts to raise taxes

(Antonucci). Perhaps more influential, however, is the political cachet carried by unions in the

halls of state legislatures.

Public education is controlled primarily by the states, so it follows that much of the

political work completed by unions is centered not on federal legislation or campaigns, but on

the smaller (and more easily influenced) state-level ballot measures, legislation, and campaigns.

The lobbying of teachers unions is so effective that in one biannual survey of state legislators,

state teachers’ unions were ranked as the single most effective and active lobbying entity in

statehouses, coming out on top of bankers, trial lawyers, businesses, and even state AFL-CIO

affiliates (Moe, “Political Control”). States also have looser campaign finance restrictions,

allowing teachers unions to spend with little to no meaningful scrutiny (Moe, ​Special Interest,​

283). In 2008, teachers unions were the number one or two contributor to candidates and parties

in thirty states, and they are especially active when it comes to state ballot measures, on which

the public is generally ill-informed and easily swayed by large-scale public campaigns (Moe,

Special Interest,​ 290). Both the NEA and the AFT have the requisite public relations machines to

do so and readily work to shape opinion and influence election through media campaigns (Moe,

Special Interest,​ 280). State-level unions spend tens of millions of dollars to defeat specific

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measures in their own states, and contributions to the political action committee fronts often

formed by unions to support their position receive donations from state-level teachers unions of

other states (Moe, ​Special Interest,​ 285). The NEA also contributes indirectly to state level

political activity by funneling money into state-level affiliates with the express purpose of it

being spent on a specific political measure—in the 2008 election cycle alone, the NEA gave

more than $17 million to ballot initiative groups in 12 states for such diverse issues as

redistricting and vehicle taxes, showing the diversity of union political activities (Antonucci).

Some of teachers unions most important political work is done not in the halls of

Congress, but in the voting booths of municipal and county elections. Because these elections

typically feature such low voter turnout, district- and country-level unions are readily able to

influence them so as to achieve their desired outcome, whether that be the election of certain

candidates to the school board or city council or the passing of a bond measure to improve

school facilities. For example, teachers are more likely to vote in school board elections than

other constituents, and local unions often conduct large-scale efforts to encourage teachers to

vote for their favored candidates (Strunk and Cowen). Teachers are not the only people who

seem to trust union opinion: one study showed that union-endorsed school board candidates are

elected 76% of the time, compared to just 31% of the time for non-union endorsed candidates

(Moe, “Political Control”). Linda Ortega, the vice president of the Mount Diablo Education

Association, explains why the endorsement of teachers unions is so vital in local politics:

“[W]hen [local candidates] get a teachers’ endorsement, it says that we believe in them and can

work with them, so we’re players in the game.” The physical presence of union members is also

a vital part of their political influence; in interviews, both Ortega and Dietrich cited union

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attendance at school board meetings and legislative sessions, respectively, as being one of the

most important parts of their political work. Says Ortega, “We’re like watchdogs.”

Ultimately, the influence that teachers unions wield in the policy arena comes down to

one thing: their massive membership. As stated previously, the NEA is the largest public-sector

union in the country, and combined, the NEA and the AFT have more than 4.5 million

dues-paying members in almost every congressional district in the country. This gives them two

things: money and power. If each member pays an average of $650 in dues each year, the NEA

and AFT are bringing in a combined $2.7 billion in revenue from ​dues alone​ (Moe, ​Special

Interest​, 280). Obviously, only a portion of this revenue goes towards political activities, but

even a fraction of it raises the NEA to the top of the national political contribution heap. Their

unrivaled size also gives them significant political manpower. Union members can be mobilized

in support or defense of ballot measures, bills, candidates, or any other contentious political

issue, as they were in the 2018 midterm elections, providing physical and organizational

presence to an issue.

Teachers unions approach education policy from all sides, exercising the political clout

that their size and effective organizing provide to maintain their powerful status. As has been

shown, the unions are deeply entrenched in both our public education system and our political

discourse, forcing legislators to formulate education policy on ​their​ terms and within the

paradigm that ​they​ set. While the positive work of teachers unions is occasionally overshadowed

by their heavy-handed political maneuvering, they play a crucial role in creating an equitable

public education system and securing fair working conditions for their members, fights that are

as important now as ever.

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Works Cited

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