Today, a coalition of Philadelphia-area rabbis and rabbinical students will meet with Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter to make the case for the Employee Free Choice Act.
Dozens of Pennsylvania rabbis and rabbinical students signed an open letter in support of Employee Free Choice, organized by the Philadelphia Jewish Labor Committee (JLC), and will deliver it today to Specter. Specter is a key vote in the fight for workers'; freedom to form unions and bargain—a fight that these rabbis know is critical to our economy and to basic fairness.
The meeting and letter are part of a larger outreach effort by the JLC to promote workers' freedom to form unions and bargain. These values, say a growing coalition of rabbis, are a key part of the Jewish tradition of supporting the dignity of workers and the strength of communities.
The new site, Rabbis for Workers' Choice, highlights the letter to Specter and includes other resources on Judaism, social justice and the Employee Free Choice Act.
In the letter to Specter, the rabbis ask the senator to look past the corporate disinformation campaigns that have mischaracterized the Employee Free Choice Act and think, instead, of the lives of workers who need the freedom to bargain for a fair share of the value they create.
We believe that the Employee Free Choice Act presents an opportunity to give concrete meaning to the often frustrated dream of a just society.
It provides an effective and concrete way for workers to form and join unions. And it opens a path toward transformational change. Adoption of the Employee Free Choice Act would give working people the strength and the opportunity to emerge from the despair that so often encumbers their lives.
These rabbis are part of a growing grassroots effort in communities of faith to support workers' freedom to form unions and bargain.