Save Our Secret Ballot Amendment Analysis

The “Save Our Secret Ballot” Amendment was initiated by the state of Arizona and adopted by Utah, South Carolina and South Dakota. The purpose of the amendment was to perpetuate employees’ rights to continue the secret ballot process when determining union organizing activities and representation.
The amendment is in direct response to the Employee Free Choice Act initiative that would allow workers to form unions utilizing a card check election process. The issue promulgated by EFCA’s proposal of card check encompasses a process that could disqualify a group of affected employees from voting for or against union representation due to the “majority” clause and process of the card check voting. The card check provision could conversely cause intimidation and perpetuate a certain undesired direction in applicable union organizing activities.
Pertinent to the participating states’ initiative, the NLRB claims that the SOS amendment is unconstitutional and that the U.S. planned to invalidate the amendment. The
issues specifically addressed by the NLRB pertinent to defense is two pronged; does the proposed amendment to the state constitutions violate the supremacy clause? Is a secret ballot a basic tenet of democracy? These are the questions that will be addressed in this essay.

Does the proposed amendment to the state constitutions violate the supremacy clause?
The Supremacy Clause states the Constitution is “the supreme Law of the Land” and state laws cannot contradict Federal law (Cox, Bok, Gorman & Finkin, 2012, p.
873). States have the ability to add their own stricter by-laws, but it is beyond their rights to lessen the effects of the Constitution. That said, the state secret ballot amendments appear to violate the Supremacy Clause. However, upon reviewing the union election process enforced by the NLRA and NLRB, it appears as though secret ballots are incorporated in the union election process. Unfortunately, they may not always be guaranteed (Hunter, 1999). Further research discovered that Judge Frederick J. Martone ruled the Secret Ballot Amendment, which protects workers’ right to secret ballot in union-organizing elections, is constitutional (Federal Court Upholds Save Our Secret Ballot, Or Does It?, 2012). Given this information, state legislation regarding secret ballots does not violate Federal
law.
Is a secret ballot a basic tenet of democracy? We believe a secret ballot is the basic tenet of democracy. Democracy goes hand in hand with the secret ballot. Our founding fathers implemented secret ballots at election times to ensure the votes of the people were not coerced or manipulated any particular way. Based upon this criteria and pursuant to union activity as established by the NLRA, an individual has a right to perpetuate a secret ballot process during union activity proceedings. This basic right would supercede the supremacy clause as "voting" is considered an individual right. Taking away this freedom of expression makes voters vulnerable to those who wish to affect the integrity of an election and create an outcome that might not have otherwise happened had the privacy of the voters remained in tact (Ferguson, 2003). Therefore, a secret ballot is a tenet of democracy.
The decision to uphold the secret ballot initiative and perpetuate the tenet of democracy pursuant to freedom of choice was a significant victory to ensure states have the authority to protect the rights of all individuals. Although the NLRB could appeal the decision, at this time the ruling has been allowed to stand.