The poster the U.S. Chamber of Commerce doesn't want you to see

Like many of the progressive initiatives of the Obama Administration, the requirement that employers post NLRA rights in the workplace has not evoked much passion on the left.

Not so on the right. Starting with the Boeing Case, the modest moves towards enforcing the labor law on the books taken by the NLRB under Obama's appointees has created a furor. The requirement employers to post labor law has prompted the U.S. Chamber of Commerce to sue the NLRB, a move supported by the National Association of Manufacturers, the National Restaurant Association, and just about every other employer group.

The requirement to post NLRA rules, which had already been pushed back to April 30th to allow time for the case to be heard, would have had approximately 6 million businesses post a simple notice of rights to workers to organize free from threats or coercion - similar to minimum wage posters, equal opportunity posters, and others already required by the DoL.

However, a recent ruling has further delayed the posting, on the theory that the NLRB doesn't have the authority to require employers to post rules unless it is specifically mandated by the Congress.

The poster the U.S. Chamber of Commerce doesn't want you to see:

"The cookwagon must go through!"

From "What means a Strike in Steel?"* by William Z. Foster:

The perspective of a huge national strike confronts the workers' leaders with the necessity of bearing closely in mind another basic principle of strategy, that of mobilizing a full sufficiency of forces to achieve their objective. A good strategist never sends a boy to do a man's job. This strategic principle may be illustrated by an old-time circus story: A boss canvasman was explaining to a visitor How vitally important it was that the cook-wagon should arrive early on the circus lot in order that the men could breakfast, or else they would not put up the big top.
Said he: "No cook-wagon; no breakfast, and no breakfast, no work," and he explained therefore, that they always used the precaution of having eight of the strongest horses to pull the cook-wagon over the muddy roads.

"But," inquired the visitor, "suppose the roads are so poor that your eight horses can't pull the cook-wagon what then?"

"Oh, then," said the circus boss, "we put on more horses, and if they can't do the job we get out old Babe the elephant, to push it from behind."

"Still," persisted the visitor, "suppose the roads are so terribly bad that even all these horses and old Babe together can't haul the cook-wagon through the mire how about that?"

"Oh hell," declared the boss with finality, "we just put on more horses and more horses. The damned cookwagon simply has to go through."

It is in this spirit of unconquerableness that the workers' leaders must face the eventuality of a national steel strike. They must be prepared to throw more and more forces into the struggle until finally they budge the "immovable" steel trust. The steel campaign must come through and that is all there is to it. Nothing will be handed to the workers gratuitously, either by the bosses directly or by the government. All they will get is what they are willing and able to fight for.

*"What means a Strike in Steel?" is referenced as being "our bible" by organizer Stella Nowicki in Staughton & Alice Lynd's oral history book Rank & File.