CARNAHAN EDGES CLOSER TO UNIONS

Gov. Mel Carnahan has repeatedly tried without success to pass collective bargaining for public employees through a Missouri Legislature dominated by his own party.

Each time Carnahan has tried this over the last eight years, the bill not only hasn't passed, but it hasn't even gotten out of either the House or Senate in which it was introduced. It is an eight-year record of failure to deliver on this, one of Carnahan's key commitments to a key constituency of his.

Notwithstanding this history, Carnahan is inching the state toward collective bargaining for public employees the effective unionization of state government. The governor issued a written directive to state department directors this summer. In the directive, Carnahan created the position of "chief negotiator" to meet and confer with labor unions representing state employees and make salary recommendations to the state budget director.

This chief negotiator, who is employed in the office of administration, also can appeal to the governor if the budget director doesn't take his advice.

All this the governor did three months ago, some seven years and six months into his eight-year tenure. Two days after Carnahan issued the order creating the chief negotiator position, his U.S. Senate campaign benefited from a $110,000 donation to the Missouri Democratic Party from the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees. Carnahan's campaign of course denied any link between the action and the timely check.

Denouncing the governor's action and making precisely this allegation are four business groups: the Missouri Chamber of Commerce, the Missouri Farm Bureau, the Missouri Merchants and Manufacturers Association and the Associated Builders and Contractors. Citing the state open-records law, these groups want to see any correspondence relating to the June directive.

That would be a good place to start. In the meantime, Missourians should think long and hard about whether they want to turn over John Ashcroft's Senate seat to a man who has repeatedly taken action that would unionize state government.