April 29, 1998
The Directors Guild of America's National Board voted unanimously to oppose California's Proposition 226, DGA President Jack Shea announced today. Prop 226, also known as the Campaign Reform Initiative, is a June ballot measure that would severely restrict unions' abilities to improve the welfare of their members by contributing to political candidates or ballot initiatives. The Guild's National Board voted to oppose Prop 226 at its quarterly meeting on Saturday, April 25, at DGA headquarters in Los Angeles.
"Proposition 226 is nothing more than a cynical attempt to silence the voices of a large segment of California's population," Shea said. "The DGA deplores the efforts of Prop 226's proponents to portray this dangerously anti-democratic measure as something intended to help working men and women. We already require the democratic election of our officials and a membership vote on our constitution and bylaws, all of which serve to ensure that our members' dues are spent in ways the members want."
The Campaign Reform Initiative would prohibit guilds and labor organizations from using any portion of a member's dues for political purposes without annual, written authorization from the individual. Included in the political purposes are ballot initiative support and campaign contributions.
"What Proposition 226 would do is create an enormous and debilitating amount of bureaucratic red tape for guilds to sort through, thereby hindering their ability to protect the rights of their members," commented DGA Executive Director Jay D. Roth. If the corporate interests behind Proposition 226 really believe that creating new red tape equals campaign reform, they should include the annual written authorization requirement for their own stockholders regarding corporate political contributions."