The story was that union activists attempting to organize and protest their arch nemesis, Walmart, were having difficulty convincing the Walmart employees, who they were ostensibly trying to help, to actually join in with the demonstrations. To “sweeten the pot” a little, the union started paying the employees to join in the protest. While this makes wonderful fodder for a “Fox News story”, the truth is a little bit fuzzier than that.
As it turns out, yes, the union was encountering difficulty getting participants for their demonstrations. And yes, some Walmart employees were being offered compensation for attending the marches. But the NLRB determined that the fifty dollars the employees were offered did not constitute a bribe, but rather was a small enough payment to qualify as the union simply offering a benefit to help balance the detriment suffered by the employees in missing work or personal time in their participation, which is a somewhat common practice in organizing procedures.
Like the Hessians in the Revolutionary War, these employees were not exactly mercenaries by the strict definition of the word. The Hessians were German soldiers who fought for King George against the Colonists. They were paid for their service, but their home country was also at the time subject to the King of England. So they were in effect paid to fight for the Empire they were a part of, much in the same way our own military serves today, except for the very important ingredient of Nationalism. They fought for their King, though not for their country, and of course they fought for the money. Likewise, whatever other reason the Walmart employees may have had for being there, in the end it took fifty bucks to get them to show up. They weren’t random street people paid to be warm bodies, but I don’t think it inappropriate to question their level of devotion to the cause.
Another quote possibly wrongly attributed to Alexis de Toqueville is, “The American Republic will endure until politicians realize they can bribe the people with their own money”. It is discouraging sometimes to realize that having fully educated yourself on the issues, and having devoted yourself to the concepts of freedom, liberty, and the high ideas that made the nation great; still your vote can be cancelled out by somebody who got a free phone. It’s not bribery, or vote buying by the literal definitions, but there’s something a little slimy about it all.
IMHO: The love of money may be the root of all evil, but in an honorable war, it is far down the list of what people are willing to fight and die for. When it comes to heroism, valor, self-sacrifice, and staying true to a cause, money is a woefully inadequate motivator. The Hessians did not have the stake in the Revolutionary War that the Colonists did, nor even so much as the British soldiers did. They were paid to be there, but their houses and families were far from the danger. It was only money, it was not their home, not their sacred honor, not the single most important struggle of their existence. Likewise, bribing voters has its limits. Some will always cast their vote based on purely selfish motivations, but they stand alone in their avarice. Those who proceed from a sense of duty and devotion to the sacred ideas of the Republic have on their side the power of persuasion, the strength of virtue, and the tenacity of those fighting what they consider to be the most honorable of wars. I know such patriots. I read their writings, I hear their speeches. If there comes a day when shallow bribery can actually forever stand against the high ideas of the Revolution, then the people and the Republic will have already fallen. That day is not today.
