Why Obama and Arne will get their way with teachers’ unions

Nia-Malike Henderson of Politico.com posted a great story this evening about the increasingly strained relationship between President Obama and the nation’s teachers’ unions as the re-authorization of No Child Left Behind approaches (it should get underway early next year). She explains,

[T]he unions are worried that Obama, a Democratic ally, is going to be just as tough on them as President George W. Bush, a longtime foe….

But they’re also making it clear they’ll only go so far with Obama, who was booed at two teachers’ union conventions when he was a candidate.

One of the little-noticed aspects of Obama’s presidency is how much his approach to education mirrors Bush’s – heavy on testing and data-collection, with support for charter schools, teacher evaluations and merit pay….

“What we have now is a Democratic president who is using the words ‘fire teachers’ so the labor movement is starting to say they want to get on the bus and help steer, rather than get run over by it,” said Amy Wilkins of the Education Trust, a non-partisan think tank.

Since I wrote about No Child Left Behind and education reform in a post last week and two posts last month (here and here), I won’t re-hash that material here. What I will say is that Obama is in a strong position in terms of getting tough education reforms pushed through Congress, mainly because he is a Democrat supporting reforms that in the past have been associated with Republicans.

I liken this situation to Bill Clinton and welfare reform in 1996.* He was able to get that passed because welfare reform was a Republican issue, so he had most of the opposition party on board from the start (all but two of the 280+ Republicans in Congress ended up supporting the bill). Even though Clinton did not have the support of party stalwarts such as Ted Kennedy, Tom Daschle, Chris Dodd, and Daniel-Patrick Moynihan, half the Democrats in the House and Senate voted for the bill–more than enough for it to pass. (See breakdown of votes by party and chamber.)

Similarly, Obama will have a good amount of Republican support for his proposed education reforms. Assuming that 80% of Republicans vote for the legislation when it comes to the floor, all Obama has to do is garner 50% of Democrats’ votes and he will have a genuinely bi-partisan bill. If the teachers’ unions or the liberal wing of the party don’t like it? Well, too bad. They can campaign and vote against the legislation, but Obama doesn’t need their support since he’ll have plenty of moderate and conservative Dems in his corner. And threatening to withhold support from Obama in the future won’t hold much weight; are the NEA and AFT really going to tell members to stay home in 2010 and 2012 so Republicans can make gains in Congress and Mitt Romney can win the presidency? Not likely. The worst they can do is target specific Democrats and threaten to fund liberal candidates to run against them in the future. But those liberals aren’t likely to win in places where moderate and conservative Democrats get elected.

So despite the noise that will be made by teachers’ unions and at least some liberals in the Democratic Party, I think the chances of meaningful education reform passing early next year look very promising.

*If you’re interested in welfare reform, I recommend this 6-page article from the University of Michigan’s National Poverty Center about the impact and effectiveness of the legislation 10 years later.