WASHINGTON, D.C. – The importance of Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker’s groundbreaking collective bargaining reform law – known as Act 10 – continues to grow.

That was evident earlier this month when 81 collective bargaining units representing school employees throughout Wisconsin disbanded after local union leaders could not entice 51 percent of their members to vote in favor of union recertification, reports the MacIver Institute. Under Act 10, unions are required to hold recertification votes every year.

MacIver analysts dug into the numbers and discovered that 16,977 government workers did not vote in favor of their union – either by voting ‘no’ or abstaining from voting altogether.

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The lesson from Wisconsin’s Act 10 is obvious:  Many labor unions would wither on the vine if their members were given a choice about the matter.

That lesson may have inspired recently proposed national legislation which, among other things, would require private labor unions to hold recertification elections at regular intervals, reports the Washington Examiner.

The Employee Rights Act of 2013 was introduced in mid-November by U.S. Rep. Tom Price (R – Ga.) and U.S. Sens. Orrin Hatch (R – Utah) and Lamar Alexander (R – Tenn.). The bill has 68 co-sponsors in the House of Representatives and 26 in the Senate.

In addition to requiring regular recertification votes – perhaps every three to five years – the Employee Rights Act would also provide workers with numerous other guarantees, including the right to cast secret ballots when voting on labor issues. The bill would also criminalize union threats of violence against members who don’t toe the union line, according to a press release.

While the legislation would apparently not pertain to state and local public employees, the Washington Examiner editors write that it “would establish a vitally important precedent in the private sector that should be applied to all union organizations.” It would be up to the hodgepodge of state and local authorities that oversee those public employee unions to follow suit.

As the Examiner editors note, public employees have a unique position in American life: There are both government workers and taxpayers. And while the can vote for the elected representatives, few of them have the opportunity to vote in union recertification elections.

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“Such elections would introduce an important new accountability factor for public employee union leaders,” the Examiner editors write.

The bill has little chance of passing, as long as the U.S. Senate remains in the hand of union-friendly Democrats. And if the legislation should somehow make its way through Congress, it’s a virtual certainty that President Barack Obama would veto it.

Regardless, the Employee Rights Act is an indication that lawmakers in D.C. – and probably in the other 49 state capitals, as well – are seeing how well Wisconsin’s Act 10 is working and considering similar action.

As Townhall.com columnist Matt Batzel writes, “States need to follow in Wisconsin’s footsteps to allow freedom for government employees and relief for taxpayers.”

Batzel delightfully borrows a line from the radical Occupy Wall Street protests by noting, “This is what Democracy Looks Like!”