The Administration of President George W. Bush is drawing to a close
after nearly eight years in office. Therefore, it is time to assess who
best fulfilled the promises made during the 2000 Presidential campaign.
In my opinion that prize goes to Secretary of Labor Elaine Chao, the
only Cabinet official to see the Bush Administration through from the
beginning.
The President's first choice for Labor Secretary was invalidated on a
technicality before ever taking office. Elaine Chao quickly was named as
a replacement. At the time she was a senior official at the Heritage
Foundation. The wife of Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY),
Mrs. Chao is the Cabinet official with one of the lowest profiles. Yet
she has the best record of accomplishment of anyone in the Bush
Administration.
Mrs. Chao is a native of Taiwan, who came to the United States when she
was only eight years of age. She, more than anyone in the Bush
Administration, has an appreciation for the United States as a land of
opportunity. Beginning with President Franklin D. Roosevelt's
Administration the Labor Department was a wholly-owned subsidiary of
organized labor. Even under Republican Administrations this was true.
President Ronald W. Reagan changed that by appointing Raymond J.
Donovan, a businessman, as Secretary. Donovan enraged the unions by
doing away with their various slush funds. The unions went after him and
literally drove him from office. President George H. W. Bush appointed
Elizabeth H. Dole, now Senator from North Carolina, to the position. She
held the line against the unions but fundamentally did not reform the
bureaucracy.
That job was left for Mrs. Chao, who has promulgated regulations which
have made the transparency of union expenditures a cornerstone of her
efforts. Although she is known for fairness, labor unions despise her.
Yet she has handled herself in such a way that she has avoided most
direct confrontation. In 1959 one-third of all American workers belonged
to a labor union. By 1980 under a quarter of the workforce held a union
card. Today that number stands at only 12.1%. If government workers are
taken out of the equation the number stands at just 7.5%. Accordingly,
Mrs. Chao considers herself Secretary of all workers and not just of
those who belong to unions.