BAY CITY – More than half a century after unions reached their pinnacle of clout in 1953 – when 35.7 of the U.S. workforce was in the house of organized labor – unions are not far from becoming irrelevant to the American political process.

That point was hammered home to delegates at the 47th annual convention of the Michigan Building Trades Council (MBTC). The reminders were aplenty how the Nov. 2 election for U.S. president promises to be a defining event in the history of the U.S. labor movement.

“Regrettably, some of our members think that a vote for President Bush is a vote for working people,” said MBTC Secretary-Treasurer Tom Boensch. “I think they’re dead wrong.”

President Bush, Boensch said, opposes the Davis-Bacon Act and prevailing wage laws and project labor agreements, has cut OSHA and reduced job site inspections, has promoted outsourcing of U.S jobs, and has “beaten down” unions in the private sector and is now targeting public employee unions.

“He has done all that, and he’s taken the wheels off the construction economy,” Boensch said. “After all the things he’s done to us in the first four years, can you imagine what he will do to us in the next four years when he doesn’t have to worry about being re-elected?”

Boensch and other speakers told building trades delegates that the results of the Nov. 2 election may help stop the historic decline of the clout of organized labor with a win by John Kerry – or provide a shove down a black hole of irrelevancy with the re-election of George W. Bush.

Below are summaries of frank comments by two of the speakers, who warned that organized labor is approaching an historic threshold.