Today's journalists no longer think they need to be protected against exploitation, believing that the shackles of exploitation exist only in history books. These journalists argue that while the blue collar workers may need unions, the professionals don't since they have higher education levels, more affluence, better working conditions, and the belief that they can deal more effectively with management on a one-to-one situation than as a group. In its quest to be given the status and respect a society gives what it class professionals, journalists believe that unions are a distinct disadvantage.

      Once, Heywood Broun and Jonathan Eddy, founders of the American Newspaper Guild, were not ashamed to stand side-by-side with John L. Lewis and Sidney Hillman. Once, journalists worried about the exploited and the oppressed; now they merely claim to worry about them, while pretending to be among the privileged few who have access to the halls of business and political power. Nevertheless, physician, lawyer, or journalist - become folded within corporate America, and as chains and groups, with their headquartered MBAs and JDs hundreds of miles away, begin buying out hospitals and law firms and newspapers, the need for unions becomes even stronger.

      The Writers Guild of America, American Feration of Television and Radio Artists (AFTRA), National Association of Broadcast Employees and Technicians (NABET), Graphic Communications International Union, Communications Workers of America, and several other unions in the media have essentially union shop guarantees or an industry-wide basis. Most broadcast network journalists, with the exception of those of the Cable News Network, are represented by AFTRA, Writers Guild of America, or NABET; ABC, CBS, and NBC are all closed-shop operations, requiring their journalists to be members of the union or to pay fair share dues to that union. You don't write a script or perform on air for network TV or most film companies without union membership; you don't aim cameras or build sets without a union card. But, less than ten percent of all reporters, both print and broadcast, are members of unions. And every year, newspapers and magazines update the public on the decline of America's union movement. And every year, there is still worker oppression, and it makes no difference if it's in a small coal community or in tinted glass walls of Manhattan. It's still oppression.

      With Just Cause is not meant to proselytize or reinforce, but to inform. It may help those who know little about media unions or who are openly hostile to see the critical issues; it might help those who are members learn about their heritage. Through an understanding of the history, philosophy, and critical social issues within the media unions, journalists, hopefully, will make the decisions of membership based upon knowledge rather than myth.