Not Accountable
Rethinking the Constitutionality of Public Employee Unions
In Not Accountable, Philip K. Howard argues that public employee unions have undermined democratic governance and should be unconstitutional. American voters elect governors and mayors who, under union agreements, have been disempowered from managing schools, police departments, and other public agencies. This is why schools can’t work, bad cops can’t be fired, states struggle under the weight of unaffordable pensions, and frustrated voters reach for extremist solutions. Politicians can’t break the union stranglehold because, among other reasons, they’ve sold their souls for union political support.
In this searing five-point indictment, Philip makes a case that constitutional government can’t work when elected leaders lose control over public operating machinery. The Constitution requires a “republican form of government” where elected executives are empowered to run government operations. Under the Constitution, public employees have a duty to serve the public, not organize politically to harm the public.
Not Accountable was published by Rodin Books on January 24, 2023.
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Reviews & Endorsements
“Philip K. Howard has written a short, important book on an urgently needed reform that gets only more urgent with every new labor contract negotiated by governments and public-sector unions. For, as the late economist Herbert Stein noted in his famous ‘Stein’s Law,’ ‘if something cannot go on forever, it will stop.’”
– John Steele Gordon, The New Criterion
“A courageous book that respects no sacred cows.”
– Michael T. Hartney, Claremont Review of Books
“Mr. Howard’s civic-minded zeal for a well-functioning democracy—not to mention the appeal of his brisk, clear prose—should focus our attention on a vexing public problem and even inspire us to wrest back control of our government.”
– John Ketcham, The Wall Street Journal
“Howard’s thoughtful perspective and well-deserved reputation for dispensing non-wonkish common sense make it likely that his message and proposed reforms will not be ignored. … One hopes that Philip Howard’s Not Accountable will motivate Americans to pay closer attention and heed his sensible recommendations.”
– Mark Pulliam, Law & Liberty
“The clearest case against [public unions'] flagrant distortion of American democracy is made in a new book Not Accountable by Philip K. Howard, a lawyer who has been a lonely voice for common sense governance since his brilliant book, The Death of Common Sense, in 1994. I consider him a charter member of the Sanity Caucus. If you are interested in your progeny not having their intellects stunted by mediocre martinets, you should read this book.”
– Joe Klein, Sanity Clause
“Howard was bound at some point to home in on collective bargaining. He began to see it as one of the biggest impediments to productivity and reform. ‘The abuse of power by public employee unions is the main story of public failure in America,’ he writes in Not Accountable.”
– Mary Williams Walsh, Political News Items
“[Not Accountable] should be on the reading list of any American who wants a more effective government. … Let’s hope all Americans hear more about Philip Howard.”
– Caroline Banaszak, The Ripon Forum
“Philip K. Howard, the famed, centrist public-reform advocate and author of ‘The Death of Common Sense’ …. explains that by their very nature, public employee unions enjoy ‘extortive power.’”
– Quin Hillyer, New Orleans Times-Picayune
“A compelling indictment of our nation’s public-sector unions.”
– The New Criterion
“In just 160 pages, Howard marshals vivid historical examples and cogent legal analysis to make a persuasive case against allowing public sector employees to unionize at any level of government: federal, state, or local.”
– Jace Lington, The American Conservative
“Howard’s bill of particulars is so strong that even judges who normally shy away from what may be perceived as judicial ‘activism’ ought, in my opinion, to be persuaded by it.”
– David Lewis Schaefer, The Washington Free Beacon
“‘Not Accountable’ is a cri de coeur, written in accessible prose with underlying heat. The author ... concludes that public sector unions are incompatible with good government and must be abolished.”
– Howard Husock, The New York Sun
“Clearly, Howard is on to something. … Teachers unions and other government unions … need to be outlawed.”
– Larry Sand, The Heartland Institute
“It's a devastating critique of public-employee unions.”
– Jonathan Leaf, playwright and author
“Howard sounds credible when he says, constitutionally speaking, that 'elected executives must be empowered to manage public employees,' and 'democracy can't work without accountability.’”
– Dan Janison, Newsday
“Longtime centrist reformer Philip K. Howard argues persuasively that public-sector unions are inherently both unconstitutional and disruptive to proper functioning of a representative democracy.”
– Washington Examiner
“Howard's book is ... a potent summons to politics, which can still bring such unions to heel.”
– George Will, The Washington Post
“Howard not only catalogs the many dreadful consequences of the rising power of government-employee unions … but also offers his own startling solution to the problem, arguing that public unions should be considered unconstitutional because they have thoroughly undermined our democratic form of government.”
– Steven Malanga, City Journal
“Howard … hopes Not Accountable, like Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle, will spark demands for reform.”
– Michael Barone, Washington Examiner
“Howard argues persuasively that 'the abuse of public power by public employee unions is the main story of public failure in America. ... It is not possible to bring purpose and hope back to political discourse until, as a threshold condition, elected leaders regain the authority to run public operations.’”
– David Freddoso, Washington Examiner
“We can continue to complain ad nauseam about the performance of our federal, state, and local governments and our seeming inability to effect meaningful reform; or we can read and thoughtfully consider the potential implications of this constructive new approach to a potentially society-endangering problem.”
– Marshall Kapp, The Florida Bar Journal
“I love cities and want them to thrive. Philip Howard shows a major reason why American cities struggle, and why they fail so many of their citizens: public employee unions prevent accountability, efficiency, and reform. Howard's novel insight: Their power is not only unconscionable, for its harm to the public good; it might also be unconstitutional.”
– Jonathan Haidt, NYU-Stern School of Business; author of The Righteous Mind, co-author of The Coddling of the American Mind
“The need to return to government of the people and by the people has been captured by Philip K. Howard in his new book, 'Not Accountable.’”
– Newt Gingrich, The Washington Times
“Over the course of several chapters, Howard deftly documents a number of the ways in which the ‘indifference to efficiency’ … increases the cost of government even as it diminishes the quality of public services. … As Howard correctly notes at the conclusion of his short book, ‘No democratic principle gave legislators and other elected officials the right to surrender governing power to unions.’”
– The Federalist Society (Part One; Part Two)
Philip Howard is an “original thinker whose new book, Not Accountable: Rethinking the Constitutionality of Public Employee Unions, is making waves.”
– Jonathan Alter, OLD GOATS with Jonathan Alter
“A riveting exposé about public unions.”
– Betsy McCaughey, The New York Post
“For those who want a real eye opener and a cut-to-the-chase discussion of what is really going on, then ‘NOT Accountable’ is required reading.”
– John Moorlach, former Orange County (CA) Supervisor and California State Senator
“Public sector unions across the country have distorted public policy, rendered government less efficient and effective than they otherwise could be and maintain this unaffordable state of affairs through brute political force. This is expertly argued and explained in [Not Accountable] by longtime civic leader and author Philip K. Howard.”
– The Orange County Register
“To his great credit, [Howard] has focused on a significant problem that is highly resistant to solutions. Why is government so inefficient especially in contrast to the private sector? His new book explores the relationships among government employees, the unions that represent them, the elected officials that hire them (and are charged with managing them), and the public that has learned to dread the process of any interaction with those who theoretically serve them.”
– Haven Pell, Pundificator