Chris Bohner’s recent essay in these pages, “Direct Elections for Labor Leaders Make for More Militant Unions,” lays out an argument that at one level is so uncontroversial that it should be a platitude — unions should be democratic. No one who believes in organized labor in the United States (or anywhere in the world) can disagree with the sentiment. Nevertheless, Bohner is right to say it, because even seemingly obvious truths bear repeating.

However, Bohner goes much further and commits an error common to union reformers — conflating the morally good with the inherently strategic. A “more democratic union,” Bohner contends, “is a more militant union.” The path to a stronger, better union is through democracy.

Would that it were so. Building more effective unions requires commitment, patience, planning, and considerable skill, and cannot be achieved by changing a constitution. We are doing a disservice to those who want to build a better labor movement if we reduce the scope and scale of our challenges to the question of how leaders are chosen.