In a March 11 editorial, The Wall Street Journal offered “congratulations” to Wisconsin Republicans for passing GOP Gov. Scott Walker's anti-union bill, which strips collective bargaining rights from public employees. From the Journal editorial:

Congratulations to Wisconsin Republicans, who held together this week to pass their government union reforms despite unprecedented acting out by Democrats and their union allies. Three weeks ago we described this battle as a foretaste of Greece come to America, but maybe there's hope for taxpayers after all.

The good news is that Governor Scott Walker's reforms have been worth the fight on the policy merits. The conventional media wisdom is that Mr. Walker “overreached” by proposing limits on the ability of government unions to bargain collectively for benefits. But before he offered those proposals, Democrats and unions had refused to support his plan that public workers pay more for their pensions and health care. Only later did they concede that these changes were reasonable and will spare thousands of public workers from layoffs.

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Mr. Walker and his allies have won a rare victory for taxpayers, one which should be a lesson for other states and Governors. The monopoly power of government unions can be broken.