Labor union membership in Rhode Island is at its lowest point in more than a half-century. Powerful Democratic legislators, long rumored to be “in labor’s pocket,” now support cutting benefits for unionized workers. And a growing chorus of critics — Governor Carcieri among them — blames unions, at least in part, for the state’s mounting fiscal problems.

Organized labor is in trouble in the Ocean State.

“I think we have to reevaluate the strength and the clout of the unions,” said Maureen Moakley, a political science professor at the University of Rhode Island, a union member herself. “They don’t have the clout that they used to. The question is how much do they have left?”

The answer may determine how the state climbs out of the worst budget deficit in nearly two decades. Facing a $425-million deficit for the coming fiscal year, Smith Hill politicians are considering tens of millions of dollars in cuts aimed at state government’s 15,000 workers, the vast majority of whom are unionized.

If unions flex enough muscle to block cuts affecting unionized employees, the money will have to be made up elsewhere — perhaps with less education aid for cities and towns, reduced benefits for low-income Rhode Islanders or potential tax increases.

Measuring organized labor’s strength isn’t easy.

It shows itself, in part, in the State House hallways, where union lobbyists and their allies dwarf the presence of other interest groups. But hallways tell only part of the story.

The rest plays out away from public view –– in political campaigns, federal tax filings and in the leadership of nonprofit organizations, where union leaders have crafted a network of political alliances that directly or indirectly influence the key decisions of the Democratic leaders who control Ocean State politics.

The labor movement has a strong voice in the debate over public employee benefits. That largely reflects the growing divide between public and private union membership. More than 63 percent of public-sector workers –– teachers, police, firefighters and state workers –– belong to unions, compared to just 7.5 percent in the private sector.

But organized labor also has a strong voice in discussions about health-care cuts for the poor, reduced benefits for foster children, environmental causes such as recycling and even gay marriage.

Rhode Island unions have formed unique partnerships with a host of seemingly unrelated environmental and social advocacy groups. Through this, relatively weak organizations gain a stronger voice in state affairs. In exchange, labor unions strengthen political alliances, expand their bank of volunteers that help elect pro-labor candidates and improve their image.

“That’s why, for all the attacks we take, they’ll never knock us down. We’re too rooted in the community,” said George Nee, secretary-treasurer of the AFL-CIO of Rhode Island. “We’re like an oak tree. Our roots are deep.”

NOWHERE ARE the alliances more apparent than inside the cramped offices of Ocean State Action, a nonprofit organization housed on the first floor of the Cranston building owned by the National Education Association of Rhode Island.

Ocean State Action’s board of directors includes representatives from the Sierra Club, the National Organization for Women, Clean Water Action and several labor unions. The gay-rights advocacy group Marriage Equality Rhode Island also shares their office space.

Ocean State Action, which regularly hosts State House rallies and lobbies legislators, spent $138,037 in 2006 “to affect legislative policymaking in areas of economic and social interest,” according to its most recent IRS form 990. And roughly one quarter of its funding — more than $34,000 — came from labor unions that year.

The connections extend beyond financing.

Ocean State Action’s secretary-treasurer, a union title generally equivalent to the chief financial officer, is Robert A. Walsh Jr., the executive director of the group’s upstairs neighbor and landlord, the National Education Association.

Walsh regularly joins other union leaders in playing a visible role at State House rallies to protest budget cuts that would hurt Ocean State Action’s members.

“The reality is that for a lot of our various advocacy organizations and service organizations, it takes organized labor sometimes to push them over the top in terms of helping them build the power they need to win on their issue,” says Karen Malcolm, executive director of Ocean State Action. “In turn, labor gains new alliances and partnerships. Labor gains support –– whenever you work an alliance there is a give and take.”

Moakley called the formation of alliances “a smart strategic move” for a group that is losing members by the thousands. “They have developed into multi-faceted organizations and that’s something that will keep them in the game,” she said.

The alliances extend beyond other interest groups.

Currently, AFL-CIO President Frank J. Montanaro is the national committeeman for the state Democratic Party, and Marcia Reback, president of the Rhode Island Federation of Teachers and Health Professionals, serves as its assistant treasurer.

And a host of new alliances — similar to Ocean State Action — has sprung up in recent years. They have names like the Campaign for Rhode Island’s Priorities and Unity R.I., and they often include the backing of the same labor leaders seeking to broaden their union’s reach and change its image.

“The face of labor has definitely changed,” Moakley said. “They may be in the process of reinventing themselves.”

Montanaro, for example, is also listed as chairman of the board for the group Working Rhode Island, according to 2006 tax filings submitted by the nonprofit group that boasts more than 100,000 active and retired members.

Working Rhode Island, which was created in 2004, is essentially a political arm of the labor movement, although it cannot make financial donations to candidates. The group regularly organizes rallies (such as the State House event last week that drew 2,000 rowdy union supporters), buys political advertisements, and produces the weekly television show Labor Vision, which often knocks labor’s critics. (For more on the rally, see M. Charles Bakst’s column on D1.)

“The governor thought this grand alliance was forming and that we were going to raise millions of dollars to spend against him,” laughed Working Rhode Island’s secretary-treasurer, Walsh, the same man who heads the National Education Association of Rhode Island and serves as the secretary-treasurer of Ocean State Action.

Working Rhode Island, according to Walsh, has monthly board meetings at the Smith Hill headquarters of the AFL-CIO. (Nee also sits on the Working Rhode Island board.)

Tax records suggest that Working Rhode Island serves as a conduit for distributing large sums of money to and from labor’s allies.

So far this year, Walsh says, Working Rhode Island has given $25,000 to Ocean State Action.

The recommended membership fee for each union is $6 per member per year, although some pay a bit more, according to Walsh. According to the group’s 2006 IRS tax form 990, Working Rhode Island’s top contributors include: Rhode Island AFL-CIO ($255,000), the National Education Association of Rhode Island ($73,500), the United Nurses and Allied Professionals ($23,400) and Harrah’s Operating Company Inc. ($200,000), which was backing a ballot measure that year aimed at building a casino in Rhode Island, against Governor Carcieri’s wishes.

The IRS form did not specify how Working Rhode Island spent its money, although $284,279 went to the production of a “publication regarding the rights of working people in the state of Rhode Island.” Another $337,567 went to produce “radio spots regarding the rights of workers in Rhode Island.” Walsh acknowledges that the form wasn’t as specific as it perhaps should have been.

Working Rhode Island, which has no paid staff, spends $24,000 each year to produce Labor Vision, which runs on public access television and often features Walsh as a host. Walsh said that the group also regularly spent thousands to help sponsor events hosted by groups such as Clean Water Action and Ocean State Action.

APPROXIMATELY 15 percent of Rhode Island’s work force — or 75,000 people — were members of labor unions in 2007.

That’s a drop of 1,000 workers from the previous year and 4,000 from the year before that, according to the federal Bureau of Labor Statistics.

“I think the whole idea of this being a union state is changing,” Moakley said.

An estimated 26 percent of the state’s work force belonged to unions in 1964, according to a 2001 study published in the Monthly Labor Review.

And membership has been falling steadily since the exodus of industrial jobs that dominated the end of the last century. Labor unions, which draw political and practical strength largely from their dues-paying members, have been desperately reaching out to new industries in recent years to control the losses.

Public-sector employees have dominated the union ranks in recent decades as the private sector continues to shed union jobs.

In 1987, for example, there were more private-sector union workers (49,514) than public-sector employees (46,092), according to unionstats.com, which tracks labor trends based on the Current Population Survey. At that time, 13 percent of all private jobs were unionized, compared with 66.6 percent in the public sector.

The disparity continues today. While public-sector membership peaked in the mid-1990s at close to 70 percent, last year, 63.7 percent of public workers belonged to unions. The private-sector percentage had fallen to a new low of 7.5 percent.

Labor has struggled to increase its ranks and influence for decades, according to Nee, who became a full-time State House lobbyist for the AFL-CIO in 1983. He recalls major legislative defeats that date to the loss of strike benefits in 1985.

“It’s never been easy. It’s some people’s political agenda … to say these people get everything they want,” he said in an interview from the AFL-CIO’s Smith Hill office, which overlooks the State House. “I would say by and large, we’ve done a pretty good job of ensuring that workers get decent protections under the law … and we’re proud of that. But it’s a struggle.”

Carcieri, a vocal critic of labor unions in the past, declined to be interviewed for this article.

At least one national organization suggests that labor leaders in Rhode Island haven’t been struggling quite as badly as their counterparts around the country.

The anti-labor group Alliance for Worker Freedom, which studied labor policies in each of the United States, notes that Rhode Island has the 12th-highest union density in the nation, with more union members as a percentage of its work force than every New England state except Connecticut (15.6 percent). The national average is just over 12 percent, according to federal data.

Overall, the organization gave the Ocean State an F — 0 out of 10 — for having among the most labor-friendly policies in the country. Connecticut was the only New England state to share the worst possible score, which judged such things as the state’s public pension system, collective bargaining rights, worker compensation laws, the minimum wage and right-to-work laws that allow forced union membership in some workplaces.

The Alliance for Worker Freedom noted that Rhode Island’s current policies are friendlier to labor unions than practices in states with higher union densities such as Ohio (C-), Michigan (C) and Alaska (C).

THERE IS EVIDENCE that Rhode Island’s labor unions are on their heels.

Mounting public criticism of generous lifetime pensions has caught the attention of lawmakers, who have passed a series of changes in recent years — and even in recent weeks — that were strongly opposed by organized labor.

As state and local budgets are strained, lawmakers’ priorities seem to have shifted away from preserving worker pay and benefits that they see as out of step with the private sector.

“Over the years, we’ve been very generous [to labor],” said Stephen Alves, the Senate Finance Committee chairman. “Times have been good. We’ve been able to afford it. Now, we can no longer afford it. We don’t have money. We’re knocking kids off RIte Care. … Everybody knows things have to change.”

“The idea of [state retirees] getting health care forever needs to change,” Alves said. “If I had to go back [to labor] and say you have to work five additional years [to qualify for retiree health care benefits] and I could keep a kid at least getting adequate health care, in my book, that’s more of a priority.”

And William J. Murphy, the Speaker of the House and arguably the most powerful politician on Smith Hill, isn’t considered a friend to organized labor. Murphy recently made news when he unexpectedly endorsed a 401(k)-like retirement plan for all new state workers instead of the current system that gives retirees fixed payments for life.

The labor faction was not happy.

“We’re in a very, very difficult time right now. You’re going to probably suffer some losses in this time. The question is staying strong enough so when things get better, you can rebound,” said Nee, adding that labor is playing a lot more defense than offense these days. “We’re drafting a lot of linebackers right now.”

But, does Nee think that labor unions have tremendous influence on Smith Hill?

“We hope so. That’s our goal,” Nee said. “Our goal is to be as strong a force as we can to protect the economic interests of working people. We’re not going to shy away from that. I guess it’s for others to judge how much power we have.”