Intended as background material for the annual meeting of the Education Commission of the States, this document attempts to answer basic questions inherent in teacher negotiations. The first section discusses teacher militancy, current status of legislation, and contents of teacher negotiation laws. The second section considers issues facing legislators in dealing with collective bargaining by governmental employees. Information presented on items being negotiated is from a study conducted by the National Education Association, which has some 1,540 written agreements between boards and teachers on file. Each agreement was analyzed, and a list of 150 negotiable items in 15 categories was compiled. The third section consists of a reprint of a Time Essay, "The Worker's Rights & the Public Weal." Appendix A contains 10 fact sheets covering specific topics related to collective bargaining for teachers. Appendix B consists of negotiation statutes from the States of California, Connecticut, Florida, Rhode Island, and Wisconsin. (Table III, pp. 17a-17d may be of poor quality in hard copy because of small print.) (MLF)