1903 -- Women’s Trade Union League founded to organize working women into trade unions and integrate the concerns of working women into the suffrage movement. America’s first nurse registration laws pass.

1904 -- MNA is founded with the goal of lobbying the state of Michigan to establish secure licensure for nurses.

1909 -- MNA efforts result in passage of the first nursing practice act.

1932 -- The Norris-LaGuardia Anti-Injunction Act is passed in order to limit the ability of federal judges to issue injunctions in labor disputes

1934 -- MNA sets goals for 8-hour work-day for nurses.

1935 -- The National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) guarantees private sector employees the right to organize unions and to require employers to bargain with unions. The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) was composed in order to oversee the act.

1938 -- Nation’s first law defining nursing and requiring licensure for practice passes.

1938 -- The Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) establishes a minimum hourly wage, premium pay for overtime work, equal pay for men and women, and rules for child labor for private and public sector employees.

1940 -- $4.00 per day, plus two meals, is the most common salary paid to graduate nurses in Detroit. Women compose 25% of the total workforce.

1946 -- ANA establishes a collective bargaining department in response to a declining RN workforce. This economic security program addresses poor working conditions and inadequate nursing salaries.

1958 -- MNA establishes an Economic Security Program to address salary and benefits issues for nurses.

1959 -- The Labor-Management Reporting and Disclosure Act (LMRDA) or Landrum-Griffin Act is passed. The act prohibits union corruption, regulates union election procedures, and protects individual rights within unions. It applies to unions within the private sector.

1960 -- MNA publishes employment standards for all RN positions. Women equal 33% of the total workforce.

1963 -- The Equal Pay Act is passed which established that women and men should receive equal pay for equal work. The EPA is an amendment of the FLSA of 1938.

1964 -- Title VII of the Civil Rights Act is passed and prevents discrimination on the basis of race, color, gender, nationality, or religion.

1965 -- Collective Bargaining efforts began through the MNESO division of MNA, which later became the Economic and General Welfare Program.

1966 -- MNA officials sign the State’s first RN Labor Agreement. It calls for a raise for staff nurses at Highland Park General Hospital.

1967 -- The Age Discrimination in Employment Act (ADEA) is passed to prevent discrimination against workers 40 years of age or older in the private sector, public agencies, employment agencies, and unions.

1970 -- MNA nurses develop a political action committee called Involved Nurses Politically United Together (INPUT) in order to make an impact and have their voice heard in the political arena in an organized fashion.

1970 -- The Occupational Health and Safety Act (OSHA) ensures safe and healthful working conditions to the majority of private sector employees.

1975 -- University of Michigan RN’s organize forming the single largest union of nurses in the state.

1977 -- Strike at Lansing General takes place in order to have a nursing practice committee recognized and to gain respect for RN’s.

1978 -- MNA helps rewrite the Public Health Code which defines contemporary nursing with new breadth and clarity. The new language included an elimination of the prohibition of diagnosis by nurses.

1980 -- Women equal 43% of total labor force. White women earn 63% and African American women earn 58% of the average white male weekly earnings.

1984 -- At the MNA House of Delegates, INPUT officially becomes the political arm of MNA, and the name is later changed to the Michigan Nurses Association Political Action Committee (MNA-PAC).

1984 -- MNA works with the Coalition of Michigan Organizations of Nursing (COMON) to sponsor the first Nursing Political Action Day.

1986 -- The Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act (COBRA) allows private sector employees and their family members to continue participation in group health plans on a self-paying basis after layoff, discharge, divorce, death or other qualifying event.

1988 -- The Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act (WARN) requires private sector employers to provide 60 days notice to employees prior to closings and mass layoffs.

1989 -- Nursing shortage takes its toll at U of M where RN’s strike over mandatory overtime and issues of patient care. The MNA-PAC is made the official political arm of the association.

1990 -- MNA represents more than sixty local bargaining units throughout the state. MNA is instrumental in the Supreme Court decision allowing nurses to organize in individual RN professional units. MNA continues to promote nursing’s agenda for health care reform and the Health Professional Recovery Act.

1990 -- The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) passes and prevents discrimination against qualified persons with disabilities.

1991 -- Nurses at Saginaw Public Health Department conduct the first public health RN work stoppage in the state.

1993 -- The Health Professionals Recovery Act, a key piece of MNA-sponsored legislation, is signed into law. MNA is instrumental in establishing the Nurse Professional Fund, which earmarks a portion of the state licensure fees for nursing research and scholarship.

1993 -- The Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) allows private sector and public employees to be absent from work or take leaves in the event of serious health conditions, childbirth, and or other qualifying events.

1993 -- The North American Agreement on Labor Cooperation (NAALC) supplements the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) by promoting improved labor conditions and the enforcement of the national labor laws in the United States, Canada, and Mexico.

1994 -- Marquette General RN’s retain control of staffing patterns after standing firm during a two month strike over patient safety issues. The 56-day strike was the longest in MNA history. MNA-PAC ranks in top 20 PAC’s in Michigan.

1995 -- MNA wins a landmark case before the National Labor Relations Board which clarified that nurses who direct the work are not supervisors and can organize.

1995 -- A MNA Labor Contract provides unprecedented rights for Sparrow Hospital Staff nurses regarding staffing levels and patient safety.

1995 -- MNA helps rewrite the Michigan Mental Health Code. The new code recognizes nurses as “ Mental Health Professionals” and includes nurses in expanded areas of practice.

1995 -- MNA receives a federal grant to help nurses assume a growing number of ambulatory care positions created as a result of hospital restructuring.

1995 -- MNA Members join more than 25,000 nurse colleagues to protest unsafe patient care in hospitals during the ANA co-sponsored “Nurses March in Washington.”

1995 -- Hackley Hospital RNs negotiate a contract that gives nurses the right to refuse Mandatory Overtime.

1999 -- Lapeer Regional Hospital Nurses strike for safe patient care.

2000 -- The United American Nurses is founded as the labor arm of the American Nurses Association. The first UAN House of Delegates is held.

2001 -- UAN and MNA affiliate with the AFL-CIO in order to create a cohesive voice for nurses and to support working women and men.

2001 -- Sparrow Hospital Professionals negotiate contract language that transitions employees who have work restrictions that impair an employees ability to perform essential functions of their job (with or without reasonable accommodation) to restricted duty jobs at their union rate of pay and benefits.

2001 -- Sparrow Hospital Professionals negotiate a system contractually requiring staffing levels on each patient care unit which reflect analysis of individual and aggregate patient needs including level of acuity, preparation/experience of those providing care, number of patients, and availability of float pool.

2001 -- University of Michigan RN’s negotiate Mandatory Overtime language that limits the amount of overtime that can be worked by RN’s and provides for overtime bonuses of up to two and a half times pay for nurses who volunteer.

2002 -- Hackley Hospital RNs negotiate a health reimbursement account to help them pay for health insurance premiums and other medical expenses during retirement.

2002 -- Whistleblower’s legislation is passed to protect employees who report unsafe conditions at work. Previously, employees were only protected when they reported illegal conditions.

2003 -- The United American Nurses achieve their autonomy from the American Nurses Association at the ANA House of Delegates 2003 by voting “yes” to bylaw changes which established the UAN as an “associate organizational member.”

6/14/07