New Super Union Goes Forward but Questions Remain

December 8, 2009

Yesterday, Rose Ann De Moro, Executive Director of the California Nurses Association, pulled off a stunning victory that has been nearly 15 years in the making.  With the merger of the California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee, Massachusetts Nurses Association and United American Nurses – De Moro’s dream of building a national union for registered nurses is finally complete (with the formation of National Nurses United or NNU).

However, while the merger engineered by De Moro places her firmly in control of the new entity – NNU – big questions remain.  Last week, the President of the United American Nurses (Anne Converso) filed a legal action seeking to block the merger with a temporary restraining order (TRO).  Joining Converso was a nurse from the Illinois Nurses Association.  In the action, the plaintiffs maintained that the UAN would be “dissolved” if the merger was allowed to go forward. On Friday of last week, Judge Blanche Manning, US District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, ruled against imposing a TRO.  This development cleared the way for the NNU Convention to proceed.

But what happens now?  The fundamental problem that remains for the newly minted National Nurses United is the lingering question that has kept these groups (i.e. CNA and UAN) apart for years…ideology!  The fact remains that some of the former UAN State Nursing Associations (i.e. Illinois Nurses Association,  Iowa Nurses Association, Colorado Nurses Association, etc.), have serious ideological differences with De Moro’s CNA. 

On issues like the Magnet Process, the value of Shared Governance, the value of Health Information Technology, and the need for a single payer healthcare system – the more moderate former UAN members (like Illinois) would likely have nothing in common with the hard-left perspective of the folks in California, Michigan, or Massachusetts.  This means that yesterday’s vote is likely not the last word on the “Super Union” issue.  As groups like the Illinois Nurses Association come under the thumb of De Moro’s NNU, they will have a decision to make – to stay or go.  However, even if some of the more moderate state nursing associations do decide to go it alone or join up with the National Federation of Nurses (a more moderate alternative to De Moro’s NNU), De Moro’s success will be none-the-less stellar. 

De Moro’s influence on the entire field of unions representing nurses has been undeniable.  Now, with the creation of the NNU, De Moro has her hands firmly on the controls of the largest, and arguably the most militant, nurse advocacy group in the U.S.