Learning Objective #1: Discuss a historical event that exemplified nurses' use of innovative approaches to address workplace grievences

Learning Objective #2: Describe the successful use of a state nurses association to address workplace issues that compromised nurses' professionalism

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On the morning of September 15, 1966 the Chicago Sun Times declared, "Cook County Nurses Win Contract." This news was hailed as a victory to nurses across the United States who sought greater control over their professional practice and improved conditions for the provision of patient care. Cook County Hospital, founded in 1847 to care for Chicago's indigent population, had ranked among the nation's best hospitals. However, during the 1950s the institution's reputation had steadily declined. Wards that had been constructed to accommodate forty-five patients routinely housed ninety patients. Nurses routinely arrived to find there were no bed linens, while suction equipment and blood pressure cuffs either absent or malfunctioning. Nurses were asked to perform procedures beyond the legal boundaries of their practice because of an insufficient number of resident physicians. Each ward had only one telephone, so nurses waited in line to make necessary telephone calls. Although adverse conditions had prevailed at the hospital for several years, the passage of the Taft-Hartley Act in 1947, combined with the nursing profession's self-imposed “no-strike” policy had stripped them of the ability to bargain collectively with the hospital's Board of Directors, and had eliminated any coercive force otherwise available to the nurses. Empowered by the anti-establishment spirit of the times, in 1966 the nurses initiated a variety of contemporary “counter-culture” schemes to publicize their inability to deliver professional nursing care. Some of their approaches included a “patient feed-in”, advertisements on brightly painted busses, the extensive use of black drape, and a threatened mass resignation. This movement demonstrated the power of nurses' use of non-traditional approaches to publicize their grievances and to enlist public support for their cause. The action was important because it captured the attention of the national media and became the model for innovative protest measures available to nurses.