Chicago’s Resurrection Health Care Workers Get Support from Obama

March 03, 2007

Resurrection Health care employees and supporters rally in Chicago.
PHOTO CREDIT: Linc Cohen

Nearly 2,000 Resurrection Health Care employees and their supporters from the labor community and religious groups, and lawmakers including U.S. Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.), rallied today in Chicago to support the Employee Free Choice Act, and the 10,000 Resurrection workers who are fighting to form a union with Council 31.

“Keep marching for justice,” Obama implored rally attendees. “Where there is injustice anywhere,” Obama continued, “it suppresses justice everywhere. And organized labor has a history of bringing about justice.”

U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin (D), U.S. Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D), AFSCME International Pres. Gerald W. McEntee and AFL-CIO Pres. John Sweeney also spoke at the rally. In addition to calling attention to the workers’ efforts to organize, the event raised public awareness about the importance of the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA), a bill that would level the playing field between workers and management during private-sector organizing campaigns.

The bill – approved March 1 by the U.S. House of Representatives by a margin of 241-185 – would allow workers to form unions when a majority affirms in writing they want one. Obama and Durbin have vowed to press for its passage in the Senate. For more on why the EFCA should become the law of the land, read this editorial from The New York Times [PDF].

To read more about the efforts of Resurrection Health Care workers to organize with Council 31, see this blog post from the AFL-CIO or visit Council 31'sReformResurrection.org. To find out how to get involved, click here.