Here's a look at some of the key battles in the states over the past week.

Locked-out workers at American Crystal Sugar plants in Minnesota, North Dakota and Iowa will soon be returning to work after they ratified a contract late last week. The company locked out 1,300 workers, members of the Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers (BCTGM), in August 2011.

The more than 14,000 waterfront workers at 15 East and Gulf Coast ports have ratified a new six-year master agreement between the Longshoremen (ILA) and the port employer group the United States Maritime Alliance.

At a time when it seems nearly every state legislature is assaulting the rights of working families, Minnesota's House and Senate are bucking the trend and are likely to soon send Gov. Mark Dayton a series of strong pro-working family bills. According to Minnesota AFL-CIO Communications Director Chris Shields, this is the first time in 20 years the state government has been unified under one-party control, with the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party holding the governorship and the majority in both houses of the legislature.

Nurses at Chicago's Jackson Park Hospital recently reached an agreement with hospital officials on a collective bargaining contract, National Nurses United (NNU) reported. The nurses went out of their way to make sure the contract wasn't just about improving their own lives, but that it also focused on improving the lives of their patients.

Dozens of Georgia union members urged their state lawmakers to block several anti-worker bills now before the state House and Senate in the Georgia AFL-CIO’s annual Lobby Day Thursday. At the same time, they celebrated the passage of a resolution that honors Hurricane Sandy relief workers from Electrical Workers (IBEW) Local 84 and Georgia Power who traveled to New Jersey and elsewhere to help repair and recovery efforts.

Communications Workers of America (CWA) has reached two new tentative agreements with AT&T divisions with some 40,000 CWA members.   

Details of a tentative four-year agreement are being sent to CWA members who work for AT&T Mobility in 36 states and the District of Columbia. The workers are customer service representatives, technicians and retail store workers. Also, the union announced a tentative agreement with AT&T West with about 18,000 CWA members at AT&T operations in California and Nevada.

One group of workers at Boeing’s Pacific Northwest facilities voted to accept the company’s latest contract offer, while a second voted to reject the deal and to authorize a strike if necessary, the Society of Professional Engineering Employees in Aerospace (SPEEA)/IFPTE Local 2001 announced Tuesday.

The National Federation of Nurses (NFN) will affiliate with AFT, the leaders of the two unions announced today. Some 34,000 registered nurses in Montana, Ohio, Oregon and Washington State are NFN members.

By a better than 2-to-1 margin, the teachers, counselors and social workers at César Chávez Academy, the largest charter school in Detroit, voted Thursday to join the Michigan Alliance of Charter Teachers and Staff (Michigan ACTS), an affiliate of AFT Michigan.