The Great Depression and the New Deal
In the summer of 1933 President Franklin Roosevelt urged the coal mining workforce to join the union. By no time at all workers everywhere were flocking to the union by the thousands. The miners believed that Roosevelt was trying to get them recognition of the United Mine Workers of America. The coal industry was dangerous work and was getting worse with the great depression in 1929. Unemployment rose while wages were cut. The United Mine Workers (MNW) lost 300,000 patrons in seven years. Workers organized themselves to get improved working conditions and a union contract. By 1930 the union victory was not final but the developments showed the forces that changed America.
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