Nazi Factory Workers Movement

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Under the Nazis, factory workers lost their representation in government and their power to alter the government. After the Reichstag fire in 1933, leftist parties were outlawed, including the KPD, on suspicion of causing the fire. These parties represented the interests of the working class in the government. President Hindenburg granted emergency powers to Hitler and the Nazis. The outlaw of the leftist parties skewed the vote that ultimately gave the right to rule to the Nazis . When they had the power, the Nazis were anxious to keep it, so they prevented further elections which could invalidate their authority.
Along with the loss of their primary representatives in government, blue-collar workers were no longer able to collectively bargain. All labor unions were consolidated into the German Labor Front (DAF) in May of 1933. There was no longer industry specific unions. Laborers in different
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Although the DAF allowed workers to file complaints, workers were discouraged from doing so by the complexity of the complaint process. Workers had to file their complaint with members of their factory’s Vertrauensrat, “Council of Confidence”. With the Council of Confidence having only an advisory positon, a member of the Council of Confidence could bring complaints against actions of the plant leader before the Trustees of Labor but there was no guarantee that the Trustees would review it. Similar to the Council of Confidence, the Trustees of Labor had little, if any, real power despite overseeing multiple factories. When the Trustees received a complaint and the complaint was deemed “unfounded”, the complainant would be immediately dismissed from their job. With its limitations and complexities, this system failed to provide workers with reliable means to improve working conditions. However, to fail implies that there was an attempt to achieve this goal. Unfortunately, there was