General German Trade Union Federation

Nonetheless, on 2 May 1933 the SA and SS stormed the offices of the ADGB and its member trade unions, seized their assets and arrested their leaders, crushing the organization.

The ADGB was founded as the new umbrella organization to succeed the General Commission of Germany's Trade Unions (Generalkommission der Gewerkschaften Deutschlands).

[3] The adjective "Allgemeiner" ("general")[note 1] was added to the name because in March 1919, the Christian and liberal trade unions had already founded umbrella organizations called the Deutscher Gewerkschaftsbund.

Roughly 12 million workers took part,[4] halting all production, transportation, mining and public services and, as The New York Times wrote, "giving the Kapp régime its death blow".

Together, the SPD and the ADGB fought for the introduction unemployment benefits and a legally mandated eight-hour workday, which was gutted by regulations established in 1923.

At the end of 1931, they united with the Reichsbanner and workers' sport clubs to form the Iron Front against the growing threat of the Nazi Party.

This changed in 1929, when the KPD, under pressure from the Soviet Union, began to run competing candidates at factory works council elections.

On 2 May 1933 all ADGB member union were stormed, their offices occupied and assets seized[11] by the SA, SS[14] and the National Socialist Factory Cell Organization.

On 29 July 1928 the cornerstone was laid for the Bundesschule des Allgemeinen Deutschen Gewerkschaftsbundes (ADGB Trade Union School) in Bernau bei Berlin, Brandenburg.

[15][18] In 2008 the restoration project won the architects, Brenne Gesellschaft von Architekten, the World Monuments Fund / Knoll Modernism Prize.