On a cold winter day, thousands gathered in front of the White House to demonstrate against racial injustice and out-of-control unemployment. Holding signs saying, “We Demand Work or Wages” and “Fight Police Brutality,” Black and White workers picketed until police broke up the crowd with billy clubs and tear gas. Meanwhile, the president watched from the White House.
This sounds like it could have happened in the past few months. But it was March 6, 1930, International Unemployment Day. With joblessness soaring after the 1929 stock market crash, it represented one of the first nationwide demonstrations where Whites and Blacks — most members of the Communist Party — locked arms against an unfair system.