The 1958 Election occurred in the middle of President Eisenhower's second term. As is common in midterm elections, the party in the White House lost seats, but losses that year were on a huge scale, perhaps due to the high unemployment of the Recession of 1958. The Eisenhower Administration's position on "right-to-work" issues galvanized labor unions which supported Democrats. The launch of Sputnik may also have been a factor. The Democratic Party took thirteen Republican seats (10 of them by defeating incumbents), and also won both Senate seats in the new state of Alaska. Senate elections in 1959 in the new state of Hawaii were split between the two parties; combined with the 1958 results, this yielded an aggregate gain of 16 seats for the Democrats for a party balance of 65-35. This was the second-largest swing in the history of the Senate, only behind the Republican gains of 18 seats in 1866, and is only the third time in U.S.history that 10 or more Senate seats changed hands in a midterm election (after 1866 and 1946).