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- Today we tell about one of the great labor activists, Cesar Chavez.
- He organized the first successful farm workers union in American history.
- Cesar Chavez was born on a small farm near Yuma, Arizona in 1927.
- In the late nineteenth century, Cesario Chavez, Cesar’s grandfather, had started the Chavez family farm after escaping slavery on a Mexican farm.
- Cesar Chavez spent his earliest years on this farm.
- When he was ten years old, however, the economic conditions of the Great Depression forced his parents to give up the family farm.
- He then became a migrant farm worker along with the rest of his family.
- The Chavez family joined thousands of other farm workers who traveled around the state of California to harvest crops for farm owners.
- They traveled from place to place to harvest grapes, lettuce, beets and many other crops.
- They worked very hard and received little pay.
- These migrant workers had no permanent homes.
- They lived in dirty, crowded camps.
- They had no bathrooms, electricity or running water.
- Like the Chavez family, most of them came from Mexico.
- Because his family traveled from place to place, Cesar Chavez attended more than thirty schools as a child.
- He learned to read and write from his grandmother.
- Mama Tella also taught him about the Catholic religion.
- Religion later became an important tool for Mr. Chavez.
- He used religion to organize Mexican farm workers who were Catholic.
- Cesar’s mother, Juana, taught him much about the importance of leading a non-violent life.
- His mother was one of the greatest influences on his use of non-violent methods to organize farm workers.
- His other influences were the Indian activist Mahatma Gandhi and American civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Junior.
- Mr. Chavez said his real education began when he met the Catholic leader Father Donald McDonnell.
- Cesar Chavez learned about the economics of farm workers from the priest.
- He also learned about Gandhi’s nonviolent political actions as well as those of other great nonviolent leaders throughout history.
- In 1948, Mr. Chavez married Helena Fabela whom he met while working in the grape fields in central California.
- They settled in Sal Si Puedes.
- Later, while Mr. Chavez worked for little or no money to organize farm workers, his wife harvested crops.
- In order to support their eight children, she worked under the same bad conditions that Mr. Chavez was fighting against.
- There were other important influences in his life.
- In 1952, Mr. Chavez met Fred Ross, an organizer with a workers’ rights group called the Community Service Organization.
- Mr. Chavez called Mr. Ross the best organizer he ever met.
- Mr. Ross explained how poor people could build power.
- Mr. Chavez agreed to work for the Community Service Organization.
- Mr. Chavez worked for the organization for about ten years.
- During that time, he helped more than 500,000 Latino citizens to vote.
- He also gained old-age retirement money for 50,000 Mexican immigrants.
- He served as the organization’s national director.
- However, in 1962, he left the organization.
- He wanted to do more to help farm workers receive higher pay and better working conditions.
- He left his well paid job to start organizing farm workers into a union.
- It took Mr. Chavez and Delores Huerta, another former CSO organizer, three years of hard work to build the National Farm Workers Association.
- Mr. Chavez traveled from town to town to bring in new members.
- He held small meetings at workers’ houses to build support.
- The California-based organization held its first strike in nineteen sixty-five.
- The National Farm Workers Association became nationally known when it supported a strike against grape growers.
- The group joined a strike organized by Filipino workers of the Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee.
- Mr. Chavez knew that those who acted non-violently against violent action would gain popular support.
- Mr. Chavez asked that the strikers remain non-violent even though the farm owners and their supporters sometimes used violence.
- One month after the strike began, the group began to boycott grapes.
- They decided to direct their action against one company, the Schenley Corporation.
- The union followed grape trucks and demonstrated wherever the grapes were taken.
- Later, union members and Filipino workers began a twenty-five day march from Delano to Sacramento, California, to gain support for the boycott.
- Schenley later signed a labor agreement with the National Farm Workers Association.
- It was the first such agreement between farm workers and growers in the United States.
- The union then began demonstrating against the Di Giorgio Corporation.
- It was one of the largest grape growers in California.
- Di Giorgio held a vote and the International Brotherhood of Teamsters was chosen to represent the farm workers.
- But an investigation proved that the company and the Teamsters had cheated in the election.
- Another vote was held.
- Cesar Chavez agreed to combine his union with another and the United Farm Workers Organizing Committee was formed.
- The farm workers elected Mr. Chavez’s union to represent them.
- Di Giorgio soon signed a labor agreement with the union.
- Mr. Chavez often went for long periods without food to protest the conditions under which the farm workers were forced to do their jobs.
- Mr. Chavez went on his first hunger strike, or fast, in 1968.
- He did not eat for 25 days.
- He was called a hero for taking this kind of personal action to support the farm workers.
- Th union then took action against Giumarra Vineyards Corporation, the largest producer of table grapes in the United States.
- It organized a boycott against the company’s products.
- The boycott extended to all California table grapes.
- By 1970, the company agreed to sign contracts.
- A number of other growers did as well.
- By this time the grape strike had lasted for five years.
- It was the longest strike and boycott in United States labor history.
- Cesar Chavez had built a nationwide coalition of support among unions, church groups, students, minorities and other Americans.
- By 1973, the union had changed its name to the United Farm Workers of America.
- It called for another national boycott against grape growers as relations again became tense.
- By 1975, a reported seventeen million Americans were refusing to buy non-union grapes.
- The union’s hard work helped in getting the Agricultural Labor Relations Act passed in California, under Governor Jerry Brown.
- It was the first law in the nation that protected the rights of farm workers.
- By the 1980s, the UFW had helped tens of thousands of farm workers gain higher pay, medical care, retirement benefits and better working and living conditions.
- But relations between workers and growers in California worsened under a new state government.
- Boycotts were again organized against the grape industry.
- In 1988, at the age of 61, Mr. Chavez began another hunger strike.
- That fast lasted for 36 days and almost killed him.
- The fast was to protest the poisoning of grape workers and their children by the dangerous chemicals growers used to kill insects.
- In 1984 Cesar Chavez made this speech, predicting the future success of his efforts for Latinos.
- "Like the other immigrant groups, the day will come when we win the economic and political rewards which are in keeping with our numbers in society."
- "The day will come when the politicians will do the right thing for our people out of political necessity and not out of charity or idealism."
- Cesar Chavez died in 1993 at the age of 66.
- More than 40,000 people attended his funeral.
- A year later, President Clinton awarded him the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian honor in the United States.
- The United Farm Workers Union still fights for the rights of farm workers throughout the United States.
- Many schools, streets, parks, libraries and other public buildings have been named after Cesar Chavez.
- The great labor leader always believed in the words "Si se puede." "It can be done."