VIVA LA RAZA SPRINGBOARDS®

iDurable, Si, Callado, No!

Manuel Montez is a Mexican-American farm-labor leader. He was asked to talk to a group of Anglo merchants and growers in Arizona to explain why farm workers need a union. Before he had a chance to begin, an Anglo grower stood up and asked, "Weren't Mexican workers getting along all right until the union moved in?"

Almost before the first man sat down a merchant raised his hand. "I've known many wonderful Mexi-can people," he said. "And the ones I've known have always been happy the way they live. Why do you

want to change all that?" Montez looked at the group. Then he said, "I'm

waiting for one of you to say that Mexicans are better farm laborers than other people because they are built low to the ground!"

The audience laughed uneasily. Then Montez said "That is not so funny if you know that a U. S. senator actually said such a thing." The audience quieted down. "And I'll ask you this," he went on. "If we Chicanos have always been so happy working in your fields, why have you had so many years of labor trouble?

"Let me tell you," Montez continued, "that before Copyright © 1972 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc. All rights reserved.

your fathers were born, hundreds of cowboys in Texas went on strike. Their leader was a Mexican named Juan Gomez. And when your fathers were young, over a thousand Mexican and Japanese farm laborers went on strike in California." The Anglos were beginning to pay attention.

"Did you know that La Confederation de Uniones Obreras Mexicanas was organized in California in 1927?" M6ntez paused a moment. "That union organized over 3,000 farm workers. In 1928 they struck in the Imperial Valley. And in 1930 5,000 laborers struck. In 1933 and 1936 more strikes occurred. Don't you people understand that we Mexican-Americans have always been fighting for a better life? Who told you how happy we have been? Huelga is an old battle cry.

"Let me read you the words of one Mexican-American labor leader who is now working in California." Montez began reading a newspaper clip-ping. " 'In the fields the bosses shout at us in front of our wives and families. They insult our womenfolk and bully our children. And because we are so poor, we cannot afford to lose the job. We take it.'

"Because we are a durable people, many of us do 'take it.' We have learned how to live with hardships. But many of us will not just 'take it' any longer. We are becoming strong. A few months ago a group of Chicano farm workers in Texas marched more than 400 miles to protest their working conditions. We Mexican-Americans are or-ganizing all over the Southwest. And La Causa will be known throughout the land!" By his audience's reaction, Montez knew he had made his point.

Chavez dijo — iBasta!

C^sar Chdvez is a strong farm-labor leader in California. He is the leader of the United Farm Workers Organizing Committee (UFWOC). Chavez was born in Yuma, Arizona, in 1927, the same year La Confederation de Uniones Obreras Mexicanas was organized. He grew up working in the fields of the San Joaquin Valley in California. He was a boy when Con-gress passed the National Labor Relations Act, an act designed to help labor unions, but not farm workers. The government has never given any aid to farm workers. But it pays farmers to not grow crops.

Cesar Chavez is like the history of his people. He has a kind and quiet face, but he is tough. Chavez seems very gentle, but he can use force. His eyes show patience, but Cesar Chavez is not patient. One of his cries for the farm workers is basta—enough. The farm-union members know that when Cesar Chavez says basta he means it. And the growers are beginning to realize it, too.

But the most common word the farm workers use is huelga— strike. The union pickets shout huelga through every row of the vineyards and lettuce fields.

"Come with us, amigos." "Go with La Causa now." "Huelga—ahora, amigos." Again and again, these cries echo through the hot,

dusty fields. The farm-labor pickets continue. Women in straw hats and old men bent from many years of labor walk along the roads yelling huelga. Cesar Chavez hopes that someday all farm workers will join La Causa.

A few years ago, Chavez told a newspaper reporter: "In agriculture, we're trying to organize in sort of a jungle. The farmer doesn't want change. We want it. So we set the pace and we have to set some rules for ourselves or there could be violence."

In another conversation with a writer, Chavez said: "We are a union family celebrating our unity and the nonviolence of our movement. . . . If we are really honest with ourselves, we must admit that our lives are all that really belong to us."

He finished a speech to his followers by saying, "To be a man is to suffer for others." Cesar Chavez, has suffered for others all his life. The Need for Unity

Two men were talking one afternoon as they sat in the hot sun that grows the grapes. One was an old man—a union man who had spent his life in the fields. He was talking to his friend, an Anglo writer. "It really hurts me a lot when a Chicano tells me, 'You people are lazy, you should go back to work.' When a grower insults me, or even hits me, you know, I don't

care. It doesn't bother me. But when a Chicano—a person of La Raza—tells me that we are communists and that they will continue to buy grapes, I really feel hurt, you know. Because I say these people at one time or another have suffered discrimination them-selves. Now they have a Thunderbird and a good job and they don't want to know us any more."

"Do you know what a latifundio is?" asked another farm-union leader. "Well, in Spanish and Mexican history, the latifundio was a farm system that decided the number of workers needed. The growers never had to worry about having enough cheap labor to care for their crops. Today, the growers in America also want a latifundio. We are too close to the Mexican border and they have always been able to import many, many workers at cheap pay." The Grape Strike

The growers never believed that the Chicano farm workers could start a strong union. But they were wrong. They did not understand the feelings of the workers. Before Chavez got the farm workers or-ganized, the growers forced them to work 14 hours a day. They made less than a dollar an hour. And they could only work part of the year—only during a harvest. The farm workers and their families suffered.

When Chavez and other farm-union organizers went to work, they did so quietly, the farm workers knew what had happened to other workers who had joined a union. The growers and the local police could be violent. Union men had been beaten in the fields. Their wives had also been beaten. Chavez knew his union had to be strong before it could be effective. So he worked quietly to build strength.

The United Farm Workers Organizing Committee now has more than 20,000 members. In 1966 the UFWOC struck the California table-grape growers for better wages and working conditions. But the strike was not very effective. Some of the farm workers were so poor they had to pick grapes to be able to feed their families. The growers could still find men who would work for low pay.

The union decided to call a national boycott of table grapes. The union convinced people all over the country to stop buying California grapes. When Americans stopped buying grapes, the price of grapes went down and the growers suffered. One grower told a group of fellow California farmers that the grape market was gloomy. He spoke of warehouses full of unsold grapes, a slow market, and wholesale prices that had been cut in half. The grape boycott was so successful that even the dock workers in Great Britain refused to unload California grapes from ships in British ports.

The strike made the farm workers proud, but it cost them money, too. They had to provide food and shelter for their families. They had to buy clothes. They got help from their parent union-the AFL-CIO. They also got a little help from people all over the country. In order for the union to save as much money as possible, the union members got only $5.00 a week from union strike funds. They could get food from the union center, and some doctors gave them free care. But it was a very poor life.

In the spring of 1970, the union grape-pickers finally started winning. The growers in California began to realize that many people all over the country would rather buy union-label grapes. The growers were losing money. So, one by one, after four years of strikes and boycotts, the growers started making contracts with the United Farm Workers Organizing Committee.

Working Together

On a warm, sunny day in Delano, California, Cesar Chavez and Senator Robert Kennedy sat down together. It was time for the farm-labor leader to end his 27-day fast. Chavez had fasted for peace. He did not want La Causa to be violent.

The park in Delano was filled with thousands of people, mainly Mexican-Americans. Chavez talked to Kennedy and to all the people. He said, "We are a family bound together in a common struggle for justice." The senator didn't say anything, but he felt a closeness to the Mexican-Americans. He sensed the dignity, honor, and brotherhood that was there that day.

Robert Kennedy did not live to see the farm workers' dream start to become a reality. Cesar Chavez and the farm workers are still fighting for decent working conditions. But now some of the Mexican-Americans can look forward to a much better life for their children. They have worked long and hard for their share of the American dream.

DO YOU REMEMBER? (Do not write on this sheet unless instructed by your teacher.)

Part I: Words to Know durable callado uniones obreras huelga La Causa Chdvez dijo—i Basta! amigo ahora latifundio boycott

strong, steady quiet, staying in the background labor unions strike the cause, the desire to better the lives of Chicanos Chavez says enough! friend now large farming estate that used peons for laborers an organized refusal to buy goods, usually used as a way to weaken the seller of the goods the price at which farmers or other producers sell their goods to a store a legal agreement between two or more people or groups, often having to do with wages and working conditions

wholesale price contract

Part II: Write the letters for the answers you think are correct

1. Manuel Montez is a (a) grower; (b) farm-labor leader; (c) cowboy; (d) United States senator. 2. Some merchants and growers think the Mexicans don't need a union because (a) they are better at farm

work than Anglos; (b) they got along all right without one; (c) they are already making too much money; (d) unions are communistic.

3. Juan Gomez (a) organized La Confederation de Uniones Obreras Mexicanas; (b) led striking cowboys in Texas; (c) founded the UFWOC; (d) was a Spanish grower.

4. Huelga (a) is an old battle cry; (b) means "strike"; (c) is the call of the UFWOC; (d) all of the above. 5. Cdsar Chavez is (a) the leader of the United Farm Workers Organizing Committee; (b) a government

official; (c) a labor lawyer; (d) a Texas grower. 6. Cdsar Chdvez thinks that (a) growers must be punished; (b) violence is the only answer; (c) men must work

and suffer for others; (d) the UFWOC has finished its job. 7. In its struggle, the UFWOC has (a) picketed and boycotted; (b) used violent methods; (c) marched on

Washington; (d) sold grapes to raise money. 8. The purpose of the grape boycott was to (a) give farm workers control of the farms; (b) keep people from

buying grapes to put pressure on the growers; (c) feed the workers; (d) help pay union dues. 9. The farm workers suffer during a strike because (a) they like to eat grapes; (b) they don't get any support

from their union; (c) the union doesn't have enough money to pay them well while they are on strike; (d) no doctors will treat them.

10. The growers finally started to make contracts with the union because (a) they were losing money; (b) Congress passed a law saying that they had to make contracts; (c) Chdvez was a nonviolent leader; (d) they felt sorry for the workers.

AUTHOR: Grant Ball, social studies teacher, Newport Harbor High School, California. CONSULTANT: A. P. Diaz, Director of Instruction, Cedar Rapids Community Schools, Iowa.

PHOTO CREDITS: (p. 1) Pete Bentovoja, reproduced with permission of the Los Angeles Times', (p. 2) United Press International, (p. 3) United Press International. OTHER CREDITS: Page 2 quoted from the Los Angeles Times, 17 November 1968. NOBLE AND NOBLE, Publishers, Inc. ( 750 TH IRD AVENUE, NEW YORK, N. Y. 10017 Z518-5