Cesar Chavez

César Estrada Chávez (March 31 1927 – April 23 1993) was an American farm worker, labor leader, and activist who co-founded the National Farm Workers Association, which later became the United Farm Workers. His birthday on March 31 has subsequently become a holiday in a handful of U.S. states, and a number of parks, libraries, schools, and streets have been named in his honor in several cities across the United States.

Early Life

César Estrada Chavez, named after his grandfather, Cesario, was born near Yuma, Arizona on March 31, 1927. He died in San Luis, a small village near Yuma, on April 23, 1993.

According to the United Farm Workers web site, as a young Mexican American growing up in Arizona, Chavez was acquainted with prejudice and injustice from an early age. In one significant incident, the small adobe home where Cesar was born was swindled from his family by dishonest businessmen. Cesar's father had agreed to clear 80 acres of land and add to the home in exchange for the deed to 40 acres (16 ha) of land. The agreement was broken and the land sold to a man named Justus Jackson. Cesar's father then went to a lawyer who advised him to borrow money to buy the land. When Cesar's father could not pay the interest on the loan the lawyer bought back the land and sold it to the original owner. Cesar learned a lesson about injustice that he would never forget. Later, he would say, "The love for justice that is in us is not only the best part of our being, but it is also the most true to our nature."

He did not like school as a child, probably because he spoke only Spanish at home. The teachers didn't permit them to speak Spanish. Spanish was forbidden in school. He remembered being punished with a ruler to his knuckles for violating the rule. He also remembered that some schools were segregated and he felt that in the integrated schools he was like a monkey in a cage. He remembered having to listen to a lot of racist remarks. He remembered seeing signs that read whites only. He and his brother, Richard, attended thirty-seven schools. He felt that education had nothing to do with his farm worker/migrant way of life. In 1942 he graduated from the eighth grade. He could not attend high school because his father, Librado, had been in an accident and he did not want his mother, Juana, to work in the fields. Instead, he became a migrant farm worker.

While his childhood school education was not the best, later in life, education was his passion. The walls of his office in Keene, California (United Farm Worker Headquarters ) are lined with hundreds of books ranging from philosophy, economics, cooperatives, and unions, to biographies on Gandhi and the Kennedys. He believed that, "The end of all education should surely be service to others," a belief that he practiced until his death.

In 1944 he joined the Navy at the age of seventeen, serving a two year enlistment.

In 1948 Cesar married Helen Fabela. They honeymooned in California by visiting all the California Missions from Sonoma to San Diego. They settled in Delano, a town located in the grape-growing region of the San Joaquin Valley, and started their family. First Fernando, then Sylvia, then Linda, and five more children followed.

Cesar went to San Jose where he met and was influenced by Father Donald McDonnell. They talked about farm workers and strikes. Cesar began reading about St. Francis and Gandhi and nonviolence. After Father McDonnell came another very influential person, Fred Ross.

Cesar became an organizer for Ross's organization, the Community Service Organization - CSO. His first task was voter registration.

Career as a labor leader

Chávez was taught and trained by Pete Fielding, and started working as an organizer in 1952 for the Community Services Organization (CSO), a Latino civil rights group. Chávez urged Mexican-Americans to register and vote, and he traveled throughout California and made speeches in support of workers' rights. He became CSO's national director in the late 1950s.

Four years later, however, Chávez left the CSO. He co-founded the National Farm Workers Association (NFWA) with Dolores Huerta. In 1965, Filipino workers, under their organization the Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee (AWOC), initiated the Delano grape strike on September 8 to protest in favor of higher wages.

Six months later, Chávez and the NFWA led a strike of California grape-pickers on the historic farmworkers march from Delano to the California state capitol in Sacramento for similar goals. Through the recognition of common goals and methods, and the realization of the strengths of people formation, Mexicans, Mexican-Americans, Filipinos, and Filipino Americans jointly formed the United Farm Workers Organizing Committee (UFWOC), which would eventually evolve into the United Farm Workers of today. In addition to the strike, the UFW encouraged all Americans to boycott table grapes as a show of support. The strike lasted five years and got national attention. When the US Senate Subcommittee looked into the situation, Robert Kennedy gave Chávez his total support. This effort resulted in the first major labor victory for US farm workers.

These activities led to similar movements in South Texas in 1966 where the UFW supported fruit workers in Starr County, Texas, and led a march to the Texas state capital, Austin, in support of UFW farm worker's rights. In the Midwest, César Chávez' movement inspired the founding of two Midwestern independent unions: Obreros Unidos in Wisconsin in 1966.The Farm Labor Organizing Committee (FLOC) in Ohio in 1967. Former UFW organizers would also found the Texas Farm Workers Union in 1975.

In 1969, Chávez and members of the UFW marched through the Imperial and Coachella Valley to the border of Mexico to protest growers' use of illegal aliens as temporary replacement workers during a strike. Joining him on the march were both a Reverend Ralph Abernathy and a U.S. Senator Walter Mondale. Chávez and the UFW would often report suspected illegal aliens who served as temporary replacement workers as well as those who refused to unionize to the INS.

In the early 1970s, the UFW organized strikes and boycotts to protest for, and later win, higher wages for those farm workers who were working for grape and lettuce growers. During the 1980s, Chávez led a boycott to protest the use of toxic pesticides on grapes. He again fasted to draw public attention. These strikes and boycotts generally ended with the signing of bargaining agreements.

Legacy

César Chávez died on April 23, 1993, of unspecified natural causes. He is celebrated in a bill to create a paid state holiday in his honor. The holiday is celebrated on March 31, Chávez's birthday. Texas also recognizes the day. Also, in both Arizona and Colorado, it is an optional holiday. It is the first and only holiday honoring a Mexican-American in the United States.

His eldest son Fernando tours the country, speaking about his father's legacy of union organizing and fighting for workers' rights. Many cities have also paid respect by renaming or naming streets, schools, and buildings for Chávez (see List of places named after Cesar Chavez).

The California cities of Sacramento, San Diego, Berkeley, and San José have renamed parks after him, and in Amarillo Texas, a bowling alley has been renamed in his memory. Also, in 2004, the United States Postal Service honored him with a postage stamp. Also in 2005 there was a Cesar Chavez commemorative meeting in San Antonio for his courageous attitude towards freeing immigrant farmworkers and other immigrants.

Timeline

Places named after Chavez

References

Levy, Jacques E. and Cesar Chavez. Cesar Chavez: Autobiography of La Causa. New York: Norton, 1975. ISBN 0393074943
Dalton, Frederick John. The Moral Vision of César Chávez. Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis Books, 2003. ISBN 1570754586
Ross, Fred. Conquering Goliath : Cesar Chavez at the Beginning. Keene, California: United Farm Workers: Distributed by El Taller Grafico, 1989. ISBN 096252980X
Soto, Gary. Cesar Chavez: a Hero for Everyone. New York: Aladdin, 2003. ISBN 0689859236 and ISBN 0689859228 (pbk.)
Ferriss, Susan and Ricardo Sandoval. The Fight in the Fields: Cesar Chavez and the Farmworkers Movement. New York: Harcourt Brace, 1997. ISBN 0151002398
Handbook of Texas History, Online Edition
Jacob, Amanda Cesar Chavez Dominates Face Sayville: Mandy Publishers, 2005.

External links

"The Story of Cesar Chavez" United Farmworker's official biography of Chavez
"Cesar Chavez Timeline", Napa Valley Register, March 30, 2006.
Cesar Chavez Foundation
Spectrum Biographies-Cesar Chavez
Cesar Chavez Public Charter School for Public Policy in Washington, DC
The Fight in the Fields: Cesar Chavez and the Farmworker's Struggle PBS Documentary
Fresno Adult School (Cesar Chavez Campus)
Musical inspired by the life of Cesar Chavez
Cesar Chavez Student Center

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