Locations
Los Angeles, CA: Community Service Organization (CSO) offices
Delano, CA: 40 Acres Union office
Sacramento: capital of California
Characters
Cesar Chavez: civil rights leader and labor organizer. His Catholic faith inspired much of his non-violent work. Founded United Farm Workers (UFW) with his wife, Helen.
Delores Huerta: labor organizer, lead negotiator in the workers' contract after the strike
Larry Itliong: Filipino organizer of AWOC, later combined with UFW.
Fred Ross: had worked for Saul Alinsky, Chicago community organizer, founded CSO in LA in 1948
Jerry Cohen: UFW lawyer, protested Vietnam
Robert Kennedy: New York Senator, Attorney General to President John F Kennedy. Supported the Civil Rights Movement. Assassinated in 1968.
Mr. Bogdanovich: Fictional farm owner. Immigrant who built his own business
Governor Ronald Reagan: of California. Didn’t support strikes or workers, later a US President
President Richard Nixon: makes deals to support farm owners to break boycott
Dates
1834 “Mill Girls” textile workers protest wage cuts
1867 Chinese immigrant railroad workers strike, owners starve them out
1877 Irish immigrant coal miners protest, 19 hanged
1911 Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire kills 150 workers
1935 National Labor Relations Act: gives workers the right to unionize. (Doesn’t include
farm workers.)
1938: Fair Labor Standards Act: Child Labor Laws
1950s Chavez does training with CSO, registers laborers to vote
1962 Chavez moves family from LA to Delano, starts United Farm Workers
1965 Filipino work camp strike, the two movements join together
1966 Pilgrimage 340 miles to state capital, Sacramento
1968 Chavez fasts 25 day for nonviolence
1970 growers sign agreements to end boycott and five year strike
1975 Agriculture Labor Relations Act gives farm workers right to organize
Farm Labor Injustices
no minimum wage, no bathrooms, paying for water. child labor, goal: keep people uneducated
hard labor hurts the body, no health insurance or disability pay. life expectancy: 49 years, no safety protections. Many big farms are dependent on undocumented labor: owners don’t have to provide the same human rights as to US Citizens.
Spanish
Si se puede! Yes, we can!
Huelga: strike
La Causa: the Cause
Non-Violence Strategies
Unions: bringing people together empowers them. fights for safety, reasonable hours and wages
Credit Union: Many poor people don’t have bank accounts, opportunity for small loans.
Union Newspaper: educating people, helping them know their rights, sending info about events and strikes. Cartoons help people who can’t read see new ideas.
Strike: Workers refuse to work. Historically, the police have helped owners by arresting workers
Boycott: getting the large community to refuse to buy a product.
Fasting: like Jesus and Gandhi, Chavez fasted from food. He did it mostly to inspire his own followers to commit to non-violence. Got national attention. He broke his fast with communion (Catholic/Christian ritual of bread and wine to remember Jesus’ body and blood)
Pilgrimage: Chavez utilized his religious tradition to make their march a pilgrimage. Historically, Catholics would walk hundreds of miles to visit a holy site and seek God.
US Justice System
Police overlooked owners or locals harming strikers, favored the rich and powerful. Intimidation, violence, arresting without a crime. Judges and lawyers make rules against workers’ rights.
Slurs
beaner: anti-Mexican slur insulting a main type of food.
greaser: 1950s insult, maybe referred to the job of greasing axels.
wetback: slur for immigrants who recently swam across the Rio Grande
spic: uncertain origins, overlaps with anti-Italian insults.
brown n*****: compares Latinx to another despised people group
illegals: undocumented immigrants, dehumanizes people to focus on a minor crime
Discussion Questions
- A rich farm owner says, “The farm workers chose this life. If it wasn’t good enough, they could go get a different job.” What hurdles did the farm workers face that made this untrue? Can minimum wage workers today easily get better jobs?
- Farm and other US industries still run on undocumented labor today to maximize profits. Many people blame the immigrants for crossing the border and for working for low wages. How can we solve these problems?
- Cesar Chavez incorporated his faith in his activism. How can your work be inspired by faith?
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