In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

C H A P T E R 4 More Mutual Respect Than Ever in Our History IN the winter of 1968, when agricultural employment was scarce and farmworkers and their families in the California’s Central Valley began to go hungry, many UFWOC members became frustrated with the slow progress of the union’s strike against Delano grape growers, which had been underway for two and a half years. Cesar Chavez recalled, “There was demoralization in the ranks, people becoming desperate, more and more talk about violence.” Minor acts of violence had already occurred, such as the arson of a few packing sheds, and he knew that if he did not act, the level of violence would only escalate. He had built the UFWOC around the nonviolent resistance of primarily Mexican American farmworkers who, against all odds, had won important victories against the powerful forces of agribusiness. If he was going to prevent la causa from self-destructing, he had to do something drastic. In February Chavez therefore decided to fast as an act of penance in order to reaffirm the union’s commitment to nonviolence. He later explained, “I had to bring the Movement to a halt, do something that would force them and me to deal with the whole question of violence and ourselves . . . I was going to stop eating until such time as everyone in the strike either ignored me or made up their minds that they were not going to be committing violence.”1 Chavez’s fast brought national attention—both positive and negative—to the UFWOC and its boycott. Inspired by his act of nonviolent resistance, Martin Luther King, Jr. sent a telegram of support to Chavez on March 5. He declared, I am deeply moved by your courage in fasting as your personal sacrifice for justice through nonviolence. . . . You stand today as a living example of the Gandhian tradition with its great force for social progress and its healing spiritual powers. My colleagues and I commend you for your bravery, salute you for your indefatigable work against poverty and injustice, and pray for your health and your continuing service as one of the outstanding men of America. Despite their mutual use of Gandhian nonviolent resistance, King’s telegram to Chavez was a tepid expression of support that did not indicate a genuine interest in forming an alliance between the Southern Christian Leadership Conference and the UFWOC. Less than a week after Chavez ended his fast, King traveled to Los Angeles (a two- to three-hour drive from Delano), but declined an invitation to meet with Chavez.2 Although both the UFWOC and SCLC practiced nonviolent resistance to achieve social change, their common ideology did not result in cooperation during King’s presidency of SCLC. Continued discrimination within labor unions left King wary of aligning with organized labor. Furthermore, because SCLC focused on African Americans in the urban South, the relevance of Mexican American struggles in the rural West was unclear. The changes that occurred within SCLC in the wake of King’s assassination, however, opened the door to a relationship with the UFWOC. Changes in American society also brought the two organizations together. The racist violence, urban rebellions , and assassinations of the late 1960s left some activists disillusioned, while others became more militant, calling for the use of self-defense or—among extremists—urban guerrilla warfare, strategies at odds with the nonviolent resistance advocated by King and Chavez. Many liberal activists had moved on to other causes that had arisen in the late 1960s, inspired by the victories of the civil rights movement. Moreover, the increasingly conservative mood of the country, as evidenced by the election of Richard Nixon as president in 1968, resulted in calls for equality and justice frequently being met with apathy and resistance, rather than sympathy, from whites. These dramatic changes led SCLC to view the possibility of coalitions with labor unions and Mexicans Americans in a considerably more positive light. In this changed atmosphere, working with the UFWOC was much more appealing to the SCLC leadership than it had been during King’s tenure. But forming an alliance with the farmworkers did not only provide SCLC with new partners in struggle; it allowed SCLC leaders to demonstrate the organization’s evolution and incorporation of economic justice and multiracial equality into its mission. More Mutual Respect Than Ever in Our History 107 * * * Although the UFWOC strikes and boycotts had obtained the support of a variety of civil rights organizations—including...

Share