No Permanent Waves: Recasting Histories of U.S. Feminism

4. "We have a Long, Beautiful History"

In early 1970, Francisca Flores, a seasoned activist in Mexican American politics, was asked by Manuel Banda, the organizer of the upcoming Mexican American National Issues Conference, to organize a women’s workshop. She readily agreed. Whatever Banda’s reasons for requesting such a workshop, for Flores, the request came at a most fortuitous time. In 1966, in response to the lack of recognition shown women by Mexican American organizations of the time, she cofounded the League of Mexican-American Women (LMAW) in Los Angeles, one of the first Mexican American feminist organizations of the post–World War II era in the nation.1 By 1970, however, Flores believed that only a national Chicana women’s organization would be able to significantly improve the economic and political condition of Mexican women in the United States. The Mexican American National Issues Conference in Sacramento provided the means by which Flores would reach her goal. So, in mid-1970, Flores began to organize for the conference. She started by using her own network of sisters in the struggle. These women included Lilia Aceves, Connie Pardo, Dolores Sánchez, and Grace Montañez Davis, all of whom she had met during the 1950s and early 1960s in organizations like the Mexican American Political Association and the Community Service Organization. She asked each one, “If I have a women’s workshop, will you attend?” They all agreed to participate. Having secured an initial cadre, she then sent out flyers about the women’s workshop to mailing lists culled from her decades of political activism. Flores envisioned a workshop that would address topics such as women’s rights, public office, family, childcare, abortion , equal pay for equal work, maternity leave, protective labor legislation, “We Have a Long, Beautiful History” Chicana Feminist Trajectories and Legacies MARISELA R. CHÁVEZ 77 4 bbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbb feminism, the draft, higher education, and the future of “Mexican/Chicana women.”2 She succeeded in recruiting approximately forty women to the meeting in Sacramento, including Aceves and Pardo. And there these women founded the Comisión Femenil Mexicana Nacional, the first national Chicana feminist organization in the nation. Because of its successful community programs, the Comisión stands as one of the most important Chicana organizations of the twentieth century. By the late 1970s, the Comisión had opened the Chicana Service Action Center (CSAC), a job-training center in Los Angeles; two bilingual childcare centers (Centro de Niños); and a shelter for survivors of domestic violence. Members also organized a national Chicana conference in Goleta, California; organized against forced sterilization; helped formulate a Hispanic women’s plank for the 1977 National Women’s Conference in Houston; and established over twenty local chapters nationwide. By the mid 1980s, the Comisión claimed approximately three hundred members nationwide and thirty members in the Los Angeles chapter, a seemingly small number of women given their ambitious range of activities and their accomplishments. The foundation of the LMAW and the Comisión Femenil tells a larger story about how and why modern Chicana feminisms developed. Various factors contributed to the emergence of the practical feminism that Flores and her allies practiced. First, contrary to most scholarly and popular claims, the Comisión Femenil and Chicana feminism in general have longer and deeper roots than the Chicano and women’s liberation movements that emerged in the 1960s and 1970s. Second, the experiences of exclusion within both Chicano and women’s liberation movements acted as catalysts for Chicanas to form their own feminist organizations. And, third, the political experiences of Flores and women of her generation engendered an astute use of governmental programs to achieve their goals. The Emergence of Chicana Feminisms For Chicanas and Chicanos, the tumult of what we consider sixties activism began in 1966, exploded in 1968, and continued throughout the 1970s. But the advent of the Comisión and the Chicano movement more generally also speaks to a historical timeline that is not bound by the decade of the 1960s. This history forces us to extend the Chicano movement back into the 1950s and 1940s. The Comisión Femenil Mexicana Nacional challenges us to MARISELA R. CHÁVEZ 78 reconsider the history of Chicana activism because it reveals a link to preChicano movement politics, a link that has not been clearly identified before. This important connection provided the Comisión Femenil with important lessons in political strategy learned...