The union within the union: Filipinos, Mexicans, and the racial integration of the farm worker movement

Abstract

Throughout the twentieth century, California farm workers endeavored to build viable farm labor unionism. In 1966, Filipino and Mexican farm workers merged their respective farm labor unions, the Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee and the National Farm workers Association, which laid the foundational base for the United Farm Workers of America (UFW). The merger constituted a moment of interracial unity, which Filipinos and Mexicans had previously lacked; by 1970 the UFW would negotiate landmark collective bargaining agreements. This article demonstrates how Filipinos and Mexicans resolved deeply rooted racial division and that doing so built a path to successful farm labor mobilization. The study complements previous farm worker scholarship that concentrates on exogenous causal factors of success by drawing focus to endogenous causal factors, particularly racial identity within the movement.

Keywords:

• Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee
• farm workers
• Filipinos
• Mexicans
• National Farm workers Association
• race

Acknowledgements

I thank the following individuals for their sage advice on this article: Michael Biggs, Douglas Grbic, Hiromi Ishizawa, Kazuyo Kubo, and Charlotte Ryan. Additionally, the scholars at Boston College’s Media Research and Action Project provided a friendly and critical audience on an early version of the study.

Notes

1. I utilize the term, UFW, for the sake of simplicity in this article. For a period of time, the union was known as the United Farm Workers Organizing Committee but ultimately changed its name to UFW, which remains its name to this day.

2. Ernesto Galarza Papers, Green Library, Letter to Ernesto Galarza from Henry Pope Anderson, 8 October 1961 (Box 17, Folder 3).

3. Additionally, emotions may be considered another essential component of the farm workers movement. While the sociology of emotions and social movements are not part of the analysis here, the edited book by Flam and King (2005) is a good starting point for the field.

4. I maintain that the AWOC and the NFWA were SMOs though many may simply recognize them as aspiring labor unions. They were not typical labor unions as they operated outside the confines of the manufacturing industry trade union tradition and worked with significant numbers of racial/ethnic minorities.

5. Larry Itliong Papers, Reuther Library, letter to Jose M. Leonidas from Larry Itliong, 8 January 1967, (Box 1,Folder 4).

6. Census data cited here is published within 1970 census reports published in 1973. However, the descriptive statistical tables are compiled from what workers reported for 1969.

7. I cannot offer complete explanation of why there is a drop in the agricultural labor force numbers from 1960 to 1970. One partial explanation is the change of age demographic from ‘14 and over in 1960’ data to ‘16 and over’ in 1970 data.

8. Los Angeles Times, ‘Cesar Chavez – Out of Sight but Still in Fight,’ 14 February 1972, p. A3.

9. UFW – Office of the President, Reuther Library, Letter to Cesar Chavez from Porfirio U. Sevilla, 15 April 1971, (Box 64, Folder 22).

10. Ibid.

11. Ernesto Galarza Papers, Green Library, Memorandum to Franz Daniel from Ernesto Galarza, November, 3, 1959, (Box 4, Folder 6).

12. Fred Ross Papers, Green Library, Diary Entry, 9 July 1957, (Box 1, Folder 19) While most of the diary entries do not list a year, two of the typewritten pages have ‘1957’ or ‘57’ scribbled near the top of the page.

13. AWOC Papers, Reuther Library, MAPA: Special Newsletter and Urgent Request to All Chapters from Edward Quevedo, 16 July 1966, (Box 7, Folder 16).

14. Ernesto Galarza Papers, Green Library, The Agricultural Worker/El Trabajador Agricola, Vol. 1, No. 3 28 October 1961, (Box 4, Folder 4).

15. Ernesto Galarza Papers, Green Library, Bulletin ‘TO ALL THE FRIENDS OF FARM WORKERS’ from Rufino Nachor, 24 October 1961, (Box 4, Folder 7).

16. Ernesto Galarza Papers, Green Library, The Agricultural Worker/El Trabajabdor Agricola Newsletter, Vol. 1 No. 3, 28 October 1961, (Box 4, Folder 4).

17. Ibid.

18. SJV Farm Labor Collection, Madden Library, AWOC Report, 9 October 1959, (Box 5, no folder number or folder title).

19. AWOC Papers, Reuther Library, letter from Louis Krainock to Lillian Ransome, February 22, 1960, (Box 5, Folder 4).

20. Reuther Library, UFW Papers – Office of the President, Part II, Ideology Paper by Philip Vera Cruz: ‘Radical Perspectives in the Farm Workers Movement,’ n.d., (Box 50, Folder 7) Though there is no date, it is almost certain that the paper is written sometime between 1965 and 1973.

21. ‘Lettuce Farm Strike Part of Deliberate Union Plan’ Los Angeles Times 23 January 1961, p. B1.

22. Fred Ross Papers, Green library, letter from Dolores Huerta to Saul Alinsky, 13 June 1962 (Box 2, Folder 3).

23. ‘Tension Grows While Grape Strike Spreads’ Los Angeles Times 30 September 1965, pg. 36.

24. NFWA Papers, Reuther Library, bulletin to striking Filipino workers from the Filipino Americanism Society, n.d., Box 6, Folder number omitted. No date is apparent on this document, but it is almost certainly written sometime in late 1965 or in 1966 as the bulletin notes that ‘OVER ONE HUNDRED (100) DAYS HAVE PASSED’ since the strikes had commenced in September 1965.

25. ‘Filipino Consul Hit for Plea to Grape Strikers’ Los Angeles Times 6 October 1965, p. A8.

26. SJV Farm Labor Collection, Madden Library, Paper Released by Di Giorgio Fruit Corporation, 12 January 1966, (Box 2, Folder 1).

27. SJV Farm Labor Collection, Madden Library, CESAR CHAVEZ….LEADERSHIP AND SACRIFICE (statements at public Congressional meeting), n.d., (Box 1, Folder labeled: SJVFL (1965–1970 Yinger Bibl, Sources).

28. UFW Papers – Office of the President Files, Reuther Library, AFL-CIO Official Charter, 23 August 1966, (Box 71, Folder 6).

29. Reuther Library, Philip Vera Cruz Papers, The Farm Workers Struggle in Delano, n.d., (Box 1, Folder 18).

30. UFWOC Papers, Letter addressed ‘Dear Editor from Cesar Chavez’, October 1965, (Box 2, Folder 6)

31. Ibid.: Los Angeles Times.

32. Reuther Library, Larry Itliong Papers, letter from Bill Berg to Larry Itliong, 15 December 1972, (Box 1, Folder 12).