Workersxt, united farm cofounder, though lotus where huerta,olores discusses the Farmworkers Movement and cesar chavez. It is about two hours. Panel brings one of the icons of the movement to our Dolores Huerta, cofounder of the United Farm Workers Movement with cesar chavez. [applause] nationala directed the boycott during the National Grape strike. She has been involved in the fight since 1955. She has been arrested more than 20 times for leading nonviolent protests. Named one of the most important women of the 20th oftury, and has dozens really important awards, including the Eleanor Roosevelt award for human rights, which was bestowed on her by president clinton, and the president ial medal of freedom by president obama. [applause] her is miriam powell, a hasnalist, author who researched the united farm workers and cesar chavez. Her recent work won the Robert F Kennedy prize, and was a finalist for the National Critics circle. As a journalist, she has spent 25 years as an awardwinning , and has been an Alicia Patterson fellow, and was awarded the National Endowment to the humanities fellowship biography. Avez next to her is matt garcia. The garcia is director of religious studies department at Arizona State arrested, he also directs the comparative studies program there. He previously taught at the mercy of illinois, the receipt of, and brown university. Own,ok, a world of its won the award for the best book by the oral history association. His most recent book, from the jaws of history, won the celeb tough philip taft award. Garcia was also the outreach primaryr, and Co Investigator for the bracero project, and recipient of the history award. He completed his phd in history at Claremont Graduate School and 19 i seven. Again, i just want to ask again, have 25elists will minutes to present. Our timekeeper will inform you, as we approach the time, five minutes, three minutes, and one minute. To the audience, i would ask i would request that you silence your cell phones, and that you be respectful of our guests. A question and answer will follow the presentation. Ms. Huerta thank you very much for holding this panel and the strike. N of impact it had we can talk a little bit about that later, by thought i would give a little bit of background. There have been many attempts to organize farmworkers in the past. The laborers union, teachers and most attempts throughout history have failed. It was really unfortunate because of a child of, had the good fortune because cesar werez, and myself, we successfule to do a union of farmworkers. Both of us had attempted to organize farmworkers back in the 1950s, and organize farmworkers during world war ii. Shortly after we did that, the group dissolved. I had also organized farmworkers and turn them over to the butchers union. Again, they took over. Association had different organizers from different ethnic groups African American mexicans, of course, and filipino. I recruited someone from stockton, california, where i was from. One of the priests working with us at the time, father macola, mcdonald, went to washington and met with the aflcio to tell them about this group of artwork is that they had been organizing. They sent someone out there, and when we saw this huge group of i was with them for quite a while. Basically, they started working with labor contractors. With the mexicanamerican community, the africanamerican, o community, that did not really work. , and said, look it was interesting because what we decided to start the union, we actually had the Community Service organization in use los angeles. I always told a story. Cesar said, farmworkers will never have a union unless we do it. I thought he was kidding. I started laughing. No, he said, we have to do it, you and i. Not, he said, but, we will see a National Union in our the owners aree too rich, too powerful, and to racist. His family moved to delano to start the union. We started their with house meetings. This is the way fred lawson taught organizing, and wrote a lot of significant legislation for the latinos in california. I will not go into that now. When they started these house i wanted to mention some of the people who were really the foundation of the delano strike, and the people who made the sacrifices. Some of them are here with us today. Blanco. Come up. [applause] antonia saludado. Her family had the first house meeting, an early one. [applause] [indiscernible] a Young Volunteer that came to work, and volunteered to work at the boycott and San Francisco. Martha. [applause] write could not read or when she was sent to the boycott. Harvard,have yale, and all of these prestigious colleges, they were first one [applause] we have wendy greenfield, from new york city. She was a teenager at the time. [applause] friends, didl her the boycott. Bobby cruz, whose mother was one of thefirst members contract we had at the time. These are the people that made it happen, leaving their homes. Farmworkers left their homes, and went to places all over the United States of america, even canada. Polly parks is also in the room. [applause] striker, when that started i do want to thank you guys. [applause] when we had that strike, on september 16 i do want to say a little bit about relationship with the Filipino Workers. Larry and i always communicated. When i went to stockton, i would him, and when he came to delano, he would call me. The farmers would stop working, and the growers would give them a wage increase. Strikee workers went on on september 18, we did not know if it would be a stoppage or strike. Thethere was so much violence, we said, we had no choice, we had to support the strike, so we did. We started organizing from 1962, and our plan was to not go on strike in 1968 because we wanted to be able to negotiate directly with all of the growers at the same time. This is what we were setting up all over the valley, the central valley. We wanted to make sure we had members everywhere so we could have this big strike at the same time. During that time, we were organizing, we did services for the workers. We did income taxes, we did immigration work. We integrated tons of people. By the way, in that time, it was easy to immigrate people. , and other things that the farmworkers needed. We were building up membership. We had insurance, what you called an insurance plan, with someone died in the family, the family got 1000. This is the way we build our membership. The members were paid 2. 50 per month. Half would go to the insurance company, half would go to the wages. By the way, our wages were very minimal. We were getting 25 30 per week. We would split whatever we could. Great, in a way, because we knew we had to work the same way the farmworkers lives. This was all building up to the original strike. When the Filipino Workers went on strike, we supported them. Eptember 16 was the launch it was, by the way, not just filipinos and mexicans. We had puerto ricans, africanamerican during that time of the strike, we were not making any money. You can imagine the kind of sacrifice that workers were making to walk out of the fields knowing that you had no money. Live, caravansto brought food and clothing. This is how we got our food. There was literally no money. Later on, we were able to increase the wages by five dollars a week. Then, 10 a week. One of the problems we had, once , we could contracts not win in the fields because there were court injunctions. These farms are huge. Have this court injunctions, this court orders, you could only have five tickets to a field. If we had more than five tickets to a field, they would take us to jail. Re was no way we could they could not see the picket line. We knew we had to do something different. On the boycott. And wentft their homes to the citys. There were 17 million americans that supported the farmworkers. Get theable to finally growers to come to the table. Contracts, ite was difficult for the filipino leadership. Pete belasco became the secretarytreasurer of the united farm workers. He was with us until the very end. When he passed away, he was living in headquarters. Larry had a lot of pressures on him. , these were workers all licensed contractors. Once we got the contracts, you could not have a separate crew, Filipino Crew and mexican group, puerto rico and crew. The growers would always use one group against another. Filipino crews are working faster, mexican crews are working faster. Ews. Esegregated the cr accordinge dispatched to seniority. We have a lot of americans that came out of that. Some young filipinos they brought in, they could not speak english. Somehow, they communicated. There was a lot of pressure because we broke up the system they had before. I know there was a lot of pressure. Before, the leadership of the crew, they would get so much money for every box the worker picked. Once you have the contracts, you cannot do that. Workers have a set wage and the crew leaders were like they had a set wage. They were not making as much money as they can before. They could get whatever it was, . 10 a box or whatever. The workers could make a lot more money. Dissension lot of and larry would talk to us about the pressure he was suffering. Stayed. The brother they stayed until the very end. We formed our own village so the brothers would have a place to stay and eat and get the medical care they needed. That was a very important point and we need to raise that. What did we win with that strike . One of the first things in that first contract we signed, toilets. How about that . Toilets in the field. Cold Drinking Water in the field. , theyof the humiliation had no place to go to the bathroom. They would have to hide behind a blanket or sheet to go to the bathroom. These farms are 20 miles out of town. The workers would have to often have one tub of water, maybe a soda can. Everybody would have to drink out of that same cup. The whole crew of 40 or 50 people drinking out of one cup. That was another thing we got in the first contract. Water with have individual cups for the workers. We got the first medical appliance for the workers. The employers had to contribute to the workers. We got the First Pension plans. Today, farmworkers here in our area are getting Pension Plans from the Farmworkers Union. This was unheard of before. Of course come a we talked about the legislation we were able to pass. Theere able to pass seasonal migrant labor act that covers workers when they bring them over 50 miles. They have to make sure they get them housing, they get than the wages they were promised. They have to be able to work in safe areas. We passed the amnesty bill in 1986. Farmworkers other legalization got there legalization. [applause] the persons that helped us get that bill, ted kennedy, rodino theo Seasonal Agricultural workers act. I was actually placed on a commission. We went through the whole United States of america having hearings to see what the impact of that was. Over ers had to bend they have to cut the weeds in the field. They can do that with a long handle. Insurance, we got that in 1975. In addition to the organizing in the fields, one thing we always did was to get people registered to vote. We were involved in many campaigns to get people elected to office, making sure that we did the work. We had a lot of support in the state legislature to finally pass Unemployment Insurance for farmworkers. We and hawaii are the only two holiness states of america to have full Unemployment Insurance for farmworkers. Unitedhe whole states of america to apple Unemployment Insurance for farmworkers. To have full Unemployment Insurance for farmworkers. We got over a dozen pesticides that were bad. The deadly dozen. On come i can go on and about the effects. It would be nice if we could say more they are no just passed in the sealants pesticides in the fields, but they keep coming up with new ones. Hold issuen get a put under department of health and Human Services and out of the epa. Thats the way we can finally see an end to the issue of pesticides. Agricultural Labor Relations law, the union was very sure that when we passed it allows farmers to organize into a union. If theres any retaliation against the workers when they are trained to organize, the to compensate those workers. They have these protections income of the workers can organize. As we get those contracts in 1970, we were able to organize. We had almost 100,000 workers under contract. One might say, what happened . , the Farm Bureau President nixon, powerful forces we have out there, they conspired and said they would get rid of the Farmworkers Union. They did. When our contracts were up for when we are negotiating to get our new , they signed these contracts with no protections for the workers. Its a huge strike. All over the valley, there was a huge strike. It took a long time to get those contracts back. We paste we had to have elections. We were never able to get all those contracts. Why . Governor jerry brown was not reelected and you and another a republican governor. The workers, the people in charge, they were more program or. Pro grower. Unfortunately, that is still the situation today. Just recently, the farmworkers signedas able to get contracts with some of these companies that have been 20 years since we had elections. Why were we able to get those contracts now . Thanksjerry brown to jerry brown, there was a law passed in sacramento that the workers joinr the the union, if they do not bargain, they can take them and get a bargaining order and force them to sit down and bargain. Elections won by the workers 20 years ago and they are able to barely does barely able to get those contracts. And they are barely able to get those contracts. When we think about the work of the union i do want to mention this when we talk about cesar chavez, i worked with him for many years in the beginning until his passing. The men only had an a grade education, but he was a genius. Thats a great education. The man only had an eighthgrade education, but he was a genius. Roomt know who in the would do what he did. Days,hout eating for 25 water only and communion. 1968. Then 1972 in arizona. They passed a law in arizona that if farmworkers when on strike, they would be let go for six months. Days, water only for 36 days, water only, and holy communion. So that the public would know made, the sacrifices he the sacrifice of the farmers made, they have to be taken into consideration. See a tabloid , many of the farmworkers themselves are not the one spoken to. People dont get their stories. Thatis really important the farmworkers stories are the ones that are told. Foundationhavez they havee built homes, low income homes for farmworkers, they have thousands of units in many states. They have programs in those homes for the farmworkers. The work continues. Most recently, they were able to get a lot of contracts. Im not with the union anymore. I left in 2002 to go back to committee organizing. That community organizing. There are some in the union that can update us. They are still continuing to organize. They are continuing to organize. Lets give him a big hand over here. [applause] we will have time after the other people speak. You can bring people up to date about the current state of the Dolores Huert united farm worke. Weve had five martyrs, five People Killed in the struggle for the decent human rights of farmworkers. In 18yearold student from boston who was killed in a strike in florida. An arab worker killed in california and the strike we had in 1973. Wanda shot down in the picket line. Lopez, young 18yearold young man killed because he got asked me to organize the union so that workers and his company at his company would have medical plans and Pension Plans. These people gave their lives of farmworkers could have the basic human rights. If you want to learn more about the union, there are documentaries. They talk about the boycott. Thank you for doing this. The impact of the farmworkers we canther units do it. [applause] is a hard act worker dolores ha to follow. Im only a writer. The president of the united farm workers, the head of the Chavez Foundation is here today. Thank you to the president of the college. And to everyone for staging this event. Its important in the spirit of te pope who was able to talk o a fractured congress and bring some you become its important that people come together and talk about issues we might not agree is ant all important piece of history. I cameto talk about how to write about farmworkers and the united farm workers and farm workers movemen cesar chavez. At the losorter angeles times, spent a year writing a series about united farm workers, the union today. I got into the history and past and present. Area in san in this diego. In a long been there time. I assume they still live there. That thete astonished 2005 farmworkers were living in shacks like these with no Running Water and no access to anything that would remotely be considered an acceptable life. I will keep going. Thank you. How thisto understand could come to be and how and had come to the trajectory it had come to. , somen to talk to people of the people he were introduced to buy Dolores Huerta, who were the pioneers of this movement. As a historian, to be writing about a time that is long enough ago that it is history but is reason enough that there are people who were resources who lived through it my will talk about the primary sources that i relied on