Making Aztlan: Ideology and Culture of the Chicana and Chicano Movement, 1966-1977 (Contextos) [Illustrated] 0826354661, 9780826354662

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Making Aztlan

@caDteKIDS SERIES EDITORS:

Antoinette Sedillo Lopez, Christine Marie Sierra, and

Michael Trujillo In keeping with the University of New Mexico's Southwest Hispanic Research Institute's (SHRI ) transdisciplinary mission, this series publishes books that deepen our understanding of the historical, social, political, and cu ltu ral issues that impact Latinas and Latinos . Topics may span regional, national, and transnationa l contexts. We invite scholarship in Chicana and Chicano studies, the social sciences, public policy, the humanities, health and natural science, and other professional fields .

Making Aztlan Ideology and Culture of the Chicana and Chicano Movement, 1966-1977

JUAN G6MEZ-QUINONES AND IRENE VASQUEZ

University of

ew Mexico Press I Albuquerque

© 2014 by che Universicy of New Mexico Press All righcs reserved. Published 2014 Printed in rhe Uniced Scaces of America I9 18 17 16 I) 14 I 2 3 4 5 6 Library of Congress Cacaloging-in-Publicarion Data Gomez-Quinones, Juan, auchor. Making Azclan : ideology and culture of che Chicana and Chicano movemenr, I966-r9 77 /Juan Gomez-Quinones a nd Irene Vasquez. pages cm . - (Concextos series) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0 -82 63-5466-2 (pbk . : alk . paper) - ISB:-.1 978-0-8263 -5467-9 (electronic) r. Chicano movemenr. 2. Mexican Americans-Politics and governmenc-2och cencury. 3. Mexican Americans-Civil righcs-Hi stor y-2oth century. 4 . Mexica n Americans-Social conditions-20 th century. 5. M exic a n Americans-Ethnic identiry. 6. United States-Echnic relations-History- 20th cencury. 7. United Scates-Social conditions-20th century. I. Vasquez, Irene, author. 11. Title. Ec84.M5G6344 2014 973'.046872-dc23

The authors wish to thank the University of New Mexico's Department of Anerican Studies, Chicana and Chicano Studies Program, Center for Regional Studies, and Southwest Hispanic Research Institute for their past and continuing support. Cover design and text composition by Catherine Leonardo Composed in Sabon LT Std Rom an ro/r 3 Display type is Hadriano Std Excra Bold and Syntax LT Std Bold

Contents

Illustrations Preface

vii

ix

Introduction: Presences and Questions 1. Paradigms and Theories 2. Past Contemporaries 3. Realities Matter

18

37

4. Identity Expressions 5. Impetuses

1

44

65

6. Circumstantial Moments 7. Half the Sky

68

76

8. Labor Risings

93

9. Tierra y vida

104

10. Justice Constructed 109 11 . Confrontation al Ways 12. Community Defense 13. Students Act 14. Youth Forward 15. Schoolhouses 16. Stud ies Evolve

11 s 119

123

148 164 168 v

xxv

Contents

17. Alternative Schooling 18. Better Times

183

19. Policing Police

196

20. Electioneering

205

21 . Church Choirs

215

22 . New Options 23. Renaissance 24. Street Says

25 . Sounds 26 . Acting

179

220 230

237

257 262

27. Dance 264 28 . Film

267

29. Words 30. Arts

270 278

31. Internationalizing 32 . Solidarity

284

296

33. Rights Revisited

301

34. Significant Syncopations 35. Electoral Exercises 36. Corrido Stops

311

317

37. Institution Building 38 . Summing Up

304

324

329

39. Analysis: The Practices of Coyountura Chronology Notes

373

Bibliography Index

345

443

399

340

Illustrations

Women Brown Berets

242

Education Is a Basic Right, Chicano Moratorium Land -grant heirs examining documents

242

243

Cesar Chavez and Corky Gonzales for Colorado Labor Council Women meeting to plan demo at Big Buy

243

244

From Denver to Chicago to New York: Brown Berets, Latin American Defense Organization, and Young Lords 244 Fellow Travelers at the Chicano Moratorium Young women meeting

245

245

Allies: John Trudell, Corky Gonzales, and Olga Talamantes

246

Dolores Huerta speaks at Corazon de Aztlan , Chicana Symposium 246 Planning meeting: Corky Gonzales, Angela Davis, Ernesto Vigil , and friends 247 Participants at Corazon de Aztlan, Chicana Symposium

247

Women's leadership panel at Corazon de Aztlan, Chicana Symposium 248 Alianza meeting in northern New Mexico

248

Women in a theater scene in Denver, Colorado

249

Native American representatives w ith Corky Gonzales

vii

249

iii

Illustrations

People's music and art: Danny Valdez Camaraderie

250

Strike Teatro

251

250

Chichimeca and Aztlanenses on stage for United Farm Workers' rally 251 Boxers in the ring and civil rights champ Stokely Carmichael Viva La Raza, high school demonstrations

252

Women high-five at Chicano Moratorium

253

Women on the march, Chicano Moratorium

252

253

Families and neighbors preparing for the Chicano Moratorium A family participating in the Chicano Moratorium

255

Group representing Venice, California, at the Chicano Moratorium 256 Students holding a Tierra y Justicia sign at the Chicano Moratorium 256

254

Preface

This preface provides a contextualization of organized efforts for social equities by Mexican Americans during the 1960s and 1970s. The Chicana and Chicano movement (CCM) comprised complex sets of consciously driven encounters by activists and organizers and bridged the historical and the modern. The context of this encounter or coyountura was more than simply circumstantial to 1960s events; it also encompassed historical processes up to those years. The coyountura encompassed two broad trends among Mexican Americans: the historicist and the modernist. The first referred to making whole their historical heritage; the second called for their full civil and social equities. The syntheses of the historicist and the modernist led to visible trends and reforms that shaped the Chicana and Chicano movement and impacted }v1exican American communities during the late twentieth century. Mexican American communities, heterogeneous in multiple aspects, formed and evolved as socially constructed populations. Arguably, these aspects had precolonial as well as colonial and nineteenth-century origins. From Guatemala to Colorado, nearly all Mexican communities had diverse Native American elements from their origins through their continuance in the twentieth century. Mexicans, north or south of the Rio Bravo, shared a colonial past of three hundred years. Major Mexican American enclaves, many of them historical communities, emerged through political transitions from indigenous to Mexican to U.S. geopolitical formations. Furthermore, heterogeneous migrants from a neighboring country multiply reinforced Mexican American communities. Immigrant and resident populations combined and formed a mosaic of social diversities and fragmentations shaped by uneven economic and social levels of development. The Mexican American social phenomena continually evolved through cultural ix

Preface

mestizaje, including integration of African, Mediterranean, and Asian descendants, with lndian heritage predominant in both subtle and overt manners. Indigenous and mixed ancestries had been and were problematic for ~1exican Americans and for others. Ultimately, a contextual bedrock of historical legacies and social realities shaped Mexican cultural and political practices that synthesized the Native, the Western, and the African. Among U.S. minorities, Mexican Americans have their claim to being territorially and civically distinct through their association with the independence of the republic of Mexico, a postcolonial state. Following this political transition, many Mexicans were incorporated into the United States, a postcolonial entity premised on an imagined nation-state. Mexicans in the far north were part of an agreement between sovereign parties in the mid-nineteenth century and later transborder migration agreements between the United States and Mexico. Jn the modern era, two ideological and legalist subelements undergirded this political association: western republicanism as a form of government and western liberalism as a civic credo shared by both societies. The historical social foundations that were antecedent and remained substantive to these modern Western conceptual clusters did not include all sectors. Republicanism and liberalism were grafted on preexisting populist ideologies, which subsumed ethnic/racial, gender, sexuality, and class biases and familial attachments. Mexican Americans, as a whole, lacked formal education beyond elementary school, yet many became familiar with the general tenets of liberalism and republicanism through general discourses. Their lack of access to legal protections and social institutions underscored their social distance from political tenets ascribing rights to citizens. Moreover, the education that was available to Mexican Americans was generally familially and culturally centered. People learned who they were not from schoolteachers but from family members. Many U.S. whites learned to be quite color conscious and to act in superior ways to darker-skinned people. Mexicans in the United States learned two lessons: One, what made them objectionable in the United States was both biological and cultural, their looks and their being, and both were related to their Indian and African heritages. And two, they were objected to civically because of their association with Mexico, a state and a society judged depreciatively by most U.S. whites. Indeed major changes experienced by Mexico and the United States influenced the status of Mexican Americans. Mexico experienced

Preface continuous struggles for electoral democracy and economic modernization. Modernization meant closer economic ties to the United States and incentives to immigrate across the border. Through the 1960s and 1970s, Mexican American communities were socially and culturally interactive with the northern Mexican borderlands, which aligned with the U.S. southern borderlands. The majority of Mexicans resided in the southern U.S. borderlands, which bordered areas of Mexican sovereignty. Thus, the ethnic and territorial links within a particular geographical part of the United States made the U.S.-Mexican borderlands distinct from other parts of the United States. The borderlands were also deeply influenced by the U.S. South. As a result of the U.S.-Mexican War, many of the first generation of Mexican American peoples of the 1830s may have been circumstantially incorporated into U.S. society. However, a determining fact of modern Mexican Americans was their presence within the United States from the 1850s onward. The U.S. Civil War in the l86os influenced the subregions in which Mexicans resided and thus impacted their status and their apprehensions. Over time, as the United States as a whole modernized, Mexican Americans faced modernization with few institutional assets and several encumbrances. Mexican Americans were titularly granted rights through an international agreement ratified in 1848 and then, in practice, over the decades foreclosed from these treaty recognitions. Mexican American leaders perforce sought to rea lign their civic status from exclusion to participation, which was not only clearly legally appropriate but civically logical according to their reasonings. Considering the civic imperatives, antecedent social gains also remained important. During the course of this Mexican American civic project lo mexicano prevailed over lo americano socially for many, but not for all. However, for many Mexican Americans the cultural identifications and practices were part of a historically ordained social order. For the first generation, those of the 1830s, 1840s, and 1850s, there was no contradiction between Mexican culture and United States jurisprudence in their civic assumptions, and there was no contradiction in the belief of some that social antecedents undergirded civic arrangements. The social glue binding Mexican American communities reflected diverse and daily living practices that evolved from one generation to the next. Mexicans survived as families and broader collectivities through concentrated demographics, collective cultural observances, the prevalent use of Spanish, shared work patterns, communications through newspapers and fraternal and cultural associations, and the

Preface

private practices of cultural habits and mores. Many Mexicans identified themselves as "La Raza," a prevalent and widely used referent; the identifying rubric "La Raza Mexicana" was the more emphatic nomenclature, but also popular was "La Raza Latina." Since these phrases subsumed mestizaje, the strategy of denying mestizo descent, which de facto meant denying Indian and African descent, was telling; equally telling was the fact that some Mexican Americans identified as being of primarily European descent. Presumably these individuals resented both Mex:icans and Anglos calling attention to the non-European descent of all Mexicans and themselves in particular. The fact that many Mexicans were for the most part not even of partial European descent was not fully debated. As distinct from what they humanistically learned in Mexican families about cultural ideals, the U.S. dispensations toward Mexican culture and heritage were harsh. In sum, U.S. authorities of one kind or another aspired to have Mexicans submit to subordination because they were Mexican. Moreover, since the nineteenth century a conservative political constituency functioned, which claimed the country and its patrimony to be exclusively theirs, and very specifically excluded Mexicans from any claims of equality as U.S. residents. Independent of what Mexicans did civically, Mexicans knew that they had an opponent in the U.S. political arena, an ultraconservative constituency who rejected them on both biological and cultural grounds. Being in, but not of, the United States exposed one to the immediate and persistant imperatives of modernization. Modernity was constructed as both cosmopolitan and particularized: capitalist investment, mass industria lization, mega agriculture, continental transits, technological communications, and gigantic exploitation of natural resources all occurring at specific and interlinked sites. All of these required many, many workers. Indeed, Mexican American workers were grounded by these modernist wheels like other workers, but their sands were filtered through different screens. Modernization, in many societies, offered schooling as a possible social and economic ladder as well as a welcoming threshold. Schooling presented a possible positive screen for the children of white workers. For Mexicans, native born or immigrant, schools and schooling were not agencies of integration but rather of segregation and, even worse, alienation. Mexican children in school were taught that they were not socially equal and that their families were far less than equal. The blatantly Eurocentric content of education compounded the negative ways of imparting education. In the Mexican

Preface American case, state education led to unambivalent results, disaster for the majority, and escape for some. Few children surmounted this education, centered allegedly on state- and country-building processes, successfully. Bad education was mirrored bad civics. The negative civic and educational mores lagged as the tempo of changes and crises quickened. In the throes of modernization, U.S. society after the r93os-r94os had more tolerant economic and civic economic legalisms . Now segments of the U.S . elite claimed a liberal civic tradition, which in actuality meant they were in practice reconstructing one while they faced the possibility of threats from abroad. Civic organizing, worker advocacy, African and ative American activism, and increasing discontent among middle-class white women and pro-gay and lesbian articulators roused elite sensitivities. As the decades had passed, society and institutions of the country faced crises because of wars and because of domestic tensions related to potentially numerically significant internal sectors. Crisis meant changes, and many Nlexicans advocated for changes. As countrywide changes occurred, Mexicans did not reject early or late modernization one iota, as all their twentieth-century political articulations demonstrate; they emphatically wanted to participate as full and equal members in U.S. society. Although the liberalism of the r96os and r97os was predicated on the rights of legally defined citizens and the supremacy of the nation-state, Mexican Americans had few options before them to improve their status. They could partake in efforts to improve and reform social institutions or face a continuing degradation of t heir social status and their living conditions. Given a still vibrant cultural heritage and given a limited situational opening, Mexican American organizers, articulators, and artists, both women and men, did not have to ask themselves who they were; rather, they had to decide what to do given who they were, where they were, and what was happening around them. Post-midcentury changes in both the domestic and international climate of ideas certainly fueled invigorated Mexican American political activities. The national civil rights movement of the r96os focused attention on social inequities, centered on the issues faced by blacks in America, but there was some attention to the inequities of other minorities and, in particular, women. Institutionally, the Kennedy administration's "New Frontier" and the Johnson administration's "Great Society" seemed amenable to increased representations by Mexican Americans for full and equal citizenship. Mexican Americans engaged these national political debates as well as international issues related to social

Preface

movements abroad. Mexican American political activists followed attempts at social revolutions. News of the Cuban Revolution and later of the African independence struggles and the Vietnamese struggle sharpened Mexican American national consciousness as to the condition of other ethnic minorities within the United States. Chicana and Chicano activists observed revolutions from the East ro the West, from the South to the North, as movements for national liberation with specific historical contexts. Moreover, some Mexican Americans paid specific attention to gender equalities, the highlighting of arts activities, and the emphatic consideration given to education. Changes in international relations contributed to the development of a critical perspective of the Mexican situation in the United States, as well as to the organizational strengthening of the civil rights impulse among political activists. Importantly, the sixties were a rime of civic discontent and potential conflict in Mexico, a rime of militant organizing by progressives, women, labor, intellectuals, and students who challenged the dominant ideology and institutions of that society. Like other U.S. constituency leaderships, Mexican American leadership during the sixties totaled the scorecard toward equality and found the score was short. Mexican Americans felt the damaging effects of irregular federal budget allocations and the less-than-adequate government support for affirmative action, bilingual education, and workers' rights. But in the swirl of that cultural whirlwind, the community remained tempered by a uniquely Mexican concern for cultural continuity coupled with political affirmation. While many remained ambivalent as to how pluralistic an allegedly diverse U.S. society was, it remained de facto segregationist as well as covertly racist. Some of these questioners proposed they were better off separate in conducting important life tasks. In truth, the weakening of formal discrimination did not eradicate white supremacy or white racism. Elites of the dominant society made two overarching responses: they asserted the belief that civil rights gains were consolidating, and they made assertions that outsiders in the society subverted the society by their presence. The outsiders prominent in their minds were the Mexicans. Thus, Mexican Americans were in the customary seesaw-accepted and rejected-while at the same time their potential unity was formalistically subverted; some were "legal" and some were not according to state-mandated activities The Mexican American scorecard, however, did note points gained. In the 1960s, Mexican Americans' numbers were modest; they counted between four million and five million, an increase of 50 percent since

Preface

1950. Blacks outnumbered Mexican Americans five to one. Mexicans were regionally clustered. Nearly 87 percent lived in the Southwest; moreover, 85 percent were native born and most lived in towns and cities and worked in industries, manufacturing, and services. Only 20 percent worked in agriculture, but the number was crucial in that basic industry. People of Mexican descent, whether in East Texas or East Oregon, East Los Angeles, or South Chicago, lived in segregated communities and neighborhoods; these were the basic political facts. Many Mexicans were poor; their per-capita income remained under $1,000 a year. A good part of the population was under twenty-one years of age, and only 15 percent of these, at most, were foreign born. College-going numbers slightly increased. Indeed, in the 1960s numbers were adding up to a few new totals. Positive numbers increased in nearly all areas. The slightly rising elements of income and education were important for a future more positive than the past, at least for those with technological skills or higher education. The growth of the Mexican community in the United States coincided with wider work participation. These numbers and increases in income provided some impetus for Mexican American middle sectors. By the next decade, slight economic and educational gains occurred for the community. The working-class composition held for decades, though customary work sites changed and diversified. Moreover, alterations in the ethnic or cultural character of the community magnified regional complexities. More Mexican Americans now were third- and fourth-generation residents and these added to the numbers of families who were "old" residents, in many cases, of several generations. Variations in the social composites of the Mexican American community foretold further changes in the next decade. Presumably, Mexican American political and partisan interests would remain consistent with the community's blue-collar and lower middle-class composition, accentuating its social/liberal/political orientation. However, within the Mexican American community there had always been a conservative sector, and this sector also grew as conservatism strengthened across the country. Demographic experts projected that persons of Mexican origin would continue to be the largest Latino subgroup, but statistical projects also announced that they would be only one of several arguably similar subgroups. In the southwest, .M exican American numbers would indeed increase to a significant ten million or more by the end of the 1970s.

Preface

In the sixties, CCM activists prioritized ten major aspects to the maximizing of Mexican American political equities in the United States: r. Realization of human potential within the community through en2.

3. 4.

5. 6. 7.

8. 9. IO.

hanced education, in particular that of women Maximization of organizations within the community, particularly of women Increased registration and education of voters Enhancement of the legal status of immigrant worker populations from resident to citizen, from undocumented to regularized Enhanced trade union organization and labor leadership Civic political education and culturally based projects Increased political resources and improved skills of electoral leadership Increased political outreach to select occupational, income, and educational sectors Spanish-language inclusion in civic matters and promotion of Spanish-language communication materials Pan-Latino cooperation by organizations and their leadership on specific issues and those that drew on interethn ic support

To some extent, some progress on these aspects occurred, though not in a consistent or comprehensive manner. Notably, Chicana rights assertions intersected each of these. Chicana women sought to prioritize women's rights vis-a-vis the Chicana and Chicano community and the dominant society; \Vomen were clearly visible and increasingly important. For a variety of reasons, some leadership welcomed this development. However, the sector that grew the most in terms of political influence was private business, which grew in numbers and wealth, including women participants. These changes were welcomed by community leadership as well as by countrywide sectorial elites . In contrast, some negative realities spelled stagnation or even deterioration in the quality of life. For example, the rates of high school dropouts and the incarcerated remained relatively high, as did poverty levels for single mothers . Comprehensive and systematic critiques of these positive and negative changes continued during these years. The persisting historical Chicana and Chicano demands for civil, cultural, economic, juridical, and political rights also continued. These were encompassed and variously expressed by the issues of equity in all

Preface

areas of life, including issues of gender and sexuality, bilingualism, political participation, education, rights for undocumented workers, employment, rights on the job, job training, economic development, and small business possibilities . Mexican women's organizing improved practices related to police, housing, social services, health services, census counting, urban development, national politics, and foreign policy consideration issues. Underlying these issues explicitly or implicitly was the commonly accepted desirability of social change by Mexican Americans and the endorsement of the methods necessary to realize social change. Past and contemporary political platforms, expressed in part or in whole, emphasized progressive social change. Coherent political programs advocated social reforms. Mexican American electoral political participation in the United States has historically been multifaceted. The CCM clearly and, in the eyes of some, paradoxically, given its critiques of these, stimulated electoral awareness, participation, and even successes. Participation in traditional political parties led to reforms in the area of civil rights and to the election and appointment of Mexican Americans to office at the national, state, and local levels. These elected officials basically represented the rise to and consolidation of power, limited by the interests of specific individuals of the Mexican American middle and upper classes. Some real benefits obviously accrued for the general community, and there were, among elected officials, forthright and responsible individuals who served the public adequately. At the local level, elected and appointed officials offered community members appointments, jobs, and problem resolution efforts. These actions ensured local leadership stability rather than building family networks or membership organizational affiliations. Most elected officials represented districts with mixed ethnic and cultural constituencies, which required them to share accountability beyond their Mexican descent constituents. These politicians were also subject to lobbying pressures from different sources, but more important lobbies represented possible resources. Although many political players were liberal, few wanted or were able to question, much less challenge, the dominant system of politics as a whole, which was conservative vis-a-vis the status quo. Officials invariably accommodated dominant interests. Electoral politicians committed themselves to resolving problems within the system and understood reform had its limits; among the limits were the endurance of a two party electoral arena . Third-party political campaigns or single candidates won some

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offices. These candidates and parties focused on electoral efforts, committed to reformist gains, and made more specific the level of political discussion relevant to minorities. However, these campaigns did not effectively realize their envisioned optimal goals. Although there were successes at the level of single offices, the two-party electoral practices assimilated seemingly independent efforts and thereby provided broader and deeper electoral experiences to Mexican American operatives than had usually been tolerated before and also raised political aspirations. Many political operatives concluded any autonomous efforts by Mexicans in the United States, restricted to Mexicans, focused on electoral politics or single issues because they were labeled exclusivist. Third-party efforts were limited, lacked resources, and were short on success. Eventually, lviexican Americans within the Democratic Party gained strength and the party in turn benefited in several areas and ways. To be sure, Mexican Americans engaged in electoral politics, but for them this type of politics was not the only or the most effective form for influencing change. Among Mexican Americans, radical political activity historically waxed and waned during periods of economic dislocation and adjustment. In many circumstances, matters were at best barely propitious for significant change. Certain circles propogated a latent or overt anti-Mexican ideology. Concomitant with this was the recycling practices of deportation, legislation with anti-Mexican aspects, continued exploitation on the job, deployment of a growing police power against Mexicans, and the continual talking down of affirmative action-all damaging to the Mexican community. Within this social milieu, Mexican American political activity in the United States was both galvanized and also seen as suspect; being Mexican was tolerated only up to a point. Their own politicos came to believe this. Some Mexican Americans have often formed and/or joined radical groups. These groups represented the varying competing ideological positions within the left in the United States. Traditionally, some leftists and liberals in the United States had an inability to overcome their Anglo chauvinism, usually denying the validity of Mexican political consciousness, activity, or priorities in determining their political principles and practices. Anglo sectors of the left and right both consistently denied the historical rights and agency of minority persons to determine their democratic rights collectively and refused to acknowledge that it is for the people in question to vindicate their rights as they choose any and all forms of organized struggle-economic, political, ideological,

Preface

and cultural. The fact remained that there were no mass democratic progressive national organizations for Mexicans to join. Workers' organizations offered a collective response. Moreover, the possible role of organized Mexican workers and the worker organizations they belonged to varied in the political process of trade unions in the United States. Ultimately unions were integrationist, moderate, and not gaining numbers. To be sure, Mexican Americans contributed to proactive militant unions. Historical research amply documents that civic organizing continued with programmatic ideas and energetic leadership into the r96os. Organizing activities found expression in sectorial and class resistance by Mexicans in the United States. Historically, a political momentum and mystique appeared in the Mexican community, but what was needed was broad agreement upon priorities, accepted tactical guidelines, and recognized coherent national political vehicles. Mexican Americans possessed a rich organizational heritage. Mexican American organizations did not always deal effectively with features of U.S. society that impeded the progress of the community. Progressive Mexican ethnic solidarity and sectorial activism offered the keys to gains through various forms of the social justice struggle. To achieve equity, a necessary condition was the continuing development of strong, "operational unity" coalitions that could serve as vehicles for the community on specific issues. Crucial to this development was the need for progressive political consciousness, agreed upon priorities, organizational discipline, and principled leadership with integrity and skills that could garner respect working with a wide spectrum of organizations and individuals. This possibility glimmered but did not consolidate or endure. Dealing with the heterogeneity within the Mexican community meant including many immigrants. Over time Mexicans came to terms with political processes and social realities and dealt with them as they existed; they joined partisan politics in greater number with somewhat greater success and pursued specific achievable benefits. The CCM constituencies reflected a broad and deep range of activities, most of which proved seminal to the debates, issues, and forms of the following two decades. CCM generated unprecedented resources and opportunities for individuals in the Mexican communities. The movement provided for two generations of leaders, its own and the next. By the late r97os, the Chicana and Chicano movement activists and activities diffused and transformed. The intensity of activities during the decade resulted in the initiative passing from movement

Preface

individuals to others more centrally located on the political spectrum. Most Mexican American political players, no longer an easily identifiable two or three sectors within the community, developed a broad range of agendas that were not primarily rooted in an ethnic-based, grassroots perspective as had been the case for the Chicanos who had first created the context and opportunity for empowerment from the midsixties through the midseventies. Rather, they had become a complex amalgam of interests, backgrounds, and goals. A growing number of professional politicians surfaced from a variety of Mexican communities, each of them espousing the concerns of a unique political constituency. Clearly, the number of participants and the diversity of activities multiplied as the seventies transformed into the eighties. By the late 1970s, many college-educated Mexicans explored the tolerance of the establishment and, in every way possible, rather than questioning the system pursued what the system offered. In that turnabout, young Chicanas and Chicanos motivated a significant percentage of their community to exhibit a stronger public presentation. In effect, activists continued to demand that society be receptive to new messages about what it was to be Mexican, but also more. They also generated some further support for educational, political, and economic advancement. Certainly, public officials began addressing issues of concern to Mexicans in a more considered manner. Finally, and perhaps most importantly, Chicana and Chicano movement activists forced certain concessions from the dominant mainstream; and some of these concessions- partial bilingual education, underfunded Chicano Studies programs, unenthusiastic affirmative action employment practices, sparse professional schooling opportunities, and less than fully representative appointed and elected offices-created a setting from which promotable Mexican American middle-class players could rise to local prominence. CCM activities laid the groundwork for a series of modest economic advancements. From the late 1970s through the early 1980s, a larger, more socially viable middle class emerged within the community. Culturally, the years between 1966 and 1977 were times of notable self-determined revitalizations within the community, self-evident in the energies directed into the arts, education, media, and religious institutions, as well as a period of increased efforts at integration into dominant ways and structures. A movement has participants and opponents, ideologies and counter ideologies, dialogues and counter dialogues, agendas and struggles, and active and supportive sectors. Reflections and analyses of the Chicana

Preface

and Chicano movement email criticisms, recognitions and praises of participants, struggles, and deconstructions of benefits. General characterizations of mass efforts by people of Mexican descent are productive to appreciating and gaining a fuller understanding of what the Chicano movement was about. To say that the "movement" as a whole ignored women's needs is to void and disrespect the experiences of thousands of women who participated and the many ways they challenged the obdurate within the movement, those deemed cultural retrogrades. The movement made possible positive changes for women in schooling, employment, and politics. Criticism waged by peoples involved in the Chicana and Chicano movement could be the most stinging, precisely because they highlighted weaknesses and limitations. Nevertheless, movements embrace critics and criticisms as much as they embrace advocates and advocacies. If women were excluded from key caucuses, decisions, positions, and so on, it reflected the chauvinism of mainstream politics as well as Mexican and U.S. societal chauvinism. Highlighting only Chicano and Mexican sexism within the larger patriarchal nation-state context reinforces cultural stereotypes. Throughout the twentieth century, Mexicans sought and obtained survival and equities in the face of the denial of these through conscious effort, at times of a few, and at times of many. The pursuit of equality has to be measured by its achievements, difficulties, and means, but also by the absence of the full extent of equality. The signs were economic presence, social dignity, cultural affirmation, and public empowerment. Yet these positive designations were not homogeneous icons but were shaped and voiced by the diversities within the Mexican community and outside it. Specifically, these diversities entailed gender, sexuality, classes, organizations, leadership, and goals. Foundational social realities operated vertically and horizontally and possessed depth and scope. They were also mythical, empowering and disempowering human constructs. Foremost realities \.Vere presence and land, oppression and resistance, history and change, and expression and dignity. These were not abstractions only, but the rubrics of specific human actions. Chicana and Chicano activities persisted in the face of government oppositions and supports of various kinds. More prosaically, developments in three branches of government and at local, state, and federal levels reflected, constrained, and furthered Mexican American civil rights. Therein exists a thick record, summing the negative and the positive; progress did occur. Courts and administrations of law were prevailed upon to recognize and extend rights and

i

Preface

be fairer in practice. Executive authorities extended benefits and protections. Legislative bodies increased their representation and attention. In sum, overall there was some latitude for Mexican American persistence and diversity. The Mexican American community has been an important historical part of the United States and its civic development. This has not been generally appreciated. Knowledge of this is important for a better sense of national U.S. diversity and progress. Mexican Americans have contributed economically and politically for 150 years. The Mexican American civil rights struggle has dimensions beyond suffrage, citizenship, and employment. The major dimensions were language, culture, land, labor, women's rights, and historical recognition, as well as the subsidiary dimension of immigration rights and the central dimension of tolerance of diversities within the United States. Undergirding these dimensions were the subtexts of a specific constellation of ethics and values claimed by Mexicans that embraced community, family, dignity, spirituality, and cultural work. All of which is to say, Mexican American historical mobilizations were an affirmation of humanist culture in the broadest sense of the phrase. To the point here, Mexican Americans have contributed to civil rights for everyone and for the public good. Multiethnicity and multic u Ituralism are ongoing processes of social definition within U.S. boundaries, whose parameters Mexican Americans have advanced. The United States is continually being socially and institutionally defined and Mexican American communities are part of that definition. Concurrently there has been a unique culture expressed and defined. Civil rights expressions are shaped and articulated through public and familia l culture as well as through specific organizational efforts. In the 1960s and 1970s very important thresholds were established that are a testimony to the evolution of the United States regardless of its past imperfections and that are consistent with the trends to extend social justice. One was the resolution on the part of many that they were going to put the instruments and thoughts of racism behind. Surely racism has not gone away, but during the r95os and 1960s many said that whatever the costs, whatever the difficulties, society was going to do away with racism and sexism and was going to further institute formal juridical equality and programs for the sake of furthering equality. Something else was proposed . Some people looked into their own pasts and said that to be ethnic is fine, to be proud of diverse cultural backgrounds within the laws of the United States and according to its

Preface

Constitution is fine, and to exercise diverse cultural preferences is fine. These were important social articulations. The sixties and seventies were momentous years and people thought about and answered the question, "What do we want the United States to be?" From their answers flowed the strengths for the engagements of these times to enhance progress toward justice and equality.

xic_

Introduction PRESENCES AND QUESTIONS

This book examines the Chicana and Chicano movement (CCM) of the sixties and seventies as a broad series of interrelated multiorganizational and multifield activities and movements that sought to secure basic equities for Mexican Americans in various aspects of life in the United States.1 The CCM evolved from a conglomeration of individuals, organizations, and movements and their actions and mobilizations. CCM activists developed a diverse range of agendas, objectives, strategies, approaches, ideologies, and identities-in effect a series of social movements in action. Yet w ithin this complex matrix of actions, organizations and movements reached beyond their immediate constituents and drew together broad segments of the Mexican American society into an animated base of support. umerous electrifying moments stitched together diverse peoples and organizations struggling for civil and human rights. During these points of intersection, individuals and groups formed an identifiable coalescence of action, a dynamic and , at times, a volatile body that we can refer to, in sum, as the Chicana and Chicano movement. While difference characterized every level of organization and every stage of organizational development within the CCM, points of convergence underscored the tensions and contest ations that stretched across diverse individuals and organizations. In effect, this examination offers an assessment of U.S . society and the Mexican American community at a given time, in relation to their overall shared civic progress toward a more equitable social order. To historicize the Chicana and Chicano movement, a narrative map of the Mexican American community is provided whereby a broad and long history is reflected , its position within U.S. society highlighted, and its analogies with other segments of U.S. society noted. The map reports the whys and wherefores of the Chicana and Chicano social xxv

lntrod uction

move ment, the socially and culturally significant realities of Mexican American communities during the I96os, and the expressed desires to change these by a wide range of activists. Thus, we begin by discussing the state of Mexican America and what activists wanted as members of U.S. society on behalf of this growing but discriminated against community concentrated in the U.S. Southwest and Midwest.

The Presence of the Community

The Chicana and Chicano movement's situational matrix was contextual, a changing range of realities for Mexican Americans; indeed change was an identifying characteristic of the conditions and the times . During the sixties there was change from within Mexican America, as well as an insufficiency of change; resurgence occurred not at a time of regression but at a time of slightly incremental changes. In the sixties, electoral underrepresentation remained the rule, but the numbers elected to office had slightly increased. While larger numbers remained wage poor through discrimination and exploitation, Mexicans continued to enter the skilled labor market. The life possibilities of many remained inhibited by social controls but, here and there, selective limited mobility occurred. At the same time, slowly, a quite modest, educated economic and political middle elite burgeoned and solidified. In comparison with preceding periods, Mexican American labor organizing continued and slightly increased in the industries accessible to unions; nevertheless, more people by far were outside the unions than inside them. The most visibly excluded, basic service workers and farm laborers, continued organizational activities. For decades, citizens and immigrants were part and parcel of neighborhoods, work sites, schools, churches, and public social life. Explicit anti-Mexican discrimination remained in some areas of schooling, employment, and housing, but overall public discrimination receded, to be sure, or individuals simply vei led their views somewhat. A working people, Mexican Americans often held the least desirable and worst paying jobs in the local economy. Mexicans were sensitive to the fact that they lagged behind the income and schooling levels of both Anglos and blacks, yet a few Mexican youth appeared on college campuses. Most importantly, the Mexican community grew numerically, including the numbers of citizens as well as high school and college graduates, and many felt underserved and underrepresented. Some

Presences and Questions x:c

positive growth continued in some areas into the years that followed and, particularly noticeable, women increased their civic access and participation. In some way or another, most Mexican Americans had experienced, directly or indirectly, economic or social discrimination, and only a few were experiencing change for the better, but some were intent on using their spatial latitudes and intellectual resources to further their own progress and that of others in their communities. Through the 1960s and 1970s, at most, the Mexican-descent community comprised some ten million people, located primarily in the Southwest and Midwest, but eventually distributed in all fifty states, including Alaska and corners of the Eastern seaboard. This population contributed numbers in the hundreds of billions of dollars to the goods and services of the United States. Contrary to the negative stereotypes that circulated, the Mexican population was indeed rich in social diversity and encompassed several social classes and several regional subgroups. As a world type, as a group, it corresponded to a phenomenon that was endemic across the world: the existence of an ethnic group within a larger multiethnic society. To underscore what was too often denied, this was and is a native ethnic group; Mexicans are indeed native to orth America and historically part of American social relations. In the 1960s they loudly claimed their equities. The CCM was a transformative group-wide experience characterized by diverse organizations, activities, and protest movements. How and with what consequences this social matrix transformed may be interpreted by several contrasting explanatory stands.

Questions

In this book, the Chicana and Chicano movement is narrated from a wide variety of angles and activities. What activists referred to as the "movement" was not a simple monolithic phenomenon, so an adequate understanding of it requires attention to several parts and the changes they concurrently underwent. The following pages offer a view of a multifaceted social movement subsuming multiple activities promulgated by hundreds of individuals and scores of organizations in the United States. Past narratives of the Chicana and Chicano movement frame individual and group actions through primarily biographical, chronological, and membership group histories. These approaches provide important historiographical and informational

iii Introduction

contributions toward a fuller record of the civil and human rights struggles of Mexican American communities. However, they do not provide an overall multisector or multidimensional understanding of the CCM. Consequently, this book offers contextualized critical analysis of the Chicana and Chicano movement as a complex, broad social movement over a ten-year duration. This book informs both academic and popular audiences by presenting a multipart narrated history of social movement activities waged by Chicana and Chicano activists. The argument presented is that the CCM consisted of multiple activities and voiced discourses in diverse spatialities aimed at accessing social, political, economic, and cultural equities. In sum, a complex processual matrix comprised the era of the Chicana and Chicano movement. The panoramic and sweeping view of the Chicana and Chicano movement offered in this publication provides a particular understanding of the interlocking and intersectional histories of the Chicana and Chicano movement. The CCM as it unfolded was multipurpose and involved diverse participants but was underlain by a basic commitment to social change. Usually, an identifiable number of activists committed themselves fully to an organization, cause, or mobilization with achievable objectives. A good majority of participants in CCM activities supported more than one CCM activity. Core participants made efforts visible and attractive to sympathizers. Crowd participation animated and influenced leaders and organizations. otably, many young activists had a wide variety of commitments and their concomitant activities enriched their public experiences as well as their public judgments and galvanized affirmative momentums. Interpretively judged in various ways, activist members of the CCM generation operated in a social context articulating a variety of specific issues and posed the following questions: What do we want for Mexican Americans? What do we want the United States to be? 2 The questions raised and answers forged took cognizance of the U.S. plural and conflictive past and the past experiences of Mexican Americans. Chicana and Chicano activists sought changes in civic arenas shaped by U.S . historic and social dynamics. Broad contexts for these efforts will be referred to in the following pages. Activists were heirs of a shaping past to be sure, but politically they acted consciously in spite of those constraints. Certainly, persons created change by acting publically and civically, as the activists of the Chicana and Chicano movement in fact did through concrete actions and contemplations. Individuals reflected

Presences and Questions

on their present and past and encouraged others to act civically to confront the limitations of their day. Activists understood that to be informed publicly meant to know what needed repairing civically. These dynamic human interactions entailed acknowledging the positive possibilities and negative limitations of the present. For the most part, Chicana and Chicano activists were conscious knowers, repairers, peacemakers, and constructors. This narrative on the Chicana and Chicano movement, premised on interlocking changes and interacting responses, entails an interpretation of U.S. society and an assessment of the Mexican community in relation to the historical contexts, the social bases, and the institutional progress{es) of civil rights over a lengthy period of time. 3 These relations, we believe, involved interests and patterns present throughout a complex U.S. history. Ethnic relations in the United States involved material interests and historical patterns; these were not illusions, but the facts of life for people of color. The U.S. contexts of the Chicana and Chicano movement were not simply some grand matters of an imagined gilded p ast, some mythic or invented recollections, but the hard specifics of the history and society of the United States nationa lly and globally, constructions affected by race, class, gender, sexuality, and power relations. Indeed , conflicted social relations in the United States provided the context in which to explain the obstacles and objectives of the Chicana and Chicano movement. Every generation in the United States evolves and contributes to redefining their society and civic polity, whether done specifically and consciously or indirectly and inattentively but under conditions inherited from the past. U.S. civil rights evolution during the mid-nineteenth century (1836-18 50) was the specific stage when Mexicans began affirming their presence in this country, as other minorities and women's groups did. Since that time, during over one hundred years, the status of ethnic minorities and women in the United States underwent some changes as civil rights efforts galvanized among several disempowered constituents. As noted, the United States goes through recurrent periods of redefinition. All the constituent elements of the United States add to its ongoing definition as a lived process at a given time. Several social movements swept the country during the last one hundred years and did so again in the 1960s and the 1970s. Minority and women's constituent elements shaped U.S. history as they engaged in historical changes in the sixties. Thus, the United States has an evolving past of minority and gender relations of more than two hundred years. The present always

>c::

Introduction

converses with that past, here as elsewhere in the world, and so it is with Mexican Americans. Alongside an appreciation of the depth and breadth of U.S. society, there was much to be criticized within it that is pertinent to ethnic minorities, both men and women. To be sure, positive criticism of past political history furthered the public good by encouraging progressive steps toward a more just society. An operative incentive for expecting and doing better was the fact that in the United States people have the ability, because of natural resources and because of the structural institutions in the country, to progress civically and developmentally beyond the present conditions, to bring about positive social change. In fact, the vital domestic challenges for the 1960s included achieving incremental economic and social justice, not as a point of invidiousness vis-a-vis other countries, but in terms of personal and group progressive life standards and personal and group progressive ideals in the United States. Thus, to criticize was a declaration that ideals existed against which to measure such important social objectives as constitutional and human rights as well as civil equalities and fair economic compensations for all working people. All societies generate myths, anchored somewhat in their historical realities, which serve as codes for proffered unifying ideals available to their citizens. Both ideals and realities existed relative to one another and should be considered in understanding the Chicana and Chicano movement. Social idealists envisioned the United States as an electoral republic, a commonwealth providing economic opportunities for all, and a social body diverse in origins and joined together by a constitution that applies equally to all within its boundaries. This political vision, linked to the notions of democratic pluralism and democratic radicalism, presupposes that everyone participates and everyone decides. At one time, the metaphorical phrase "melting pot" referred to a means forged by honest work and good neighborliness achieving a plural society and implied a standard of gradual equalization for European immigrant arrivals with native-born citizens. To some extent, the means partially occurred for many, but the means were denied and the standards were not achieved for women and people of color. Inequality is the reality for most women regardless of ethnicity and for the majority of minority peoples. Women and workers have shaped the social progress of the United States, including those of Mexican Americans, premised on the promise that civic ideals can be made real. Facing diverse inequities and injustices, many women and workers engaged in

Presences and Questions

struggles for justice and, thus, in practice, voiced resonant articulations with those of African Americans and Native Americans. The Mexican American experience offered a set of testimonies on the overall governmental structure and social substructures of the United States. Mexican Americans represented individuals and, as members of a community, comprised historically an integral part of the U.S. past. Yet Mexicans were not often accorded historical recognition or entitlements. Nonetheless, as time progressed, leaders of Mexican communities strove to receive civic recognition and achieve civic saliency. They argued Mexican Americans' equities were part of the public good. Historically, Mexican Americans have engaged in social, constitutional, and civil rights struggles in the United States. This narrative presents a framework that includes context, argumentation, foundational elements, institutional advocacies, and episodic implementations. All of these are subsumed in certain social interpretations. The subsequent conclusions may be interpreted as an assessment on civil rights progress subsuming the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth constitutional amendments and, very importantly, the further civil and human rights beyond these amendments' parameters. Certainly in regard to Mexicans, not all rights in the constitution have been accorded, beginning with its first ten amendments, as well as those following. Thus this narrative assessment addresses civil and constitutional rights historically, as a whole, for Mexican Americans and, through their contributions, civil and human rights including cultural and historical rights. Mexican Americans have lived through diverse oppressions and have struggled broadly beyond the parameters of the specific legal dispensations of the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth amendments. As a result, because of both social and political necessities, the CCM became both a civil rights mobilization and also more than that, a social movement, a summing of energies for collective social and cultural affirmation. Civic activists of the Mexican American community were principally concerned, as were civic activists of other ethnic groups, with two main overall objectives. One was social survival and the other was social equality, both translated as the achievement of public equity in all realms of public life. This was a particularly U.S. social/ontological challenge in the sense that Mexicans were an ethnic group that had maintained some cultural cohesion over time, and they were a historical group that formed part and parcel of the continental and U.S. experience . .Mexican

>
rative Americans, Latino Americans, African Americans, or Asian Americans and, worse, the overall coverage of workers declined. The struggle for workers' rights continued through the decades of the I96os and 1970s and was shared by all peoples experiencing discrimination. The Native American question and the African question came to the fore several times in U.S. history and will continue to do so. The questions of gender relations, as with those of labor, have flared and dimmed. The Mexican American question arose in the 1960s alongside all of these. These questions of inequalities had to be answered before there could be progress toward the ideal of equality in society. These questions involve realities and perceptions. Tremendous changes that affected nearly everyone flowed from seeking to address these questions, and undoubtedly these questions will remain in the decades to come. A completely positive solution, that is, a just society with social justice for all who live within the boundaries of the United States, will take several more generations. Reflections on the whys and wherefores of beginnings, transitions, and evolutions are in order for historians. Many Mexicans share African descent and nearly all Mexicans are affected by the legacy of racial oppression and discrimination directed at Native Americans. All Mexicans are affected by the gender question and the strengths or weaknesses of legal and organizational workers' rights, as well as by the fortunes of Native Americans and African Americans. The social origins of what came to be the United States were colonial impositions and multiethnic social constituencies, not only in regard to Native American populations and African American populations, but also in regard to Mexican Americans. These origins also involved class interests and relations. What bridges other Latino populations with Mexican Americans, aside from a common European heritage, are their important foundational Native American and African heritages. To appreciate the plural beginnings of what came to be the United States, several aspects of European colonial expansion need to be considered. Europeans came to the Americas and established versions of their home societies in different parts of the Americas. From their encounters with indigenous and African peoples evolved some of the main social and national groups that now inhabit the region. Though relatively small in numbers, at one time there were the English in "New England," to them appropriately named, and, concurrently, the

Past Contemporaries

Spaniards appropriated "New Spain" and other large parts of the Americas. Following suit were the Portuguese with " ew Portugal," and to a much lesser extent the French who at one time enjoyed a "New France." In these places the colonials achieved privileges at the expense of others, initially primarily Native Americans and Africans. Social evolution in these tiny communities, which occupied garrisons we euphemistically call "settlements," varied, but contextual similarities existed- European languages and laws.

Foundati ons

Historical foundations undergirded twentieth-century socia l relations in general ways and, over time, provided the impetuses and reasons for social change. 5 Among the features of that evolution were the material and political aspects of colonial mandates, including survival, production, trade, and, ultimately, profit. Basic to this process was the fact that Native-born peoples occupied the Americas. Europeans displaced Native Americans from their homelands to accommodate the new arrivals . People came to the Americas for basic material reasons to profit or at least survive. Women were appropriated as captives of men. Empowered Europeans kidnapped other people, bringing them to the Americas for forced labor. One step that enlightens analysis is to establish how the economy operated and how profit seeking occurred in a society. To be sure, any number of alleged motivations may have been involved for individuals in the establishment of colonies during the development of the United States. These alleged motivations may be contextualized in ways that allow for critical reflection. People write that they came in pursuit of liberty, or liberties in the plural, and for religious motives. Whether they sought to be unhinged from the dictums of the Church of England or to spread an earlier variety of Christianity, Catholicism, to the benighted of the Americas, the outcomes benefited European elites financially. There was also the explanation that Europeans came "to develop" native peoples, which assumes that Europeans came for benign reasons . These were legacies of colonial rationa les. But as may be noticed, all the motivations cited as the biases of colonization and U.S. development represented self-serving interests and the need for appropriated labor under some guise or another. Indeed, people came to improve their lives, yet many downplay the fact that the

2:::::

Chapter 2

way they were going to improve their lives was by taking other people's labor, other people's goods, and, indeed, other people's lands and property-and by taking all of these through force if necessary. Purs uing wealth to the detriment of others, racializing others, became a historical pattern. Stereotypes served to justify these patterns. In the thirteen colonies and in the early republic, empowered persons initiated separation and segregation between Europeans and others. This invidious pattern of social inequalities went with the English-speaking settlers westward. Gender inequities also served ro justify the resource and power accumulation of a minority, primarily men of European-descent. Broad segments of U.S. society shared a varied unity and also ethnic, class, and gender divisiveness among exploited populations living at the suffrage of the larger dominant society. But among the segments, the ancestors of Mexican Americans had a particular historical evolution in that they were impacted by the consequences of both Spanish and English colonialism. In greater Mesoamerica, stretching from the Rio Grande to Nicaragua, from the Pacific to the Mississippi, a process of development surged that involved exploitation and domination but also acculturation.6 Nonetheless, the established social and colonial foundations occurred at great social costs to women, Indians, and Africans. In Colonial Mexico, this synthesis of what was Indian and Spanish was a lso, to a significant measure, the synthesis of what was African American. Given that Native American interlocking cultural and economic networks spanned North America, initially these networks were magnets to Europeans. Across North America, consequences followed the realities of diverse aggressions. As Europeans came to occupy North America, large numbers of Africans suffered abduction from their homelands at the hands of other Europeans. In the surge for profit and power, Spanish colonial leaders encouraged some settlers northward. English leaders urged their colonials westward to what is now the U.S. West. Thus, some went forth into the borderlands moving northward and others westward. Social consequences of colonial domination, among others, were subsequent syntheses, that is, what we refer to now as borderlands people, which included members of Native American groups from the interior of southern North America, now Mexico. Nahua-speaking settlers involved in the colonization of New Mexico and Texas contributed to the establishment of settlements alongside preexisting Native American settlements, adding further complexity to borderland mestizo settlements. Moving northward, the colonial

Past Contemporaries

Indio-mestizo mulatto descendants of Indians and Spaniards encountered English speakers coming from the east. All the while these, as well as ative Americans, moved from one area to another. Native Americans are a continuous historical presence in all areas also settled by Hispanicized settlers. There was not one great trek but, rather, continuous northward and southward economic thrusts occurring in what is now north and central Mexico, which began at the end of the sixteenth century. The founding of what is now Santa Fe, though the site was moved several times, arguably can be dated from 1598. Thus, Mexican American social history entails the foundation of colonial Indian/mestizo/mulatto- Spanish-speaking- Christian settlements, with legacies continuous to the present times. These early historical accomplishments have human and economic consequences, which became very much a part of twentieth-century regional societies. Whether colonial histories are much appreciated or whether they are seen as marginal or distant, they are important historically and socially. Colonial Mexican social formations were contemporary to Atlantic coast foundational events that are more familiar to U.S. classroom au diences. Indeed, multiethnic North America is such because in addition to ative Americans, in addition to African-descent residents, there are the Indio-Hispano mestizo-mulattos moving southward from central Mesoamerica at a very early point in the development of what comes to be the continental United States. This historical presence and contemporary existence came to be under certain conditions.7 The multiethnic formation and ultimate contribution on the part of the Mexican Indian/mestizo/mulatto Spanishspeaking populations came about through two broad but clear processes. One way was, of course, the process that involved the territorial expansion of what came to be the United States. The United States is thought of as being primarily seeded by the Anglo New England colonists. Actually, the English settlements involved were multicultural to begin with and included women. These organized near mini-states went through a series of expansions, which invariably used force. Colonial aggressors advanced on others and killed and pillaged along the way. Thus, U.S. history has the chapters of the so-called Indian Wars. In addition to recurring wars against Native Americans, English colonists resorted to maintaining an enormous laboring population of African descent. Indeed, there are records of force against Mexicans beginning with events dated roughly from the 183os-pertinent to Texas-and there

2~

5

Chapter 2

are forceful events and consequences surrounding the United StatesMexico war. The one event that we are told about, for which full data is usually not presented, was the conflict at the Alamo fortress situated at San Antonio, Texas-then indisputably Mexican territory. Somewhat hazy explanations for a United States-Mexico war are offered but the culprit is identified as Mexico. The war is expla ined as allegedly due to the antagonism of unstable Mexico, whose government had the audacity to commit aggression against the United States and thereby received a just punishment, losing the war. The compensation agreed on was a very attractive one-an enormous slice of nearly one-half of the territory then claimed by a young republic, the republic of Mexico. Importantly, within that territory lived a diverse range of people-Native Americans and the descendants of earljer settlers, including central .Mexico Native Americans and recent immigrants later to be joined continuously by cultural kin from the south. The peace treaty of February 1848 offered U.S. citizenship to Mexican citizens residing in the acquired territories, which de facto included Native Americans who were citizens under the Mexican Constitution of 1824. Even though the U.S. dealt with Texas prior to and separately from the 1848 acquisitions, and despite Texas being considered a southern territory, Mexicans, in principle, held citizenship rights. To be sure, civil rights in the United States during the 1840s were limited. The operative overarching "civil rights" legislation at the time was the aturalization Act of 1790, which made citizenship rights difficult in practice for U.S . residents of Native American, African, or Asian descent. There were, however, some minimal constitutional recognitions for some residents.

Dispensations

Mexican Americans as a resident population and an extensive territory came into U.S. history at a precise time- the 1830s in Texas and through the 1840s in the Southwest-and under conditions involving politically and civically charged issues pertinent to the South-North divisions. 8 From that time forward, Mexican Americans, along with other ethnic groups, have been part and parcel of U.S. society, its politics, its economic changes, its good times, and its crisis times. Certainly the social ideologies, the labor practices, the property acquisition modes, and the governance structures of the United States in the 1840s

Past

Contemporaries

impacted the formative experiences of the Mexican American group. Particularly important were issues pertinent to maintaining slavery, the markedly unequal relations of labor with entrepreneurs, the oppressive Euro-American gender traditions that generalized patriarchal practices, :md the continual wars against Kative Americans and their resultant ~nclosures.

To be sure, the annexation of resource-endowed land and working people via a negotiated international treaty perforce entailed adjustments of some laws pertinent to property, electoral practices, economic urangements, and alterations to some social modes. Up to a point, given the treaty, U.S. laws had to be in sync with some rights and protections under the constitution of the Mexican Republic. In this context and circumstance, the Mexican American civic efforts extended rights for all in various ways, some straightforward, others ironic and paradoxical. For example: precedential [exican prohibitions pertinent to the enslavement of Africans and the largeness of the acquired territories meant the U.S. extension of slavery beyond eastern Texas would be intensely debated. Access to Mexican-held property meant property holding became more accessible to others. Mexican legal precedents meant that in the Southwest, public interests came to supersede private interests in regard to water availability, a particularly sensitive issue in arid zones. Mexican frontier precedents meant the conduct accountability of public officials became an item scrutinized through citizen participation. Spousal rights in marriage now included some property rights for some women because of Mexican legal recognition of the rights of all siblings to inherit and consequently the desire to protect inheritance rights of some Mexican women married to Anglo males. Moreover the Mexican constitution recognized the citizen rights of male persons residing in Mexican territory regardless of color or ethnicity; that is, Native Americans and Afro-mestizos were deemed citizens, and their citizenship was recognized under the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. Some economic and administrative adjustments did occur. However, after 1848, securing clear civil rights in practice for persons of Mexican descent, as well as for men and women of African American and ative American descent, required efforts that spanned over l)O years. The Mexican American population, initially in the late 1840s and earlier in Texas, joined the United States through force within a certain political context: the historicity of a lost war and being at the social mercy of those who won the war, within a racialized societal context.

2

Chapter 2

U.S. legal systems accorded privileges to propertied white males and tolerated or, worse, legitimated the pejorative treatment of colored minorities, women and men. Most 1exicans were racially mixed descendants of families of varied genetic and cultural backgrounds and could be judged Indian or black by white officeholders. From an Anglo perspective, Mexicans were socially stigmatized because of their physical appearance. U.S. practices legally stigmatized Africans and Indians. At a given moment, Mexicans as ethnic others had to defend other ethnic peoples and also disassociate from them to salvage their own protections or rights. The Dred Scott opinion of 1857 clearly restated prejudices and reaffirmed the slavery and property status of African American slaves. Tellingly, a debate ensued before and after 1848 as to whether Mexican Americans should be granted rights within the United States. Many argued that since not all U.S. residents enjoyed full rights of citizenship, Mexicans should not be granted rights because of their Indian and African ancestries. A few suggested sectioning Mexicans off into certain locations as Native Americans had been. And a few others thought about enslavement for Mexican Americans, though slavery was already disreputable to many in the United States. The fact was that race aroused deep conflictual emotions, as witnessed in the actions directed at African Americans, Native Americans, and Mexican Americans in the years following the Civil War, and the public overtly and juridically approved legal and social segregation practices in the United States. For Mexican Americans the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo (initially signed February 2, 1848, and reaffirmed May 26, 1848) offered a pivotal statement as to legal and civic standings. 9 The treaty that settled the United States-Mexico war is a document produced by mid-nineteenth century U.S. national politica l leadership that tried to map what their "dos and don'ts" were going to be to definitively settle the acquisition of an enormous territory. As a byproduct, they established a precedent visa-vis non-European, non-English-speaking populations that might fall within the ever-expanding continental U.S. borders and eventual overseas territories. To be sure, this document delimited certain rights, for example when and how property ownership could be established, while it provided only tentative recognition for certain other rights. Moreover, since the document made reference to citizens living within the Mexican republic, and under the Mexican constitution all native born were citizens, its constitution recognized Native Americans as citizens as well as

Past Contemporaries

persons of African descent. The treaty clearly compelled this recognition; not to recognize these citizen rights would be a violation of the treaty and arguably a violation of the U.S. constitution. Arguably, the treaty is the foundational formal recognition of Mexican American civil rights; in practice, the recognition was extended erratically. Arguing treaty protection, Mexican American solicitations were often denied by the courts. Overall, litigation records show corporations and wealthy individuals, as well as state and federal governments, to be the parties who, for the most part, benefitted from the court's interpretations of the treaty. Though Indians and Mexicans went to court and continued to do so for decades to address civil, property, and religious measures, most lost their claims. Undeniably, the treaty granted to the Mexican citizen at the time, whether individuals explicitly asked or not, full U.S . constitutional rights in clear language. An early test of this was the California case of People v. Naglee (1850), and another was Tobin v. Walkinshaw (1856). Thus from the treaty stemmed rights, and arguably from these rights stemmed constitutional benefits including the rights to political participation and the right to be free from discriminatory practices. Yet the conditions of the times meant the rights were questioned. Exceptions to this dominant trend occurred. Reluctantly and by necessity, as the result of a U.S. court case, a judge made a decision that interpreted that Mexicans merited special recognitions under U.S. law. The judge posited that since at one time certain individuals as Mexican citizens were protected under Mexican law, they were now to be protected under U.S. law (Ward v. Broadwell, 1854). Referring to the treaty, scores of Mexican Americans defended basic rights pertinent to citizenship, voting, elected office eligibility, and, very importantly, the right to own and hold property in a variety of circumstances. 10 Many Mexican Americans across the Southwest called upon the courts to recognize their property rights. Moreover, particularly acute citizenship and electoral challenges occurred during the second half of the nineteenth century. At the California Constitutional Convention debates (1848), Pablo de la Guerra faced a challenge to his electoral rights because he was judged to be of "Indian" descent. Here both the accusation as well as the defense signaled notable benchmarks. He defended the rights of Native American descendants to property and suffrage because they had enjoyed the rights of citizens under Mexican law and the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. Other instances where the rights of Mexicans

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•

Chapter 2

were raised in courts involved U.S. v. Lucero (r 869); People v. D e la Guerra (r 870); and U.S. v. Santiesteban (r874). Notably, in the D e la Guerra v. California court case, the state supreme court held th at given that California and its citizens had been admitted with the equalities due the original states and citizens, De la Guerra was reaffirmed in his equal rights. Ironically, De La Guerra's detractors had accused him of "acting" like a citizen, thus engaging in a form of civic deception, though in fact the accusers were the deceivers since through falsehoods they denied De La Guerra his legal rights. Prior to the r96os- indeed, over the past r50 years-African American, Mexican American, and Native American equities intertwined and shaped U.S. social historical relations. The r866 and r875 civil rights acts increased the probabilities of rights for blacks, but they specifically exempted persons of Native American descent. Moreover, independent of federal courts, state governments moved to curtail several rights. For example, the court ruling on the Robinson v. Memphis Charleston RR Co. case of r883 explicitly enforced racial segregation. Following this case, the courts (Elk v. Wilken, r884) curtailed voting rights of Native American- descent people seemingly in principle under all circumstances. The U.S. case of Plessy v. Ferguson (r896) devastatingly withdrew in total civil rights and protections from African Americans. Since states had prerogatives in determining citizenship and "free white" status, rights argued under the treaty were continually subject to being questioned and thus under threat as can be read in Milton R. Konvitz, The Alien and the Asiatic in American Law (1946).11 The Texas r 897 Ricardo Rodriguez case paradoxically recognized that the Treaty of Guadalupe rights also pertained to Mexicans of Indian ancestry and, rather ambitiously, also conceded rights to Mexican immigrants by extension if they were from Mexico's border states. Yet its arguments sustained racist premises and exclusions. Inspired by apprehensions as well as alleged civic righteousness at the New Mexico state constitutional convention in r9ro, Mexican American delegates, one-third of the attendants, starkly raised the protection of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. The delegates sought to protect the electoral, cultural, civic, and educational rights of those identified as Spanish-speaking persons explicitly in the text of the constitution and in forthright clauses. Comparatively, a few courts in the late nineteenth century were somewhat sensitive to Guadalupe Hidalgo treaty rights, but they were less so after r900, though the treaty's influence did remain variously. As referred to earlier, the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo's civil rights

Past Contemporaries

coverage extended to Native Americans, arguably to some, because under the Mexican republican constitution and its laws, Native Americans were citizens of the republic, not wards of the federal government. Thus, the treaty clearly protected Native American religious, electoral, and property rights as gleaned from the legislative debates of February 16, 1859, on Pueblo Indians' political rights in territorial New Mexico. 12 Moreover, in United States v. Lucero, the New Mexico Supreme Court ruled in 1869 that Pueblo Indians were citizens of the territory and the United States, though these recognitions changed later. Certainly, in Arizona, Indians, formerly Mexican citizens, were also disenfranchised .13 Some jurists eventually argued that a duly elected congress would have the power legislatively to determine that all persons of a particular ancestry or their children could not become citizens. From the contextual situation of the 1840s and the phrases of the Treaty flow any number of early issues through the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. One issue was the maintenance of voting and property rights for Mexican Americans. Another was maintenance of their civil rights and, by extension, their cultural practices-guarantees for language rights, choice of domicile, rights to travel back and forth across what came to be the U.S. southern border, and the rights to access public facilities and thoroughfares. Juxtaposed to these were U.S. legislative and court practices of delimited references to race and color, and some references to gender. For example, white women could not vote or hold office or inherit or dispose of property but were considered part of the "free white population"; nevertheless, their legal rights were limited, including their economic and social prerogatives. Under Mexican legal practices, women could inherit and dispose of property under particular conditions, thus certainly Mexicans should be able to own and dispose of their own property. In sum, several major rights issues of the Mexican American community began to be energized in the 1850s and l86os, and they continued through the decades. What issues were raised, who raised them , and how the courts interpreted them were affected by the facts that not only were many Mexicans native for generations in areas now in the United States, but the country of historical origin for Mexican Americans bordered the United States. Moreover, inclusive of many economic relations with that country, Mexican labor was drawn to the United States and incorporated into the Mexican American community from the mid-nineteenth century through the twentieth.

3

Chapter 2

Incorporations: Usefulness and Consequent Perceptions

The incorporation of Mexicans and the recruitment of Mexican immigrants as laborers within the United States paralleled the close, dominant economic ties of the United States with Mexico that emerged after independence. 14 The United States developed a particular relation with a much weakened, ostensibly independent republic to the south of it. That relationship was important, although not often referred to in the literature on U.S. international relations during the nineteenth century. Economic relations with Mexico benefited the United States and did impact Mexican Americans. The importance of having a militarily defenseless and resource-rich neighbor like Mexico should be considered in any appraisal of its strategic deployment worldwide. Mexico was a de facto dependency of the United States, and all the good-neighborly rhetoric that was enunciated by representatives of both countries cannot erase that political-economic point. This asymmetry was an observable fact of modern Mexican history and its impact on Mexican Americans. Mexico, as an economic and political entity, and its peoples were disdained by many Anglo-Americans and the disdain was expressed repeatedly and in various ways. Certainly, the asymmetry meant economic dependency and, to a measure, political dependency. One partner had veto power over aspects of the relationship that the other did not. But there were, of course, a range of specifics and these involved economics, the extraction of Mexican raw materials, and, very importantly, the appropriation of Mexican labor. These facts impacted Mexican Americans in various material and subjective ways. To many Anglo-Americans, Mexico was dark, Indian, and African, a specter recalling a past that was preferable to forget. These fears were attached to encounters with Mexican Americans. There were other acknowledgements. Mexico was historically anchored to complex indigenous societies in ways the United States was not. Some Anglos see Mexican American ancestry as an enticement to land or political claims. In the minds of some, the possibility existed that Mexico would be the future alongside the expanding non-European world. In sum, Mexico was a resource for U.S. investors and also a source of apprehension for many citizens. The CCM proactively confronted not only the realities of the economic relationship, but also mainstream imaginings of the specter of Mexico as a dark society and ominous state. Without demonstrated logic or proof, .fexico remained a source of some rationales for discrimination against Mexican Americans, a premise for

Past Contemporaries

their diminished and marginal status, and a rational foreignness more compelling to some than their contributions. At certain stages of the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, what the U.S. economy needed was the sheer muscle and brawn and the tremendous energy and endurance of both working women and men. Even with the great European immigration numbers, which explained some of the multiethnicities in the United States, available Europeanorigin labor did not suffice; more labor was needed. Thus, Mexican laborers increased. Economic needs preceded the development of clear codes as to how to handle the arriving immigrant popu lations. Drawn from colonial and early republic times, the color code for handling and maintaining a laboring population was not easily transferable or efficient for the southern and central Europeans or for some other populations. To be sure, ethnic codes for these were attempted, for example, Jewish, Irish, and Italian immigrants were not considered white and were labeled with derogatory names in reference to alleged physical characteristics . In fact, ethnic labor restrictions continued and, in certain specific circumstances, these were applied to Mexicans. With numbers increasing, a code developed for Mexicans, one that was pervasively covert and overtly anti-Mexican.15 Into this expansionist-derived phobia politics fitted the recurrent arriva ls of Mexican immigrants. Immigration was the second way in which Mexican Americans entered the United States. Economic interests encouraged immigration concurrent with racist feelings and racist stereotypes concerning immigrants to the United States; labor relations aroused certain kinds of politics. Indeed, stereotypes of Mexicans, some simple, some contradictory, and some complex have existed for over one hundred years. The simplest stereotype of Mexicans and the images they conveyed, asserted by political-economic evaluations, is that " they're passive " or " they 're good workers"; that is, they are manageable and productive, dutiful, and loyal. In contrast, Mexican women were seen as productive but also as being of better ethical character than the men. However, many were seen as "nonconformists," which justified increased supervision and control. In sum, Mexicans were useful to the extent they were not likely to question economically or politically the status quo. More complex, the stereotype of the Mexican as a subversive and an outlaw reinforced the notion of the Mexican as a potential proactive enemy of the existing social order. In practice, a range of attitudinal negativities ex isted about Mexicans . Worse, these were often destructively inculcated among

3

Chapter 2

some Mexicans themselves. The matter was not simply that the majority white population had stereotypes, or even contradictory ones, about an ethnic population-but members of the ethnic groups accepted negative views about themselves and, in turn, abo ut other nonwhite groups, who also harbored stereotypes. Simply put, these stereotypes facilitated labor, gender, and political manipulations and denials, and impeded solidarities because they were part of popular lore. Stereotypes imposed and represented figurative chains in a person's mind, chains placed onto women, just as they were placed onto African Americans and Mexican Americans, with associated disabling consequences. They recurred from generation to generation. For Mexican Americans they were replayed with cycles of immigration-when numbers of immigrants were believed to increase, anti-Mexican stereotypes increased in public circulation. Mexican labor- and immigrant-related oppression and repression were constants of life; incrementally these practices became part and parcel of the experiences of a vulnerable labor force simply moving across the landscape. 16 Public discourses that criticized immigrants were often rationalized by some people as doing what they had to do to empower themselves, and they did so at whatever cost to others. Thus, complaints about immigration practices and against immigrant residents coexisted with the entrepreneurial practices that encouraged immigrants. That swinging door, the labor entrance, was there, and that swinging door was economics. Mexican laborers, as sources of high productivity at low cost, were undoubtedly sources of profit and assets to the economy in various ways. Historically, the Mexican immigrant was a multifaceted resource; she and he provided profit and services and even sometimes a rationale for what worried individuals in U.S. society. Mexicans were readily identifiable socially and culturally, a laboring population set off by ethnicity, set off by a certain skin color, not quite black but certainly not white. Presumably important, this laboring group did not intrude into the important facets of society-major politics, public institutions, high culture, and so forth. In the elite U.S. imagination, Mexicans were a group that was present to labor. They were suited for work. The labor expectation has remained a constant since the first waves of Mexican immigration came to the United States during the r85os through the 1880s. Mexican immigration continued through World War II and into the r97os when immigration became one of the issues that politicia ns bashed around. Mexican immigration has been occurring for a long

Past Contemporaries

time in North America and has been an integral part of U.S. labor history. The disdain for immigrants has been related to the disdain for workers, which in turn has been manifested in suspicion that organizations of workers were not part of the public interest; labor grouping has been seen as subversive for society. Looking at U.S. labor in the I96os, several aspects can be noted. Labor organizing may be historical and even heroic, but for the most part unions have been exclusionary and limited in outreach to workers overall. U.S. unions have covered only a minority of all workers and have excluded or segregated workers of color for decades. Their leadership, with some outstanding exceptions, revealed moderate to conservative inclinations. But whether speaking of labor patterns or exceptions, a labor-historical awareness was not readily available in the schools, either through teachers or materials. The labor histories and labor participations of many minority groups, particularly African Americans and Mexican Americans, have been absent in general textbooks. By looking clearly at the development of the U.S. Southwest, one can see that Mexican labor has been present and underappreciated in the farming and livestock industries, railroad construction, mining development, and during the growth of manufacturing and services. Mexican labor comriburions are a litany of very vital economic matters that often seem in the telling rather mundane. Not readily appreciated, labor is what explains part of the Mexican population in the United States, but this is labor under certain conditions and these conditions encourage a civil rights response involving basic freedoms such as speech, assembly, association, petition, due process, the right to protest, and so on. Mexican labor and Mexican immigrant labor have been essential, important components of the evolution of the Chicana and Chicano movement. To recall the question of what Chicana and Chicano activists wanted, the answer is a practical synthesis of the results of U.S. and Chicano histories-justice and equality. Two sets of trends came together to provide forms, substance, and contexts for the overall efforts of Mexican American politics; these address the larger society, on behalf of Mexican American rights and equities. One set involved those matters that stem from the fact Mexicans are a settlers' group on territories now part of the continental United States. As a group combined into U.S. territority they faced assaults to disestablish their historical patrimony, their civil rights, their social preserve, and their legal equities as incorporated citizens. In fact, the United States declared Mexicans to

35

6

Chapter 2

be citizens with the 1848 signing of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. The second set of trends stems from Mexican Americans' pejorative condition as a discreet laboring group set off ethnically and culturally from the rest of the population. Since their conditions as workers were plainly unequal and since trade unions were in existence to benefit all workers, Mexicans understood they were discriminated against and marginalized. In fact, both trends conditioned U.S. elite views and practices vis-a-vis Mexican Americans. Ultimately at issue was whether the body politic of the United States, principally its leadership, met the civic needs of Mexican Americans at several levels and offered the enactment of legal and institutional dispensations in regard to Mexican Americans for constructing their survival. In sum, these histories of postponed and ignored rights provided major parts of the multifaceted context for the Chicana and Chicano movement, a context that is as broad as U.S. history; from this context arises some of the movement's ascertainments and contradictions, as well as its diversity. CCM was both deeply ethnic and very much part and parcel of the United States. The immediate local foreground and background of the CCM, its terrain, were the cohesive realities of the Mexican American communities, the ties of land and culture, economic realities, social conditions, political practices, and the challenges of gender relations.

CHAPTER 3

Real ities Matter

y the mid-twentieth century, the work and life experiences for many Mexican Americans had been full of hardship, deprivation, and disempowerment. These provided multiple inspirations for Mexican American contestations for change. 1 Inequities manifested themselves in various ways during the 1960s. They represented a range of social, economic, and political concerns for Mexican American activists. Mexican Americans called for support for stable and quality housing. During this period, far more were renters, rather than owners. As a whole, housing quality was poor as many Mexican families were forced through segregation and low incomes to reside in dilapidated and unhealthy housing whether in urban or rural areas. Consistently, social services were undersupplied and not readily available, and women were particularly impacted by these scarcities. Mexicans lacked ready availability to health services, including mental health services. An avenue of mobility for members of other immigrant groups, public education for Mexican Americans was not well funded or well staffed , a notable disadvantage. In most places, school officials prohibited formal schooling in Spanish to assist Spanish-speaking students' transition to English, and the use of Spanish had been forbidden at school. This meant that Mexican Americans received little or no formal education even while in school. Under thes e conditions, bilingual students could not help monolingual Spanish speakers. In some cases, school officials and teachers ridiculed Mexican cultural expressions in U.S. schooling, making children uncomfortable. Moreover, a lack of formal education on the part of their parents or caregivers placed children and youth at a severe disadvantage vis-a-vis other children from families with formal educational training. Too many children left school. For certain, the U.S. legal system had Long operated contrary to

B

37

Chapter 3

Mexican American interests. The courts, juries , and the police have long records of victimizing Mexican persons and, too often, have applied a harsher standard of justice to them. In effect police had many communities under siege through strip search and seizure practices, heavy patrolling of Mexican neighborhoods, and other overt forms of repression. Mexican Americans, as a broad sector, engaged in limited political participation as a way of addressing inequalities. Through a series of tactics like poll taxes, language competency exams, gerrymandering, hostile precinct staff, and outright staff intimidation, Mexicans were hampered from participating fully in the political process and inhibited from addressing their needs through the use of their votes. In the private sectors, a particularly telling set of job-related vulnerabilities characterized Mexican participation in the labor force. Mexican workers received less pay and recognition for comparable work than other workers. They confronted a whole series of injustices that undermined their ability to secure meaningful well-being in return for their labor. Discrimination in jobs followed historical trends and patterns. Mexicans, relegated to the worst jobs, received lower pay and were generally underclassified for the work they did. For these workers, promotions were difficult and they were among the first fired and last hired. Accident compensation, unemployment, and other worker benefits had been minimal, difficult to acquire, and absent for many. For some sectors of the U.S. population, unions offered the possibility for addressing these problems. Unions covered only a minority of workers. Often the rights to organize unions or participate in unions were curtailed by corporate or state officials. Moreover, anriunion laws, the so-called right-to-work laws, were in effect in several states where Mexicans were concentrated. As the I97os advanced, demographic growth and political and economic potentialities offered bases for optimism as well as frustration. 2 U.S. census figures during the I97os undercounted the Mexican community by as much as IO percent, excluding half a million to a million undocumented Mexican workers; other population estimates ran between eight and ten million persons of Mexican origin residing in the United States. At the same time, the U.S. census estimated 7.5 million people of Mexican origin. The majority of these persons (" Hispanics ~) , about 6 million, lived in the five southwestern states (Arizona, California, New Mexico, Colorado, and Texas). Most-about 4.5 m illion-lived in the state of California, followed by Texas (2.7 million), Arizona (4rn,ooo), New Mexico (406,000), and Colorado (275,000).

Real ities Matter

People of Mexican descent who resided in the Midwest cities of Chicago and Detroit, and their surrounding areas, numbered nearly 2 million. Clearly, the Mexican community represented a fast-growing ethnic minority in the United States. A 50 percent increase occurred when comparing the 1960 figure with the 1970 figure, and a 60 percent population increase arose when comparing the 1970 census figures to the 1980 ones. The Mexican-origin population was a young population. The average age of Mexican Americans was twenty-two, eight years younger than the national average. One out of eight persons of Mexican origin was under five years of age, compared with about one out of every fourteen of non-Mexican origin. The Mexican American median age was nineteen, an important political and economic consideration. Many Mexican American females in the 1970s were in their peak child-bearing years, nineteen to twenty-nine. This indicated the potential for Mexican population growth during the next ten years, with the Mexican population doubling in thirty years. Partly because women, in general, usually married at younger ages than did men, there were proportionally more single Mexican-origin men than women in March 1979. About 35 percent of the men of Mexican origin fourteen years of age or older were single, compared with only 27 percent of women. Divorced and single female heads of households were on the rise. Females in the Mexican American population had a socially and economically disadvantaged profile in regard to income, education , mobility, services, and political participation . Thus, women's rights were a major issue and women's groups were among the most visible and active . Concurrently, cognizance of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgendered (LGBT) persons and their rights increased from little to some. Recognition of LGBT issues emerged somewhat throughout the 1970s. On the socioeconomic ladder of the country as a whole, the Mexican community still lagged behind the dominant society. Marked differences still persisted between the Mexican-origin populations and other populations in occupational characteristics. A mere 6 percent of employed Mexicans engaged in the professional and technical occupational group. The percentage of the l\lexican-origin population identified as managers and administrators was even smaller at 5 percent . Blue-collar workers, at 25 percent, and service workers, at 13 percent, represented the largest concentrations of employment for Chicanas and Chicanos. In the labor market, gendered variations existed. About 6 percent of men were employed as managers in March

3

10

Chapter 3

1979, while only 4 percent of women were in those positions. In clerical positions, 32 percent of employed women were found and only 6 percent of men . About 6 percent of the Mexican American labor force worked in agriculture. Income for Mexican Americans continued to be considerably lower than for the non-Mexican-origin population. In the 1970s the median income reported by Mexican Americans was roughly $s,ooo as compared to nearly $7,000 for Anglo-Americans. In particular, a significantly smaller proportion of Mexican men with income were in the upper part of the income distribution as compared with men not of Mexican origin: only 12 percent of Mexicans showed an income above $15,000 a year, whereas 22 percent of Anglo-Americans did. Among Mexicans, income differentials by gender were evident. Men had significantly higher incomes than did women ($8,380 and $3,415 , respectively). Variations in income depended also on geographic distribution and educational attainment among Mexicans. Because Mexicans often lived in areas that were strongly antiunion, they suffered lower pay scales and standards of living than persons in more unionized parts of the country and in relation to other groups. Even when income rose generally, Mexican income remained lower. Conditions were better in some industrial centers, specifically the Midwest where pay scales were higher than the Southwest or Northeast. Educational attainment clearly influenced income. The median income in the late 1970s of Mexicanorigin men twenty-five years of age or older who had completed four years of high school was about $12,600; by contrast, the median for Mexican men with only eight years of school completed was substantially lower at $9,ooo. In the 1970s, about 20 percent of all Mexican families in the United States lived below the poverty line. This percentage did not change significantly over the r97os and would not change later. Mexican Americans were a multidifferentiated social composite population in several ways. These communities became more heterogeneous politically, economically, and culturally. Significant differences existed between generations. The majority of the Mexican immigrant population had been characterized by low educational levels and limited skills. Yet many Mexicans among the first generation after immigration had been successful socioeconomically even though the parent group had an average fourth-grade education. Children of immigrants tripled the income of their parents and improved their occupations as well. The numbers of persons in the middle- and upper-income levels

Realities Matter

slowly increased. Often, the second generation suffered from a relative decline in status from the first generation and did not do as well, which is to say they hit a ceiling. From the 1960s onward, the dispersion of Mexican American concentrations in city barrios had been increasing. This dispersion hera lded the development of new barrios with perhaps innovative possibilities for self-sustenance and group identity. Two primary issues of concern economically were family housing and business development. Housing was the single most important economic necessity and, in turn, the largest individual or family investment. Perhaps eight out of one hundred families owned homes. Loans for homes were not easily secured. A phenomenon in the Mexican community was the strong interest in business and growth of a consumer market, eventually reaching a significant $so billion yearly in the late 1970s. While 220,000 Mexican-owned businesses existed, only four hundred of these grossed over one million dollars in sa les . Significantly, profits and investments had increased despite the recession. In educational achievement, a traditional indicator of probability of individual success, the Mexican community lagged significantly behind the dominant society. The Mexican American had a median ten years of schooling while the Anglo had thirteen. In 1979, only about 40 percent of Mexicans twenty-five years of age or older had completed high school as compared to 70 percent of Anglo-Americans. At most, only 3 percent of Chicanos completed four years of college or more in 1978, a period that marked an increase in college admission and attainment for Mexican Americans. The highest proportion of Mexican American college enrollments occurred at the community college level. At the university level, enrollments had risen in the early seventies and then decreased in the late seventies. However, while Mexican students improved in educational skills, their interests increasingly diversified as more students entered the sciences, communications, arts, professional schools, and the social sciences rather than humanities and other liberal arts. In the sixties and seventies, one of the most remarkable traits of Mexicans in the United States was their bilingual skills- some even had trilingual abilities. Many researchers were so intent on questions concerning Spanish that they overlooked the retention of indigenous languages among Mexicans. Some Mexicanos maintained some knowledge of an Indian language. To be sure, Mexicans retained Spanish as a significant means of communication and identification. Nearly

4

Chapter 3

90 percent of the Mexican-origin population spoke some Spanish, a notable feat given that only recently had the use of Spanish been allowed in a small percentage of schools. Significantly, Spanish-language media increased dramatically via television and radio. In these years, both legal and undocumented immigration a ded significantly to the Mexican American population . The immigrant h ad more limited skills and educational levels than the Mexican Americaa and was most often monolingual in Spanish, though many understood some Native American language or another. Although the economic significance and economic participation of immigrants was great and diverse, they were rarely referred to as constituents except by demagogic racists. Immigration numbers increased to the point that some Mexican American communities were greatly impacted between the 1960s and 1970s. Voting and registration patterns varied through the seventies. Voter registration by the Mexican population mirrored increased civic participation. In the 1978 congressional elections, of the approximately 6.8 million Spanish surnamed persons of voting age estimated by the U.S. census, only r.6 million or 24 percent were reported to have voted. However, a study conducted two years later indicated two significant changes . Latino voter registration in 1980 was 29.5 percent higher than in 1976. Moreover, voter turnout in 1980 was 19.3 percent higher than in 1976. The large number of youth in the population and the large numbers of non-U.S . citizens who could become citizens underscored the electoral strength seemingly possible when aggregate numbers were touted. Interest in political affairs and participatio11 in politics continued as a significant thrust of the late seventies and into the eighties. Both elected office holders and participation in Democratic and Republican parties increased. Undoubtedly electoral numbers and organizational resources of the Mexican American community eventually meant gains in political offices held, including governorships, mayorships, and congressional, county, city, and other offices. Occasionally hostile majority public opinion reactions, in matters perceived negatively as Mexican related and associated with Mexican American constituents- for example, immigration fears and youth delinquency-somewhat tempered positive political-recognition gains. In attempts to impede progress, sometimes-legal practices pertinent to how officials were elected were changed as Mexican Americans gained political access. Further, with the exception of ex· ecutive positions, such as mayorships and governorships, these

Realities Matter

Mexican American gains often occurred in legislative bodies where the efficiency of Mexican American officeholders was checkmated by their minority numbers. When they campaigned for office, Mexican Americans logically sought votes from citizens other than Chicanos, but, often paradoxically, these outreaches entailed giving less attention to Mexican American needs and issues. Thus, political realities of minority status remained even when tangible gains progressed.

43

CHAPTER 4

Identity Expressions

hicana and Chicano identity was posed as the identity issue of the I96os and 1970s; actually it was only one of many elements forcibly fitted within that simplistic rubric. Being Chicana or Chicano in the United States represented a far more complicated constitutive agency than this referent connotes or denotes; to use the label "identity" to discuss Chicana and Chicano history and culture is reductionist. Some social scientists may define identity as a series of persisting traits, but this list is not satisfactory for explaining why or how people may perceive themselves and act for themselves. Historians criticize the parsing of identity, the way some empiricists did, with a few overt traits . On the other hand, historians do admit that there was a cultural differentiation, if not always an iron-curtain divide , between Mexican American cultural practices and understandings and those of power-wielding Anglo-Americans. Cultural practices for any humans and their groups are never simple.

C

Culture Frame

In the r96os and 1970s, Mexican Americans acted contestorily in response to juridical, cultural, and ideological contexts across many diverse parts of the United States. Their historical memories provided a frame for their ideological understandings and motivations. This memory, composed of several recollections or parts of memories, repeatedly referred to as a source of inspiration or as a motivation for action, drew from the past and from cultural expressions and contributed to a certain J, a certain Yo, and somos, or we. Memories were sewn together by individual and collective interpretations of belonging and not belonging to a Mexico 44

Identity Expressions

of the past and present. Thus, positive, neutral, and negative associations with Mexican history, geographic culture, and heritage informed Chicana and Chicano identity-making constructions in the United States. Identity and cu ltural constructions evolved through mediations and constituted arguably basic aspects of identity; the whole and its parts constituted a consciousness reflected in a processual praxis for those who chose to be Chicana and Chicano activists. Among Mexican Americans, constitutive group-identity formations drew upon a variety of expressive dynamics, but not equally or universally: Chicanas and Chicanos insisted on their Native American origins, rejecting the notion that they were "alien" or "foreign" to North America and celebrating their Native American heritage; lo indio was upheld. 2. 1estizaje, acknowledged as a real and ongoing historical cultural synthesis of the past and present with the Native American compo· nem, invigorated public proclamations. 3. The Indian countenance-the Native American physiognomy- was held as beautiful and desirable: "Brown is Beautiful." 4. Identification with the land, in personal image and outreach, infused the recognition of the historical community. 5. Pride in ethnic and racial descent was believed and asserted, and families promoted cultural and familial backgrounds. 6. Stress on the importance and survival of the family was a living, constant priority, and cultural values and related ethical standards were the ideal ethos of daily life. 7. Acknowledgment of family was a protean recognition of the importance of women within the family and of each individual's dependence on and responsibility for others. 8. Acknowledgment of the personal importance of history and culture was basic to explanations of family and self, and this orientation provided the bases or justifications for uniqueness. 9. Women seized upon a basic acknowledgement of self-worth and dignity premised on women-centered and women-led social change. Io. A basic personal epistemology was a claimed "historical narrative," which explained Mexican origins and included or assumed triumphs and tragedies. The major ones included resistance to colonization, the struggles for Independence, the United States-Mexico war, the Mexican Revolution, and all the circumstances that led to self and collective being on the U.S. side of the border. i.

4

Chapter 4 An awareness was underscored that survival involved a series of negotiations in daily life benveen "Mexican culture" and the "dominant culture," a practice of the consciousness of "lo Mexicano" in contradistinction to "lo Americana" on a more or less regular basis. 12. There was an emphasis on not being white while reflecting on self in the larger society; this was part of an internal dia logue that affirmed not being able to imagine being white. lJ . A popular saying that emphasized strength of character and heritage among laboring or barrio-affiliated Mexican American populations was "rafz fuerte que nose arranca" (a strong root can never be uprooted). 14. Racism and oppression were denounced as a basic self-civic tenet, reinscribed regularly when faced by discriminators and oppressors; this was a form of alter assertion. 15. There was a basic consciousness that the CCM itself involved a set of cultural practices and a knitting process, an unfolding shared narrative, a story being acted by self and compafieras and compafieros, the making of history. I I.

Whether individuals chose to identify with one or several identity or cultural expressions within a larger Mexican American cultural matrix did not diminish the interactional and constitutive processes that embody identity formations . Mexican American identity formation involved complex and dynamic processes and individual choices amid a variety of diverse options. Not all persons of Mexican descent drew uniformly or exhibited the same cultural identifiers, but many activists participated in constructing and upholding these sociocultural characteristics as part of the cultural discourse of the movement. All or most of these sentiments, completely or to some extent, informed rhetorical testimonials, programmatic demands, and inspirational creativities of CCM organizers and activists. These action-inspiring tenets occurred in the practices of historically derived cultural preferences and identifications that evolved under specific circumstances. There were, to be sure, some general aspects in the unfolding of the multifaceted, multilayered phenomena denoted as culture. In the case of many Mexicans in the United States, vibrant culture, inherited ethnicity, and remembered history interrelated on an ongoing basis; each was seen as a part of or as encompassing the others in the makeup of self-identity and group affinity- the glue of obligation and

Identity Expressions

the gum of affinity between committed individuals. Overall this cultural life, like many others, encompassed social beings, including the customs, values, attitudes, ideas, behaviors, and arts common to members of a group and, among other benefits, provided a design for living and possibly the basis for common action vis-a-vis others. Cultural practices and preferences expressed and reflected working-class relations; they also experienced change. Culture as a human expression involved contestation. The dynamic aspect of living operated seemingly in conflict with the perception of culture as stable, a perception in contradistinction to the fact that people inherit, learn, and experience culture. Thus, from these assumptions, culture was mistakenly assumed to be stable. Identitythat is, "Who am l "-in relation to others, evolved from and involved a cultural framework even as it changed. An individual, more often than not, consciously identi£ed or disidenti£ed with cultural expressions and practices available within a variety of social contexts. The absence of any one expression or several does not rule out the general sum of cultural performance or possible identification among Mexican Americans. Cultural commitment encompassed innovative possibilities in that daily living was not "above" or "independent" of people; people change cultural aspects and practices when necessary or desirable. The potential political praxis of ongoing cultural vibrancy and identification was related to Mexican American social bases. Cultural life, as a phenomenon, was social in that it was shared by people living and interacting in organized communities. This interdependence, expressed in the values of group cohesion, advanced the cultural forms of social cohesion, group protection, and group preservation and expansion. Thus, in part, cultural preferences formed complex, dynamic, and interactional ideational norms. An individual's behavior might or might not have conformed to the norm depending on circumstances or will; the norm may have been important. There was no homogeneous cultural delimitation, no iron template for all persons of a group, and cultural expressions reflected class aspects as well as other matters.

Responses

In the United States, Mexican persons knew and felt the extent and limits of who and what they were, and thus who the others were. The

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limits worked in general and specific ways. A foreign domination system, principally involving leaders, ways, and means alien to them as a social collectivity, relied on human labor, material resources, and political and cultural hegemony. In this sense, domination meant power by some over others. Persons know their domination to some extent. Domination affected the creation and continuity of culture, the process of development. Suppressive acts occurred daily. Through encouragement and force, people negated the historical process of themselves as indiv iduals and families choosing who they were. Dominations worked to displace the historical culture with an ersatz culture, a counterfeit culture, a superimposed culture of domination by schooling, market, and survival and lumpenization pressures. Media projected and reinforced what people should be or should have aspired to be. Domination processes justified themselves recurrently. Dominating cultural institutions did the following: (1) legitimized domination and those who held power, (2) reinforced social hegemony and its allied interests, and (3) claimed to embrace integration and in practice alienated oppressed peoples. Nearly always, in domination, cultural assimilation was both an ideological mystique and a social-control policy, which was conditional and selective and acted upon oppressed individuals. In extreme form, the existence of the people and their concurrent claims were, in fact, denied; they had neither history nor presence. However, assimilation deforms but does not equitably bring about integration or acceptance of the discriminated population by the dominant group, and those who accepted the mystique were nearly always marginal themselves in their accommodating role. Within the boundaries of the acceptance of domination, cultural expression was permitted if appropriately entertaining or saleable. During the 1960s and 1970s, Mexican individuals and groups contested domination because they rejected exploitation, which meant subjugation, and that in turn threatened survival. Various kinds of actions took place against domination, including sporadic or consistent, individual or small group, aggressive or weaponless, and juridical or civic. Many of these varied forms of dissent challenged social hegemony. Among these, the most encompassing and persistent challenges were those of class, gender, and culture; these subsumed the others. Cultural assertion, involving the questioning of a dominant culture, meant rejecting assimilation and propagating self-worth and self-determination. This took two routes: "traditional" for its own sake perforce involving exclusive and selective practices, or a synrhesis of traditional and

Identity Expressions

innovative, a more inclusive and broader practice. Heightened cultural expression, however, was not of itself political in the sense of critique, an act of struggle, or a denunciation. The principal, most potentially subversive action was that against economic exploitation and political hegemony. When broad participatory contestation occurred, crisis ensued between dominated and dominators-domination was being tested. At that point, political crisis intensified cultural expression as a result of tightened group cohesion and sharper group values; these expressions were novel if not radical or, if in the guise of traditional practices, contrary. Political dissent, class conflict, and cultural assertions reinforced each other but not always. Women sought to reform and reject oppressive aspects of culture supported by the church, the state, and the patriarchal family. To be an act of struggle, the practice of culture required critical consciousness and collective participation in politics. In moments of crisis, class and cultural dissent assumed political form, which was all encompassing, and thus social identity was politicized.

Historical Memory

In the United States, the Mexican American-origin population was diverse and their struggles recurrent. Historically, regional variety was related to: the regional economy; the rate, length, and type of settlement; the local geography; access to natural resources; the culture of local Native Americans; the relationship with local ative Americans; and the rate and manner of displacement by Anglo North Americans. The local regional differences were, in addition, a result of culture brought over by succeeding generations of Mexicanos to the communities at different times, as general migratory preference patterns shifted. Within each of the regional diversities differences existed, and these were shaped and marked by the occupation of the person and the family, ethnic/racial features, individual and familial senses of history, gender relations within the family, cultural practices, length of residence, education, use of Spanish, type of English, acculturation, degree of participation in Anglo society, urban or rural residence, and individual experiences of exploitation and discrimination. Differing regional economic, political, cultural, social, and demographic complexes also impacted the formation of regional differences. Ethnicity, class, history, gender relations, sexuality, and, again,

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Chapter 4 domination underscored common features across diverse Mexican American communities. Important to these unities were descent, ethnicity, and enculturation to general Mexican culture. The genetic inheritance reflected Indio-mestizo-mulatto heritage, but, on inspection, the conclusion was that the Indian was generally predominant. Thus a wider and more historically cosmopolitan assumption undergirded social relations. Since Mexicans shared race and geography with Native Americans, these relations were particularly important. Most important, a common dependent relation to the economy united most Mexicans; they were workers living in workers' conditions. Thus, in regard to cultural practices and cultural manifestations, class membership coincided generally with community membership and family identity. There were other factors of unity. Importantly, the circumstances and the sociocultural legacy of the Mexican community involved recognition of what was their part of history-history as remembered or known by family members. This was common to all regions, that is, the explanation of the place and the people there. Importantly, many Mexican people consciously perceived the Southwest as part of the broader homeland, whether particularized as tierra or neighborhood. Many Mexicans Americans perceived the existing set of dominant relations as a usurpation and unjust fact of history. Further, the historical legacy meant that the Anglo dominant elite were not only exploiters but also imagined historical enemies. To acculturate was not merely to exercise a culture preference, but to go to the other side in the judgment of many. For this foreign side, the reverse of the Mexican side, the legacy of the 1846 war as well as other determinants, such as racist disdain and ideological supremacy, meant the Mexicans were viewed and treated as a subject people by Anglo individuals and institutions; they saw themselves as naturally endowed. Across class lines, racism was pervasive and rationalized anti-Mexicanism experienced by and directed at Mexican-descent people; in their case, racism was related to their Indian heritage and their mixed-race ancestry. Overall, in many areas of life, social hegemony by Anglos was a fact for Mexicans. Coexistence, the economy, and subjugation have caused a continual cultural syncretic process, a culture of adaptation, of survival, and of change, which welded some of the people together. The varied continuous oppression meant varied and continuous moYements of contestation; the uniting cohesive elements were history and culture. Significantly, in the twentieth century ethnic names did a dance. From the past to the present, generally, Mexicans Americans referred

Identity Expressions

to themselves as 1V1exicanos when speaking in Spanish. Also, in Spanish, the regional references used were Tejanos, Californios, and Nuevo Mexicanos, similar to Chihuahuenses, Tapatillos, Jarochos, Costenos, and so forth. Chicano, handily used in both English and Spanish, was an abbreviation for Mexicano with familiar connotations. In English and in regard to the North American Eurocentrics in the dominant society, group labels became a problem; they were tenuous and seemingly purposely inchoate. However, there was nothing ambiguous about the negative. To the Anglo, "Mexican" had pejorative connotations, and the Mexicans of upper- and middle-class aspirations were sensitive to these Anglo sensitivities. Spanish identification became a polite conversational euphemism used by the Anglo to distinguish between "good" and "bad" Mexicans. In fact, the word "Mexican" nearly always had to be substituted. In the Southwest, "Latin" also came into use as a euphemism for Mexican during the 1920s. The fuller phrases "Spanish American" and "Latin American" were for more formal occasions and so were "Hispano" and "Hispano American." In the fifties and sixties, more assertive public names succeeded one after the other, leading up to "Mexican American" and "Chicano." Obviously past labels avoided the word "Mexican," a word with Nahua Indian roots, which, in practice, was reinforced by an another old word- Chicanowhich shared similar Indian roots. Conditions, times, and consciousness opened the question of "lo Mexicano" to be answered in a historically unprecedented response by "lo Chicano." Here, as in other matters, changes arose on the basis of and in relation to existing realities and constraints.

The Border-Constructed Since 1848, the question of culture and identity had involved a continuing choice of consciousness for many people of Mexican descent living within the United States. In effect, heightened cultural awareness was an aspect of consciousness shared by the Mexican population in the United States and the people residing in the northern Mexican border states to some extent. Broad historical relationships existed between the "Greater Mexican North," the provinces occupied in 1848, and the adjoining Mexican border states based on economics and demographic fluidities. Among some Mexicans, a popular consciousness of kinship solidarity rose and fell in peoples' families according to feelings, views,

Chapter4 economic times, and political mores. These relationsh ips, besides being spatial and geographic, were shaped by interlocking Native American and mestizo-mulatto patterns of settlement; the economic complex of cattle raising, agriculture, mining, transportation, and local trade; and the social ways and values surrounding these, including how some women were relatively recognized in their economic importance. The greater Mexican border-area communities were relatively inclusive socially due to property, family ties, and work arrangements, in contrast to the central Mexico cities and zones of commercial estates that were populated by elite circles who dominated economically and socially. The North was more frequently characterized by wage labor or commerce, independent rancheros, a local and often laborer-dependent artisan, and a small middle class that on occasion displayed radical overtones. Politically, liberalism, conservatism, and contestationism were features of this area, often related to conditions of local rule. Along the border, political feelings were historically strong.

Class and Circumstances

In the 1960s, historica l relations between the Mexicans in the Southwest and the people, industries, towns, and countryside of the present Mexican border states and border towns became mediated by the large border urban conglomerations from the Tijuana/San Diego Pacific shores to Matamoros/Brownsville on the Gulf of M_exico. Coincidentally, workforce concentrations involving women workers in several subsectors of the economy rose dramatically. In the r96os-197os, nearly ten million Mexicans lived in the "zona fronteriza," a number roughly equal to the Mexican residents in the United States, many in contact with Mexicans on the U.S . side. Exploitation, the centrality of workers, and weak social integration facilitated but did not ensure an oppositional consciousness. Whether in public or private, among Mexican Americans in the United States there were three main population groupings in regard to the adherence to cultural identities and practices: those who outwardly and inwardly clung to U.S. dominant cultural and identity associations; those who found resonance in U.S. dominant and Mexican cultural and identity markers; and those who insisted on primarily identifying with Mexicano culture, history, and identity within the U.S context. But these were not discrete categories, and there was fluidity coursing among the three broad group preferences.

Identity Expressions

The first was the sector affected by and committed to U.S. culture and identity. This population, though of Mexican descent, practiced the culture or identity of the dominant culture, usually along lines affected by class, education, status, and region, though individuals certainly may have selectively practiced one trait or another of Mexican culture, and certainly many rhetorically argued for Mexican or Chicano authenticity and identity if advantageous in a specific situation. They also played a role in public political affairs, but they operated outside the Mexican/Chicano resistant cultural context. In public situations, they lived the contradiction that their personal self-interests may have improved because of claimed community familiarity, but they actually opposed, and even disdained community interests and even community claims to collective recognitions. A few of these may have aggressively repudiated Mexican identity and cultural practices. Next followed the sectors more historically conscious and culturally operative. The second sector was the group of transitional culture and identity, composed of the self-denoting subgroups-H ispano, Mexican American, Spanish American, and so forth-that practiced and identified with a cultural matrix generally made up of adaptions and borrowings from the twentieth-century national cultures of Mexico and the United States and survivals from nineteenth-century Mexican national culture. Class, status, education, and region affected this universe. Their political alignments varied in relation to community interests. Upon inspection, what gave uniqueness and cohesion to this group visa-vis the culture of the United States was its Mexican content and its claimed community considerations. Regional variants subsumed these Mexican contents. This transitional culture was fluid and, at times, the balance favored the dominant culture. This fluidity was noticeable in the labels used to denote culture and identity. Psychologically, as well as politically, this culture and identity was a safe house, and thus provided the strategic and tactical elasticity vis-a-vis the dominant society. The third sector was the group of Mexicano culture and identity, which presumably meant identification with the majority of Mexicans and their interests. Class, status, education, and region also shaped this sector. Here the Lag between new and traditional, the conflict between progressive and retrogressive, between traditionals and creators, was keenly felt. Further, as is obvious, Mexicano culture was not static; it too changed and so did political positions on given issues. Moreover, its content and transmission experienced change as change occurred

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within Mexico; add itionally, external cultural forces affected cultural practices in Mexico. Bearers of the culture into the United States carried some of these influences and changes. Though there may be mainly three subcultural groups, a dialectical process underlay and energized all three. In each subculture the question of class was salient, which meant class politics were important. In each of the cultural groups there were class divisions, values, loyalties, and consciousnesses . Though all too often treated as abstractions; culture and civics were expressed through people in their social relations in a cultural context in their daily lives, particularly at work and in their political choices. When looking at culture, class aspects are discernible as were matters related to class politics. The politics and related policies of cultural and economic suppression and assimilation, both in regard to class and culture, resulted in alienation, false consciousness, and internal economic and social division within the Mexican population. Each of the three groups had class aspects. Distributed among the three groups was a very small elite of high wealth; a traditional middle class of merchants and professionals; a newer state-dependent lower middle class, involving artists and intellectuals; and a worker sector composed of diverse skilled and semiskilled workers and, to some extent, those marginalized out of the regular workforce but once part of it. Individuals in each of the cultures may have had a class loyalty to a class other than the one to which they belonged and had no sense of membership or responsibility to the local community. But if the dictum was true that real politics were tough politics, these were the sectorial bases for Mexican American politics. Though clearly class divisions existed, domination eschewed the general stratification patterns of bourgeoisie, petite bourgeoisie, proletariat, and lumpen. Outside parts of New Mexico and Texas, the elite of high wealth were scarce. The middle-class element, which owed its origin ro business, the state, and education, had been historically small and in some areas absent, but, since World War II, its numbers increased. The lower middle class was recent, small, unstable, dependent, and generally of working-class origin. Its political, cultural, and economic instability was the result of the crisis it experienced because of strain and conflict with the dominant economy and society. Interestingly, elements of the middle class functioning as "colonial" mediators held their positions, in many cases, only to the extent that they received popular support or tolerance. The contesting forces from above and below continually pu lled this class. At this time, the vast majority of the

Identity Expressions

Mexican people consisted of members of the working class, working in technologically and organizationally updated production or in urban services. There was also a large disenfranchised class. The cruelty of the job market, crime and vice fostered by the system, cultural disintegration, and the lack of quality schools all increased the underclass segment and increased the aspiration to be recognized and included. Class interest and assimjlation resulted in an element among the people of Mexican descent who identified with dominant cultural practices. Assimilation and class have a rough coincidence. Those who identified with the dominant culture were particularly numerous among the middle and upper classes, however small these were in actual numbers. Some remained forthright in their allegiance to the dominating culture and its values, others were less forthright, a few were deceptive, and more than a few were simply confused. On a surface level, for some Mexicans or Chicanos, identity was a means to bolster arguments for benefits of status and income. These persons enjoyed conditional social status and relative economic privilege, but they were not full members of the mainstream. Petite bourgeoisie, salaried artists, institutional professionals, and specialized white-collar elements were spread across cultural memberships, or their class loyalty was fluid.

Resistance

Mexican culture in the United States was practiced within the confines of the state, the economy, and a dominant culture. As the center of the capitalist world, the system and its values were strongest and most pervasive. All elements associated with commodity production and the exploitation of people and nature were at their most intense. Capitalism continually de veloped. Mexican culture could not be free from this influence. All its features and expressions took place \ vithin a framework of effective hegemony. With often a great display of apparent liberality, this hegemony and its acceptance was strengthened concurrent with some public display of Mexican culture. Mexican cultural practices also continued in the home and within the circle of Mexican organization activities. Concurrent with the social and political crisis of the Mexican community, in the I96os-r97os an intensive series of cultural manifestations occurred. Lively debates centered on identity, and conscious acts to strengthen perceived traditional norms of culture, as well as a creative surge in the arts, denoted a continuous and 1

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conscious reinvigoration of cultural practices. These followed and segued, not preceded or postdated, the political process. Cultural concerns were already present before this period; however, an undeniable aspect of the 1960s and 1970s was an accelerated scope and intensity in manifestations of culture as a further growth and corollary to political dissent. In sum, both the question of cultural identification and conscious cultural products were major aspects of the times. Mexicano-Chicana and Chicano cultural vitality was possible because cultural practices survived. They survived most strongly among the rural and urban working classes, providing the cultural resources for other sectors to draw upon. These sectors had the cultural values and artistic themes to draw from to engage in a progressive integration of culture consistent with the objective interests of the people; they were also the substantive sources of political power to defend the overall community. Witness the character and base of the main sectorial representative organizations: the United Farm Workers union, the Alianza, and the early pre-1970 Crusade for Justice, followed by student organizations in California and Texas and the multiple women's organizational struggles. The class and cultural characters of all of these movements were fairly discussible upon inspection. The student groups, though different in base from the first three, came into being because, among other reasons, sufficiently large numbers of working-class students formed critical political masses at middle-class or elite universities, particularly on some campuses of the Southwest. Women's groups were the most class diverse, but arguably a major impetus apart from gender relations was related to worker needs and the dependent situations of many women. Undeniably there were sectorial differences and sectorial tensions within all these aggregates. More saliently, among all these organizational sectors, the question of identity varied in importance-not much discussed among some and intensely discussed among others. The importance of cultural identity increased in relation to social status, urbanization, and education-in other words, in relation to the subjection to assimilation, which by the sixties had touched all sectors of society to varying degrees. Cultural reaffirmation of the community as a whole may be viewed from two contrasting cultural points and divisions: (1) those that never greatly suffered cultural or related identity loss and hence had preserved their cultural autonomy and identity, and (2) those who consciously sought to restrengthen cultural heritages and related identity. A vigorous cultural vitality, conscious propagation, and aggressive dissemination of cultural material existed among both groups. There were moments of overlap or even a conflation of these divisions,

Identity Expressions

at least in part. The crisis of the system, the impact of the movement, cut across class and cultural divisions among the Mexican people. As economic and political crises ensued and class and cultural resistance occurred, a twofold division was present: those who unquestionably held to their identification and participation in the mainstream- culturally, economically, and politically-and those who gradually but increasingly questioned domination in regard to identity consciousness and cultural allegiance. However, the crises of the 1960s were foremost economic and political; thus, community welfare needs encouraged responses in these areas. From the point of view of cultural maintenance and social assimilation, politics generally involved fou r groups: (1 ) those who supported domination and its culture, (2) those who vacillated, (3) those who practiced their culture but allied politically with domination, and (4) the individuals who joined the cultural-political process of resistance and work in order to further it. The reaffirmation of culture and identity was predicated upon the need to realize self-worth, avoid social annihilation, and receive recognition, because discrimination had to be denounced and assaulted. At a time of crisis, class resistance and cultural reaffirmation, joined to politics, had a number of ramifications. Organizations worked to attack systems of oppression politically, economically, culturally, and ideologically. Ideological weapons, which domination had monopolized and used to intimidate, were turned against it with irony and skill. When even a few, a tiny fraction, who were seemingly favored or indoctrinated by domination, questioned oppressive circumstances, the action set a temper to be repeated. Other elements of this "privileged" sector were affected and influenced. Individuals were recruited, while yet others withdrew to neutrality favorable to reaffirmation, and, importantly, the opposition was forced onto the ideological defensive. Further, this cultural and ideological reaffirmation, with its aggressive stance, had effects on middle-class professionals, intellectuals, and artists of the oppressor causing them either disorientation or even realignment in favor of the oppressed and discriminated against. Most importantly, the meritorious thoughts, ideas, and facts stemming from members of the populist sector absorbed and retranslated contestatory thoughts and ideas from intellectuals and their work. The dispensations created by dissent brought forth plain adamant speech as well as esoteric language or stylistic idiosyncrasies, privileging voices and actions of individuals in cultural and ideological revolt. When acting consciously, organizers, articulators, and artists

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helped forge class politics and cultural practices into a unity for progress for the people. A question of class became one of culture and vice versa. Class, culture, and politics were closely interrelated in the most widespread and influential organizing efforts during the ten years from 1960 to 1970, which included the unionization of farm workers, the struggle for land and preservation of language in New Mexico, the struggle for the education rights of Mexicano parents and children, the empowerment of women, the effort to uphold prisoners' rights, the exertion to uphold and expand welfare and health and human services, the initiatives to provide space for cultural expression and representation, and, eventually, the struggle for unity on behalf of defending unorganized workers, in particular undocumented workers. All were seminal to initiating and continuing many and diverse emancipatory developments.

Organizers and Artists

In the transmission of cultural promotion, cultural re-creation, and radicalization, group organizers, creative artists, and community activists played key roles in challenging social and political hegemony. These individuals, with experiential and/or formalist special knowledge, represented conscious cultural workers working to politicize others . Among the Mexican women and men in the United States, many teachers, spokespersons, journalists, artists, and intellectuals of working-class origin were common, standing in contrast to their usual middle-class origin elsewhere. However, in many instances they were absorbed into state-related assignments or private businesses, that is, public or private dependent employees of one kind or another. In any case, some Mexican educators participated publically in solidarity with the workers and associating themselves with the struggles of workers because they were, in fact, from their ranks. Though social background in any particular case must be taken into account, whatever their social origins, what was to be observed and evaluated was the perspecti ve the organizers, articulators, and artists brought to culturalist advocations, how they viewed their role, and what conscious ends their intellectual work served. Certainly, organizing leaders and teaching intellectuals were products, as well as shapers, of times and conditions. Formal education and professiona l certification were not requirements. Many self-educated and formally

Identity Expressions

educated activists produced materials for Mexican American audiences. Teachers and artists whose special skills dealt with ideological criteria, ideational methods, and social communication were no more or less valuable than specialized or skilled workers in a sense. However, their indirect relations to direct production and their access to distributed surplus set them apart from industrial, agricultural, and service workers . In community activities, this knowledge specialist performed a self-assigned role in regard to culturalist endorsements or critiques, one of clarifying values and of introducing perspectives. Many artists sought to bring about group progress by establishing meaningful patterns of historical judgment to contemporary relationships. They shaped ideological weapons by providing information and analysis and shaped action by offering direction. If progressive as critics, they questioned culture, the past, the present, and the future. Cultural workers invalidated the alienation of praxis from utopia by negation, the supposedly impossible more equitable life, "si se puede." They provided conceptualizations for rudimentary institutional alternatives . Conscious spokespersons organized, informed, interpreted, idealized, and exhorted; thus, they were important agents of change or retardation. Th is was particularly impactful when their engagement involved a group or groups of organizers and agitators. Then it is not simply a matter of one, individual, correct view, but one of a collective process, of participating in a sector and community-wide rethinking, not in the abstract, but in the specific. They came to consciously believe they must wage an ideological struggle within the political process. This articulating set of individuals had ideological, functional, and special responsibilities. There were two types: (r) regular, that is, conventional, task-performing intellectuals who had a role dealing with facts and responsibilities as individual writers, journalists, artists, scientists, teachers, lawyers, and so forth; and (2) extraordinary, that is, frontline or leadership articulators who dealt with special information and skills but also had functional responsibilities as formal unit directors, project managers, or special organizers, particularly connectors who linked groups and networks for more effective mobilization. The dominant culture possessed intellectuals of the two types. In order to effectively challenge domination's social hegemony, the forces of contestation recruited and developed an opposing stratum in a variety of work areas.

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A community under domination must incorporate intellectual sk ills, albeit always critically, or it seriously undermines its struggles for justice. All too often there was expressed a destructive anti-intellectual bias; it was always good for applause. Unlike individual acts of resistance, the progressive development of mass contestation depended on intellectual material. Rather than accepting or making false distinctions between formal and informal intellectual work, or between intellectuals and others, the analytical distinction between service and leadership intellectuals drew from a framework that evaluated whether oppression or liberation was served. Importantly, the exhortation to develop community-related and working-class intellectuals was linked to the development of effective organized dissent. Class and culture consciousness not only emphasized the importance of facts and identity on an individual leadership basis, but also those shared by a group whose sharing of them then determined group action. Sharing certain progressive ideas and values was a prerequisite to group action in a determined manner. Organizers were important in bringing about this process.

Constructions

Identity shaping- defining who people of Mexican descent were-was at the core of issues of representation involving the five or more million Nlexicans and Mexican Americans constituting Mexican America as such, which in 1960 formed a complex of social islands across the United States. 1 These islands had class distinctions and were also impacted by other Spanish-speaking minorities. In the 1960s, the communities experienced in part an identity crisis vis-a-vis others in step with the dominant society, but with particular manifestations, including articulations of self-reference. Crises for Mexican American communities resulted from persisting objective disadvantages. Paradoxically, recent political ameliorations, as well as changes in its relations to other minority groups, extended self-identified .Mexican American enclaves. As a result of their growth and distribution and the social changes around them, many Mexican Americans chose and engaged in a redefinition and reconstruction of what was to be their asserted identity. Those involved civically reexamined the values and goals upheld by the liberal platitudes of the day through the late fifties and sixties; this reexamination persisted through the midseventies.

Identity Expressions

The crises became apparent in a variety of areas: in complaints related to equities as well as suggested ameliorations, and also in how articu lations were voiced and how they were covered . These were related to changes experienced and perceived. The spatial and demographic position of the Mexican American community changed in relation to U. S. society as a whole as well as in relation to other minority groups. It was now larger and both concentrated and dispersed as well as more class nuanced. Historically Mexican Americans had been relatively small numerically and delimited to the area along the border with the republic of Mexico. There were class differences, but the numbers registered in the tens of thousands. By the late seventies the community registered, as mentioned, at eight to ten million- a population larger than that of some countries- and the internal sectors were accordingly larger than in the past, in fact larger than the total number of Mexican Americans in 1900. Perhaps over five hundred thousand were white collar and professional, including women. Changes related to women were now somewhat more noticeable. The population continued to be strong particularly in the five Southwestern states, which had Mexican roots: California, Kew Mexico, Arizona, Colorado, and Texas. Importantly, there were now significant popu lations in the M idwest, Northwest, and East. By the late seventies, Mexican Americans lived in all fifty states. In some local areas outside of the Southwest, populations were particularly numerous, and in some cases, other Latinos were their neighbors. Mexicans had avai lable a constructed pan- Latin American concep tualization. A Mexican educator and writer, Jose Vasconcelos, in the 1920s conceptualized in a book titled La Raza Cosmica, a future synthesis of Latin American peoples who would carve out new achievements and a greatly empowered bicontinental Latin America. 2 The blending of "La Raza Cosmica" was ironically occurring in the United States, where Latinos were making achievements and their empowerment was occurring. This Latino assertion impacted articulations and mobilizations in the 1960s and 1970s, but it was not wholly progressive or even liberal. The largest membership organization of the 1960s proudly referred to itself as Latin American. Significantly, as the 1970s progressed, Mexicans were becoming only one group among a growing Latin American population in the United States, a population which by then comprised all Latin American nationalities. However, Mexicans remained the largest group among these new and important Latino demographic forces . Eventually this impacted the extent to which

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Mexicans pursued strictly :Nlexican interests in the late seventies and beyond, if they believed Latino alliances valuable. Of immediate importance in the 1960s, Mexican communities evolved in numbers, spread, and grew in complexity but also in relation to class distinctions and interests. The living standard gains registered as absolute only in reference to sorry conditions of decades past. The social positions of Mexicans relative to the Anglo community had only slightly improved, and the need for more improvement became more pressing. Macro solutions involving relatively significant federal and state intervention offered increased probability of improvement for some segments of large sectors, and these programs existed briefly. State intervention along the lines of the "war on poverty" programs had diminished by the mid- and late seventies. Certainly relative gains resulted in modest improvements for the middle class, for the most part college-educated professionals and small business persons and an additiona l increment in wealth for upper-income wealthy entrepreneurs. These sectors had not been there in significant numbers in the early sixties; they prospered in the late and early seventies, and they moved further into the private sector in the late seventies. Indeed these gains were important not only economically but also politically and rhetorically to members of the lower middle class. Interestingly, public employment sectors have in the majority been sig· nificant proponents for social and cultural equity on beha lf of all Mexicans, a characteristic they share with their black counterparts. The League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC} and the American G.I . Forum stood against discrimination and also ostensibly against any recognition or compensation that might be available on a group basis. For reasons of political self-protection, they moved more cautiously than youth or unionized workers, and the distance between them and the working poor, their own community, gradually increased. Thus, growing alienation may have negatively impacted cross-class coalitions on behalf of civil rights and economic equities for Chicanas and Chicanos within the community itself. 3 Chicana and Chicano public media presentations were limited . In the early and late sixties, the presentation to the public became somewhat more differentiated as a result of their own efforts but also by a few media presentations that discussed their plight and needs. During the late 1970s and later, the so-called Latino minority, putatively composed of U.S. residents whose family ties linked them to Latin American countries, received increasing visibility in the U.S. press and media

Identity Expressions

coverage. The happenings of Mexicans, who constituted the majority of this group, received much less attention. However, this Latino visibility was not due to advocacy actions on their part, but to decisions made by others outside the community and the growth of a relatively large Spanish-language media and marketing industry centered in Miami, Florida. In English-language media, Latinos received media attention not through newscasts or special programs, but through advertisements. Corporations overwhelmingly targeted growing Latino advertising content but did not underscore .Nlexican American customers. Beginning in the mid-r96os and lasting for several years, Mexican American organizations constructed the mystique of the "Chicano Movement." Although porous organizationally and visibly and containing a multitude of emphases, it was, nonetheless, at its core insurgent, assertive, populist, and ethnically centered. While vibrant, the CCM inspired further CCM-related actions and activities and generated its own momentum. Obviously these political projects and related mystiques were an anomaly within the body politic of a country such as the United States, an emphatically supremacist state that civically stressed rhetorical amalgamation and accommodation in politics and culture, the former determined by an elite and the latter promulgated by media corporations . Chicana and Chicano activist individuals and groups questioned the rhetoric and tactics of this assertive mystique. The hope for transitions expected by the idealistic formed a growing political trend that demanded more people-centered institutions as well as governance of all sorts. Actually the trend favored conservative values and practices because of its commodity language. Though supposedly the U.S. elite influenced the diffusing of liberal ideological elements, in practice institutions committed to a conservative credo-both consumerism and conservatism permeated political and institutional sectors. Elites did not participate directly in Mexican American education, but their general views were intensely propagated through the schools, particularly in the teaching of history and civics . Mexicans did not easily permeate these elements of the overarching hegemony. Mexicans lacked the status to command the moral attention of the country's large public or its pundits. Moreover, they were unable to access on a broad scale allies from cross sections of the U.S. populace, and these would not be willing listeners until voting or membership numbers increased. For militant Mexican Americans, significant allies were few. A minimally strong socialist left in the United States

6

Chapter4

was scant, and their attention to Mexicans was episodic at best. They were not secure ideological allies, though there were individual exceptions. Perforce their recurrent and growing political activism, Mexican Americans were determined to be effective vis-a-vis community needs, which had, in practice, meant adaptation to the dominant reality. Moreover, the left in the Chicano community did not fare better than the left elsewhere, though, as elsewhere, the left propelled actions ultimately appropriated by liberals. 1uch of what was sought and ways of seeking had occurred in the past, but three advocations seemed uniquely modern: women's rights concerning access and participation; health services for all members of the family; and environmental concerns pertinent to land, water, food, and labor. These issues, advocated and discussed throughout the 1960s and 1970s, were enveloped in affirmations of cultural identity.

CHAPTER 5

Impetuses

F

or some Chicana and Chicano activists, activities from the midsixties through the midseventies compelled a reevaluation of earlier ideological and organizational tenets referred to as Mexican Americanism. 1 This reevaluation inspired both older and younger activists to develop a new in-your-face style of politics, an insistence upon democratic rights, addressed to an audience with a heightened sense of cultural and ethnic affiliations and legitimized by relatively wide mobilizations. The practice of Chicano civics became increasingly regional and tentatively national, as well as what had been previously local, but now the local intensified. In actuality, the daily practices of the Chicana and Chicano movement reflected an ethnic revivalist movement of the mid-r96os and r97os, anchored in very specific local political mobilizations around concrete local needs. It was also greatly influenced by the national politics of the]. F. Kennedy-L. B. Johnson, R. Nixon- G. Ford, and J. Carter-R. Reagan administrations, the black civil rights movement of the r96os to r98os, and the Women's Movement of the 1960s to the 1980s. Across the country, central to the movement phenomenon, Mexican American ad hoc organizations arose focused on particular issues. Education reform, women's rights, social services inequities, health services needs, undesired urban changes, inequities in the War on Poverty programs, prisoners' rights, welfare rights, immigrant rights, cultural arts affirmations, and ex-felon needs, as well as the insensitivities of the Interior Departments and its administration of national lands, captivated activists' interests and energies. The convergence of these multiple movement activities brought about rising critical discourses within Chicana and Chicano organizations regarding articulations, approaches, styles, and methods. 65

Chapter 5

Self-help discourse animated diverse movement activities. In fact, Title II of the Economic Opportunity Act (1964), which stipulated participation by the "client," that is the poor, encouraged local group mobilizations either by positive outreach to facilitate participation or as a negative reaction to the perceived misfunctioning or exclusion of programs. Self-help organizations developed in many localities, stressing the assertion of one's rights and of one's access to services, particularly for women and children and particularly in regard to health needs. Perhaps thousands of urban Mexican Americans participated in these public activities, which involved direct interface with officials and program personal, more than at any time previously. Youth and women were the most motivated to participate. In many localities public health and social activist programs and practitioners served as springboards for their own self- defined type of movement activity and supported the movement activities of others. Federal health program funds facilitated this health sectorial momentum. Ayuda mutua (self-help) had a long and honorable tradition for the most part in the Mexican community, to be sure not exclusive to Mexicans yet certainly a practice much ingrained in their organizational histories. In practice mutualistas had been the site of opportunist accommodation to oppression and also sites of cultural maintenance and political contestation to oppression. For decades, Mexicans organized associations premised on the principles of ayuda mutua in highly structured organized ways to support their basic economic requirements in times of need and to provide a refuge from discrimination. Initiatives took the shape of civic cultural preferences and deeply felt educational priorities. Telling about their usefulness, from the nineteenth century through the whole of the twentieth century, mutualista groups held the largest organized Mexican American membership, exceeded only by that of churches. In terms of tactics and goals, mutualistas were moderate advocates and issue specific. Religiosity has a deep and wide heritage, which can run backward and forward in convoluted ways. Some religious follow various transcendental influences and maxims, some follow Native American traditions, and still others draw from overseas Mediterranean, Middle Eastern, or Asian customs. Various practices of Christianity served as a major inspiration for religiosity in the Mexican community, some in open or covert contention with one another. These religious events detonated politically almost from one moment to the next, whether they were Penitente, Cursillista, Espiritualista, or Danzante. There remained

Impetuses

a tradition that tolerated religiosity but reflected deep anticlericalism and judged the church and even the precepts of European Christianity as a bane of the Mexican people. Christian practitioners were also critical of the state in limited ways such as moral permissiveness or women's total birthing rights. For the most part, Christian churches, regardless of denomination, preached accommodation to state authorities even when they petitioned for fairness and equities on behalf of their congregations. Although politics in the early 1960s was overwhelmingly liberal and reformist in nature, more radical currents insisting on civic equities challenged and voiced a distrust of electoral or patronage cliques. Certain left currents encompassed anti-repressive institutions and anti-corporation tendencies vis-a-vis constituted civic arrangements; some held the potential for being fundamentally critical in self-determined proactive ways. Some trends were ambiguous in that they voiced discontent with resource d istribution in the society but did not indicate alternatives to the status quo allocation beyond fairness and participation in specific civil moments.

6

C HAPTER 6

Circumstantial Moments

olitical energy at times flowed from cultural circumstances, and at other times political circumstances encouraged cultural happenings. These processes produced an extraordinary flow of information, encouraged group formation, and stimulated self-identification. 1 Community affairs became increasingly more varied and complex, reflecting nearly all hues of the social spectrum from center to left. Those opposed to the movement momentum, rhetoric, priorities, or styles could be judged as politically to the right of center. Older organizations and electora l politics continued as new politics emerged. The origins of t he energized activity lay in the demographic and material conditions of the early 1960s as well as in the subjective conditions of the "climate" of the times, that is, the mentalidad, the general mind-set of the people during the epoch. As population increases occurred in !vlexican communities, scholarly and political interest expanded, as did contrasting opinions on its condition and past, and these no tions contributed to ideological growth . Although the mainstream media gave a little more recognition in the 1960s to the Mexican p opulation as the nation's second largest minority than in decades past, it did not delimit this Chicana and Chicano protest movement as much as it defined others, t hose of white radicals or black reformers. The mainstream media did not cover the Chicana and Chicano movement extensively, but it did impact it. This was an interactive relationship. The socia l and economic conditions of the Mexican people spurred the heightened national consciousness of political activists and, in turn, they accessed or pressured radio and television media to contribute to awareness of their activist focus. Spanish-language media covered events more than their English counterparts; their coverage publicized issues. In par ticular, they were

P

68

Circumstantial Moments

relatively favorable to immigrant and farm workers' issues. Some commercially sponsored expressive cultural activities flowed to some extent, centering on traditional and contemporary music and other performance acts, and endorsed cultural appreciation. Media access may have increased audiences for CCM civic discourses . The CCM drew inspirational and ideological reinforcements from a variety of informational and interpretive sources, including those common to and from other social movements. However, the CCM, in particular, drew from the cultural memory of earlier generations, the political heritage of Mexican Americans, and the heritage from across the border from Mexico and Latin America. Activists also explored and deployed Native American heritage, which had available fair amounts of visual and printed materials often displayed in Chicana and Chicano activities. The images and concepts of the CCM increasingly drew some public attention within Mexican communities.

Reference

The CCM term and self-designation increasingly appeared in community discourses.2 Sharing the ferment created by changes in the ideologica l climate and material conditions of the early 1960s, self-chosen activist individuals were seen as engaged in a variegated burst of activity loosely identified by the late 1960s as the "Chicano Movement." Activists stressed, as an ideological point of departure, "Chicanismo," a composite of politicized identity, ethnic pride, and civil-rights articulations. Importantly, these were promulgated as components of a community identity. Singled out were the United Farm Workers of America, the Alianza, or the land rights movement, and the Crusade for Justice. Local attention focused on civil rights efforts, regional student organizations, neighborhood defense groups, widespread artists' efforts, growing health organizations, expanding women's organizations, activist church associations, immigrant rights centers, and, eventually, La Raza Unida party. Whether national, regional, or local, these organizations were represented as the progressive CCM forces from the late 1960s onward. In the Chicano media, direct action efforts loomed especially large in activist perspectives. To be sure, these efforts remained specifically focused and the majority of activists related to these and close to their own individual initiatives. Thus "the movement" in practice had a range of concurrent media fronts and these fronts were often situated within loca l bases.

6

O

Chapter 6

Whatever the particular goals and methods of the political activism, the underlying external articulations were dissatisfaction over the status of Mexican Americans politically, economically, and socially in specific instances and institutions. Political activists questioned the understanding of how economic and class exploitation gendered subordination and racism and shaped the Mexican experience in contrast to the favored sectors of the United States. Contrasts were important to perceptions. At times, the experiential posture explored how Anglos oppressed Mexicans, and the internal articulations involved stressed subjectivities. The discourse struggle by activists to understand the Mexican American experience increasingly focused on questions of alienation, ethnicity, identity, class, gender, and chauvinism. Perhaps more than in other social movement, understanding of the historical Mexican experience became a paramount motif, a voiced necessity in the internal discourse to shape an assessment of the present and vision of a future for Mexican Americans. What was not easily translatable externally, or even to some community listeners, was that to be within the CCM was also a style, an expression of being, a rooted behavior. In any case, these articulated expressions displayed that movement activities were fluid and dynamic and shifted with perceived priorities and necessities. Importantly, for both external and internal communications, a reinvigorated redefined group designation appeared for both external and internal communications. Although Chicanismo, an affirmative consciousness, was often a loosely expressed concept by individuals, in the opinions of many it did translate as a radical political and ethnic populism. In the sense of collective membership in Mexican American communities, group identity provided the basis for articulating the responsibilities and aspirations that comprised Chicanismo. Chicano politics emerged as a challenge to the assumptions, politics, and principles of the established political leaders, organizations, and activity within and outside the community. To voice and express hopes and affirmations, and certainly the praxis of an overt identity, there came into use among the youth the term Chicano/a, used as a group referent since at least the turn of the century. Chicano/a denoted the person and group of the present, paradoxically conscious of the past but also a bridge beyond into the future . Chicanismo referred to a set of beliefs, but it also referred to a political practice. The emphasis of Chicanismo in contemporary United States was based on dignity, self-worth, pride, uniqueness, and a feeling of cultural rebirth, which made it attractive

Circumstantial Moments

to many persons of Mexican origin in a way that cut across class, gender, regional, and generational lines. Chicanismo reflected primarily ethnic pride and assertiveness and was and is critiqued for aspects that promoted male centeredness and privilege and downplayed women's empowerment. For this reason, Chicanismo was not fully embraced as an expression of ethnic pride. Yet shared negative experiences as a group increased the appeal of Chicanismo and underscored a reevaluated Mexican cultural consciousness and heritage as well as pride in claiming a second language, Spanish, and economic and occupational opportunities. However, even though Chicanismo marked a progressive step in the struggle for identity since it denied the grosser aspects of deculturalization, it also became a subterfuge for avoiding a further critique beyond simple characteristics of identity. 3 The widespread appeal of Chicanismo, without an explicit ideological referent related to class aspects, explained, in large part, hmv often heterogeneous political elements could identify with the "Chicano Movement." One can ask whether, for some, Chicanismo, though a militant rationalization, was, in the context of its politicized identity and ideological notions, simply one more effort to subsume Mexican identity and all of its implications into a social context of covert anti-Mexicanism. Nevertheless the term conveyed necessary social referents for a distinct social group and mentality differentiated from its ethnic and national roots. Other designations continued to be used. In any case, the tension between Chicano Mexican evolved but did not disappear. Clearly, at the beginning, Chicano connoted an abbreviated form for Mexicans north of the Rio Bravo, and Chicanismo meant a politically asserted Mexicanidad. Curiously, it was rejected on the right and by some middle-class people as pejorative, and at the laboring base Mexicano was preferred. But to many of the young, Chicano was the term and the litmus test for a political frame of mind. Furthermore, enhancing its meaning represented an attempt to emphasize not only a "lifestyle" stressing Chicanismo but also the more widely noted features of radical personal values of the late sixties and emphatic public cultural practices embodied in the attitude, "Soy Chicano y que?" (I am Chicano and what of it?). Chicana and Chicano activists periodically invoked "Nationalism" as rhetoric, rubric, and reification, and they often did so in association with public CCM activities. Many participants in the movement did not purport to be nationalists or push a n ationalist agenda . In fact ,

~

Chapter 6

individuals and organizations that formed part of the Chicana and Chicano movement era promoted forms of ethnicism and civicism intended to promote pride and/or access to basic services. Actually, the uses and abuses of the term nationalism, within and without CCM, were both ambiguous and challenging, and these uses persisted over the years. Some literary or arts commentators of the Chicana and Chicano Movement upheld national ism as an ideological concept underscoring peoplehood as a priority. The term was used loosely among individuals and underscored issues subsumed under its connotative umbrella differently in different circumstances. Patriotism may have meant loyalty and sacrifice, while nationalism entailed priorities and a vision for a future to be realized, and its steps were often coded in a political program. In many cases nationalism touted by activists referred to a socially premised force, an emotionalized solidarity, or a social bonding related to historical heritage and imagined effective kinship. Nationalist rhetoric, at times referred to by CCM activists, did not equate to state sovereignty, state succession, or an exclusive separatism. Perhaps Corky Gonzales and statements of the Crusade spoke to revolutionary nationalism and expounded on it more eloquently than others, but the fact remains there was no unanimous explanatory statement on the phrase available. Nor did the programmatic agenda of the Crusade promote separation from U.S . institutions but rather promoted a discourse of civil rights equities and inclusion alongside ethnic pride. Eurocentric speakers have colored the term to suit their needs. Colonialists and their academic representatives, who exalt their own claims to invidious power exercises but grimace when the colonial subjects claim "national liberation," have stigmatized references to nationalism on the part of Chicana and Chicano activists. Obviously, any nationalism other than white conservative nationalism is judged skeptically in U.S. public discourse, the site of vehement and pervasive white supremacy. Unlike some African American activists, Chicana and Chicano activists did not use the term much if at all, with the exception of those participants of the Crusade that qualified their use of the term with the phrase "revolutionary nationalism," concurrent with "revolutionary humanism," stressing collective aspects, participatory equities, and egalitarian ethos, all aspects, forms, and objectives in their progressive programmatic advocations for self-determination. Obviously revolutionary nationalism is not definitionally narrow in a social sense, since total social change is an aspiration for the referred society as a whole. A cultural nationalism mode fits nineteenth-century European declarations and

Circumstantial Moments

styles more than U.S. minority insurgencies of the late twentieth century. In contemporary Mexico, the critic Carlos Monsivais preferred the designation cultura nacional and disparaged the phrase nacionalismo cultural as a misnomer for a heterogeneous cultural heritage. 4 The phenomena and the phrase "cultural nationalism" were found among Eastern or \i?estern European intellectuals, including those from France, Italy, and Spain. In England, Anglo nationalism was proverbially strong, as was white nationalism in the United States and in Australia or South Africa. Jewish people share a strong ethnic religious cohesion and a strong identification with an overseas state, but do not refer to these attachments as "nationalism." The mentioned Eurocentric articulations are to the right of center in counter distinction to nationalism being associated with left causes in the I96os and I970S outside of Europe. In Latin America, some progressives used the phrase nacionalismo revolucionario in reference to progressive populist struggles. However, in Cuba the term was infrequently used in political discourse. Though nationalism has been expressed across the globe and should be analyzed comparatively globally, most students of it underscore knowing its local origins, expressions, and evolutions. In any case, the sentiment evolved wherever it was found . More in sync with widespread aspirations among activists was the objective of liberation-Chicana and Chicano liberation initially was voiced as Mexican American liberation on early buttons or in signature slogans. In any case Chicana and Chicano expressions of peoplehood were not merely negative reactions to discrimination and subordination; they were positive modernist assertions positioning persons more strongly empowered for the present and future . In the I96os these assertions in the Southwest may have been linked to land or space associations but were obviously not universally embraced by community activists outside the region. For many, the "land question" did not inscribe the "Chicano question." Of course, a radical nonliberal activist could always say, "If you are not a nationalist, don't run with a nationalist movement." Some thought if you were not a nationalist you should not be in a movement for self-determination; that is, if being a Chicana or Chicano was not your first priority, you could belong to an organization that expressed your basic social or cultural priority, whatever that might be. In any case, pro-the-people sentiments and ideals expressed by CCM activists did not narrow as the years advanced, but rather they broadened quite obviously. Moreover, somewhat too quickly, some writers have equated what they believe to be indigenous

r

Chapter 6 motifs or even a cultural indigenista orientation as confessions of nationalism. In a Mexican context, ideological indigenism was arguably countemationalist in that it supposedly anteceded and superseded that which is considered modern Mexican. This was an erroneous supposition for reasons obvious to many indigenistas, mainly at a basic level of "Mexican" being a mega plural participatory constant, which was questioned or affirmed variously. Moreover some could argue "mestizo" was empty of content in and of itself. Colored by a liberal centrist or leftist moderate ideological stand, confrontation politics and heightened ethnic consciousness characterized Mexican American organizing activities. Chicanas and Chicanos confronted institutions through demands, assertive meetings, demonstrations, boycotts, strikes, sit-ins, propaganda, art messages, and street fighting . To be sure there were also efforts that deemphasized the public for the private and the confrontational for the conversational as a means to arrive at negotiated outcomes-closed-door meetings arranged by respected brokers between militant activists and institutional representatives. Gradually, a perceptible development in political ideas occurred in the movement from protest over the denial of full and equal civil rights to the rise of a vehement cultural stridency whose logical culmination would seem to be an insistence on political self-determination; however, dialectics were not simple in life but only on blackboards. What actually followed were five trends: A strong current of access to society's institutions and hitherto closed circles and one demanding more access with respect 2. A briefly growing emergence of a class politics that envisioned national radical economic and political change and attempts at transborder ties with radical worker-premised groups in both Mexico and the United States, centered on the overarching economic and labor ties between the countries 3. A further concurrent trend emphasizing the conceptualization of historical nationality identity as ethnic identity and full democratic rights and economic and social participation stressing cultural recognition and affirmation (in either case the emphases did not become a fu ll-fledged and mass-based nationalist political movement for self-determination) 4. A trend among some activists that entailed the conviction of thorough radical social change in the United States in step with major social change across the world

I.

Circumstantial Moments

5. A notable current of criticism by women seeking greater equities

In contradistinction to other comparatively more narrowly based and targeted civil rights efforts, however, Chicana and Chicano movement participants constituted a concert of actions in relation to labor, land, space, gender, and cultural issues, the most basic of equities to many. These demands were followed by other assertions in the areas of education, communications, health, employment, and politics, as well as equities within the arts and cultural representations and expressions. Perhaps not receiving much attention were organizational efforts often situated in the fami ly or at the core involving individuals linked by neighborhood, place of origin, or school ties, which is to say that Chicana and Chicano activists were not divorced from the social and ethical moorings of their lives prior to activism. Their activism often involved these affinity ties. Chicana and Chicano efforts, far from being a gathering of radicalized strangers in a self-fashioned nonconformist space, involved relatives, neighbors, friends, and schoolmates in familiar terrains. Moreover, Chicana and Chicano activists were not marauders or strangers in Mexican communities, although their opponents sought to label them "outside agitators." In many ways, activists were the community.

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CHAPTER 7

Half the Sky

hicana activists were not simply dispersed participants; they were a full-fledged sector of the CCM, discrete but also integrated with other sectors, whether workers or students. Chicana activists-particularly community activists and later campus activistsraised the woman question with particular sharpness in several areas from the late sixties forward. 1 At the core of these questionings remained the contradiction of women as social actors in labor and family and women as subordinates in a modernizing world order with increasing specializations and complexities. Chicanas challenged the ways they had been defined politically and socially both within the dominant society and within Mexican families , communities, institutions, and organizations. Chicana activists operationalized a consciousness of equality by insisting that this be joined ideologically with an explanation of practices of inequa lity. They did not see themselves as victims; they acted as agents of change often with a deep sense of responsibility and often with a stronger ethic of solidarity than male activists. Those seeking change struggled in a variety of sites and ways. From the early days of the CCM, women sought to challenge the intersecting dynamics of social and gendered oppressions as expressed by patriarchal values and practices and sexist language and behaviors. Women were, and understood themselves to be, socially and economically integral to Mexican American and U.S. societies. Concurrently, they were advancing understandings of equality and justice that were politically integral to any effort to define and advance Mexican Americans. Activist women's rhetoric departed from the conventions or exceptions of the past with its adamancy, publicness, and contentiousness in terms and references of the 1960s and 1970s. In fact, many women participated in all facets of CCM community organizing with great vigor. However,

C

76

Half the Sky

women's equities were often minimized and were in practice not readily resolved. This deprioritizing practice became a source of increasing challenges. Several arenas can be ascertained: (1) the larger society; (2) subsectors of the larger society; (3) the Mexican American community as a whole with different formative currents and sectors; (4) the CCM movements and its various components, factions, and currents; and (5) the increasing professional sectors. Chicana empowerment was not so much a set of goals as it was an incremental process that entailed subjective and objective markers. The context was the CCM. Several questioning currents arose in the 1960s in specific contexts and discourses. In particular, many women in Mexican community neighborhoods, particularly women with children, youth and student circles, raised the issue of gender inequities. Chicanas obviously participated in all efforts associated with the Chicana and Chicano movement; any reference to its subsumed activities implies women participants. Women joined and led in the efforts and organizations of the movement across the country, sharing the various tendencies and also, on occasion and to a lesser extent, the formal leadership. There were also some women active who were challenging their subordinate status outside the radius of the movement. Mexican women, inspired by other women, integrated Mexican feminist heritage into their views as well as drawing from centrist feminist programs in the United States. Some women in the Mexican American community drew from the historical legacy of women's activism in Mexico. Quite obviously some of the designations for women's groups or publications harken to this legacy. They also read some Mexican writings that related to history or that were written by contemporary writers or appeared in publications such as Fem. Mexican American women also followed women's activism in the United States as covered by the media and read Helen Gurley Brown, Betty Friedan, and Gloria Steinem and reacted to their commentary. A few reflected on readings of Simone de Beauvoir and Ana.is Nin. Women's organizations grew out of community actions, political campaigns, union organizing, immigrant rights, campus activities, and also inmate and ex-felon concerns . CCM activities involved women from a wide range of ages and occupations. Questions on new definitions of women's personas and roles arose within the movement's organizations. Gendered critiques of male-centered discourse and rhetoric proliferated in the seventies, as did critical examinations of religion and the ideal family, both gendered constructs. Women engaged in public critiques in movement forums, publications, and organizations. At this

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8

Chapter 7

time, to be noted, the arena of practice and accountability for activists for the most part occurred within the domains of the CCM movement activities; this was to change as the latitude of women's civic participations broadened. In turn, these spheres transpired w ithin the larger universe of the Mexican American community. To be sure, the galaxy of the larger society also remained a constant. For example, when examining sixties' women's activism in electoral campaigns, one can point to Evelyn Velarde Benson and Dorothy Calderon in California, Polly Baca in Colorado, Clotilde Garcia in Texas, and Ernestina Evans in New Mexico. Women who held appointments through the Office of Econom ic Opportunity (OEO ) included Clotilde Garcia of Texas, Maria Urquides of Arizona, and Henrietta Villascusa of California. Among notable community activists who stood out were Dolores Huerta, Soledad "Chole" Alatorre, Alicia Escalante, and Francisca Flores, all of California. Women entrepreneurs such as Dolores Sanchez in wholesale foods and later in print media and Ramona Banuelos in banking advocated for strong civic values. The late sixties through the seventies witnessed an increasing emphasis on the full participation by Mexican women in all aspects of community civic efforts and the realization of activities specific to women. This dynamic played out in several important gatherings. The one often commented upon as a disappointment was the women's workshop at the 1969 National Chicano Youth Conference in Denver, Colorado, which is a case in point. However, the women's workshop proved a gauge of interest and involvement among Chicana and Chicano activists. The Denver Conference's women's workshop was the most heavily attended workshop and the one, within a generally heated conference, that generated the longest and most intense discussions . These dialogues ranged over a wide assortment of topics related to gender. This gathering represented an early exchange of views among diverse activists on the Chicana question. The workshop attendees were exper ienced, articulate women, some young and some old. The roster included names that made up a directory of outstanding women activists in se''eral fields-women who would become increasingly outstanding in the years to come. The young woman selected by the women to make the report to the conference seemed hurried in her task. What followed , an understated conclusion, a garbled and unexplained "we do not want to be liberated," was reported as the sum of the workshop. This abrupt declaration was completely out of the context and foreground of the intense discussions of the workshop. For some unstated reason, no one

Half the Sky

expressed publicly what many felt-perplexity over the contrast between the contents of the workshop, the statement actually prepared for presentation, and the stark verbal report: The Chicano Women Resolve ot to Separate but to Strengthen Azthin, the Family of the Raza. With grave responsibility of the rebirth and forming of our ation of Aztlan the women have come to realize that they must begin to develop and function as complete human beings. We have reached a point in our struggle for the liberation of La Raza where the growth of our women is repressed as a great potential for strength and knowledge. We must through education develop a full consciousness and awareness of the woman to the revolution and of the revolution to the women. This is the beginning for the women to free themselves psychologically of thinking of themselves as inferior beings and to educate themselves so that they too can implement the Plan de Aztlan . In order to implement the Plan, we must understand all of the things that it calls for. With the preceding things kept in mind, we resolve the following: All women must participate according to their capability in all levels of the struggle. 2. We encourage all Chicanas to meet in their own groups for the purpose of education and discussion. 3. Self-determination of the women in terms of how they will implement their goal of becoming full human beings and participants [in the Chicano Movement]. 4. We must change the concept of the alienated family where the woman assumes total responsibility for the care of the home and the raising of the children to the concept of La Raza as the united family. With the basis being brotherhood, La Raza, both men and women, young and old, must assume responsibility for the love, care, education, and orientation of all the children of Aztlan.

I.

All of the preceding ideas must be included in the ideology of the La Raza Independent Political Party so that everyone, men and women, will work consciously toward the goal of total liberation of our people. For the purpose of unity and direction, the women of La Raza have

Chapter 7 set up communication in the form of a newsletter to be shared by all women active in the struggle for liberat ion of our people. We resolve not to separate but to strengthen and free our nation of Aztlan, women, men and children. 2

The point repeatedly raised in the Denver Conference workshop was how activists should address the undeniable inequality of women during the struggle for community rights vis-a-vis a dominant system. To be sure, the verbal report echoed in part an interpretation of a repudiation of antifamily and anticommunity contentions of radical petite bourgeois white feminists, particularly as portrayed in their press coverage; those contentions nevertheless came to be associated with white women's publications and organizations. More substantively, in the workshop, not inconsistent with other discussions, family and child rearing received commentary including critical evaluations, but so did women's full political equality and participation and a whole range of possible public actions on behalf of women's equities. Being a workshop of activists within the CCM, the conclusions emphasized actions directed at public offices and agencies. In the ational Chicano Youth Conferences held the following year and the year after that, the women's workshop was nearly as crowded and intense as the first year, and women did prepare statements. The question of women's empowerment within the context of CCM generated dynamic discussion at local and national levels. Years later a statement published by Southern California women affiliated with La Raza Unida Party (LRUP) stated, "La Federaci6n de Mujeres del Partido Raza Unida does not view [Chicano] men as the enemy but the system as the oppressor. Our struggle is not a battle of the sexes but a common struggle for true liberation alongside the men. " 3 This statement would have resonated with some women in the Denver workshop . The position was consistent with the tenor of an ethnic social movement, not a radical feminist-oriented campus workshop like many held at the time. The women's workshop resolution at the r969 Denver conference illustrated more than a divide between women who prioritized women's equality over those who did not. The conference brought together women who had local involvements on a broad range of issues and some who had been integral to student and community organizing efforts. Years later, one may wonder if someone who was not in accord with the statement of the Chicana issues

Half the Sky

workshop could have said so; if they had, they would have known whether they had support, which they very probably did. Actually there was a m ix of positions in the workshop and a greater variety beyond the workshop. There was no single monolithic posture at the Denver Conference, and any proffered posture, if shared by several, probably wou ld have multiple nuances . A common divide used to describe Chicana women's activism during the period of the Chicana and Chicano movement has been to label some Chicana women as loyalists and others as feminists . Those deemed "loyalists" are characterized as women who emphasized group unity with a foc us on racial and ethnic discrimination and those labeled "feminists" as those who prioritized gender equality. Upon further examination of the Federaci6n's declaration, one can see that there is no simple divide here. The Federaci6n statement called attention to the issue of educating women and men about "true liberation," which implied women's equality and empowerment within La Raza Unida Party. La Federaci6n recognized gender liberation as a critical front in political organizing during the period of the Chicana and Chicano movement. The fact that these women organized an offshoot and developed an agenda specific to women underscores their focus on women's empowerment. The statement also reads, "The purpose of the Federaci6n is to develop La Mujer into leadership positions at all levels of the Partido . . . La Federaci6n shall not be limited to only women but shall make every effort to involve men as well as educate them to the issues and needs of La Mujer. La Raza Unida Party is opposed to the domination of one sex by another and recognizes no distinction between men and women in the common leadership . Both women and men must provide leadership."4 The words of the Federaci6n are clear as to a gender analysis and prioritization on women's liberation. Chicana women contended with gendered and sexualized dynamics of social movements as other women did in the 1960s and 19 70s. The issue of sexual harassment has been documented in submovements of the CCM. Certainly t he alleged dictum of Stokely Carmichael on women's roles in the Student Nonv iolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), or statements reported by women involved in Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), including Casey Hayden, Mary King, and later Alice Echols, reveal that sexism and sexual harassment affected women in a variety of movements. Women's leadership in CCM organizations d id occur alongside their disparagement and harassment. By 1969, CCM activists and organizations recognized Gerry Gonza les

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(Crusade for Justice), Dolores Huerta (United Farm Workers , UFW), and Luz Bazan Gutierrez (LRU) as major figures in the late six ties. The potency and potential of the women's thrusts were plainly visible in these years. Early women's groups included the Chicana Welfare Rights organization of East Los Angeles (1968) led by Alicia Escalante, and the Hijas de Cuauhtemoc group of Long Beach (1969) led by Anna ieto-G6mez. Early symposiums set important precedents on the discussion of women's liberation. The benchmark Chicana Corazon de Aztlan Symposium (UCLA) of 1969 included a very large attendance of over one thousand; this large conference's resonance set a standard of women's communication for their empowerment. Supported by United Mexican American Students (UMAS) and organized by Elsa Garcia and Maria Elena Yepes, the intentions involved bringing senior women activists to state their positions on women and community while addressing the concerns of young women activists. The invited speakers included Gerry Gonzales (Crusade), Alicia Escalante (Welfare Rights Organization, WRO), Dolores Huerta (UFW ), Betita Martinez (El Grito del Norte), Susan Racho (UMAS), and others. The critiques they voiced emphasized political and social values. They advocated for women's organization, leadership, and participation on an even greater scale than was already visible. After this conference the women's force in the CCM was undeniably acknowledged . This Chicana empowerment force energized women's assemblies repeatedly throughout the 1970s. The Mexican American National Issues Conference of 1970, held at Sacramento, California, led to several organizing and advocacy efforts, in particular, the milestone organizing of Comision Nacional Mexicana Femenil led by Francisca Flores. Moreover, the Chicana Regional Conference at California State University, Los Angeles, in May 1971, was important because it began specifying an all-woman's agenda for the 1970s. Actually, this assembly held a number of informed workshops that were well directed by the organizers and moderators, including Vickie Castro, Sandra Ugarte, and Vela Martinez. Castro at the age of twenty-one had been organizing for almost five years and was a founding member of Youth Chicanos for Community Action (YCCA) in high school during 1966. The Houston La Conferencia de Mujeres Por La Raza of May 1971, also referred to as the nationa l Chicana Conference, was to be long remembered for its achievements and disappointments. This benchmark event had a large attendance and intensive discussions. Ostensibly stemming from a call by administrators and women associated with the

Half the Sky

Houston YWCA, and perhaps associated to some degree with mental health programs, the expectations for the prospective conference's worth became stronger and stronger as its opening date drew nearer. However, the expectations did not translate into adequate planning and capable leadership. Since a general call for open attendance was made, hundreds of people of varied backgrounds and interests arrived. What was striking was not so much the cross purposes but the diversity of views among women attendees. Contemporary depictions of the conference as simply a dichotomy between feminists and loyalists downplay the complexity of views held by Chicana women. Most attendees' ideological views were not reducible to one or the other. At that time, women activists did not pigeonhole themselves into one camp or the other, and, up to this conference, there had been no negative labeling of women by women publicly. To be sure, there were dissatisfactions visible from the opening of the conference to the end. This was not a conference called by a CCM organization or led by recognized Chicana organizers. Some attendees arrived at the door and then turned and left, saying the sponsors, speakers, and program were not to their liking, and, before the conclusion, there was a walkout by many attendees. The discordance at the 1971 Houston conference was not simply over the rhetoric of equality but, to the clear discomfort of the organizers, or rather the hosts, was also over demands for direct actions rather than prioritizing personal and group introspection. The heavily attended workshops were on "sex and the Chicana" and " marriage Chicana style," but the loudest calls were for planned actions to benefit barrio women. Moreover, there were differences over the arguable slighting of major Chicana and Chicano movement priorities, for example labor organizing, education reform, and the comparative importance of electoral participation in relation to other issues. Some of the most experienced and articulate activists walked out led by Maria Elena Gaitan, who took about half the attendees; however, many others remained. The walkout did not end the conference; its work continued, and the conference was a significant event. The organizers, among them Marta Moreno, Lucy Moreno, Stella Borrego, Berta Hernandez, and others worked hard and to a point their work had positive consequences. The major points of contention involved women of La Raza Unida and program facilitators, not some dispute among a dozen attendees from Los Angeles . M.oreover, territorial and leadership recognition issues played out as time passed, involving attendees other than those from Texas or California.

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This Houston affair was one of a series of seminal conferences held in Texas, which were more consistent with CCM priorities related to Mexican American Youth Organization (MAYO) and LRU. There were several, including Texas La Raza Unida women activists such as lvlarta Cotera, Carmen Lomas Garza, and others who organized around Las Mujeres Pro Raza Unida. Linkages existed between these and those in other states. Several important assemblies took place in the Midwest, such as "Mi Raza Primera," Women's Caucus, February 1972, led by Olga Villa; the Midwest Spanish-Speaking Women's Political Conference, May 1972; and the Chicana Seminar at the University of otre Dame, Spring 1975, led by Lydia Espinosa and Olga Villa. Across the country, a variety of d iverse women's groups began; some ended too quickly. A seminal one took place in San Jose, California: Chicanas de Aztlin (1969), founded by Delia Alvarez. This group, led by and composed of women with a multiple-point agenda, sought to encompass several community sectors and priorities led by women. A somewhat similar one, Mujeres de Bronze (1972) in San Pedro, California, led by Patricia Duran Herrera, Esther Burruel, Maria McCrossin, and others, focused on public agencies and their services and accountability. There was also a short-lived female inmate organization, MARA, at the women's prison at Ontario, California. Additionally, Mexican American nuns formed Las Hermanas (1971). In fact, several organizing efforts that had developed by the 1960s gathered momentum through the early 1970s. As is noted, several women's groups arose and consolidated. Within the CCM parameters these were some exclusively women's efforts. No large-scale regional or national women's CCM-identified group emerged, though one might have been expected given the dynamics clearly visible in Denver, Houston, and elsewhere. No major CCM statement was agreed to and distributed by women through women's resources and auspices in the early and midseventies, though nearly all conferences after 1968 produced Chicana resolutions. However, many publications published Chicana empowerment statements. To be sure, Chicana activism was visible in many discrete efforts led by women. The respected veteran civil rights activist Maria Varela organized a successful rural development and services-based cooperative in northern New Mexico, which made a real difference in the lives of local resident families. The widely admired Olga Talamantes remained a steadfast advocate and organized for world peace and human rights for decades, long after the Vietnam War ended. The women members

Half the Sky

of the Brown Berets of Los Angeles organized a successful free clinic, la Clinica vhich punctuated rhetoric, writings, and CCM activists' demands. Activists appealed to feelings for the land and associations with the identity and history of Mexicans and Mexican Americans. The invocation for land rights and access had a deep history and several layered meanings, which at times could be cultural and at other times political. How land was used, distributed, and claimed had been flexible over time, and how those in authority or with access to authority legislated or legitimated land holdings had changed and would change again. The land question was and continues to be potentially radical. The broad contours of the land question were several and distinct. Two governments, the Spanish colonial government and the Republic of Mexico, authorized and extended land allocations to individuals, to groups, including Native Americans, and for public usage throughout the then northern territories that are now part of the Southwestern United States. A third government, the United States and its subparts, territories or states, curbed these allocations. Descendants of the recipients, in many instances despoiled of their lands and claims, maintained vivid memories of these lost equities. Land grant-based claims occurred before the 1960s, concurrent with legal efforts, involving class as well as ethnic distinctions. Complicating the situation were claims by wealthy Europeanized Hispanos versus demands by poorer mestizoIndio Hispanos and then those involving Native America ns. In turn, these were made distinguishable by those who claimed communal recognition, and others who requested individual compensation. Moreover, agrarianist demands were made by the poor or dispossessed who

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claimed access to land on the basis of working it. Territorial demands, assertions to land on the basis of Spanish colonial authority or Mexican historicity, were referred to here and there in discourses; however, at one time, there were no major, explicit mass-organized efforts based on these. Land-based cooperatives were called for and occurred in several places in and outside New Mexico. The attempts at organizing landbased communal farming entailed some legally recognized access to land for these purposes. In any case, the largest acquisitions of land after 1848 were by federal and state governments. Revocation of these acquisitions in New Mexico memorably concretized the land issue for many activists, and this became an important part of the arsenal of the CCM deployments. The land revindication efforts were seminal and remarkable, especially in regard to consciousness, land, culture, and language, though the importance of the latter was not fully understood by some urban activists. This could have been a uniting national issue. An organization of seminal influence in the mid-196os for the development of the Chicana and Chicano movement was the Alianza Federal de Mercedes (Federal Land Grant Alliance), also referred to as the Alianza de Pueblos Libres (the Alliance of Free Pueblos), organized in 1962 in New Mexico by Reies Lopez Tijerina and supported by his family members. 2 His brothers, his wife, and his children were core participants . Originally from Texas, a person of limited formal education but amply read, he and his family often worked the fields and traveled the countryside. Reies, an itinerant Protestant fundamentalist and revivalist, inspired others who led a hard life under tough circumstances, both women and men, and communicated well with those who lacked much schooling. Members of his family, foremost including women, actively worked for Alianza priorities, women participants, adherents, and supporters and were quite notable in Alianza. They certainly knew about exploitation and the varied ways that rural working people like themselves were taken advantage of by the educated, the propertied, and the empowered. The Tijerina family endured much and was itself conflicted. Tijerina's persona, rhetorical phrasing, and condemnatory speech recalled biblical voicings; this biblical analogy likely referred to him as a man of "constant sorrow," rather than as a prophet. Alianza was part of a heritage of efforts to reclaim or to retain the land and/or maintain water rights, and many shared frustrations over these issues. A 1960 court ruling had upset the hopes of many heirs because the opinion stated that Congress rather than the courts was the ultimate arbitrator in questions pertinent to land-rights issues based on

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the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. Land-grant issues were not likely to receive favorable attention in Congress. With its most immed iate predecessor-the 1950s Abiquiu Corporation, based in Albuquerque, Santa Fe, and Tierra Amarilla of R io Arriba County-the Al ianza formed to reclaim land for descendants of both Mexican and Native American grantees. This land, which included hundreds of thousands of acres, was represented by Spanish and Mexican government land grants dating from before the 1848 annexation by the United States. These grants had been taken by governmental agencies or corporations or by wealthy Anglo individuals. In the fifties and sixties many Hispanos shared sharp memories of land-use rights. Initially, Alianza proposed the courts and public support as a means of securing land rights. In support of their demands, they argued the guarantees of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, which stated that Mexicans in the Southwest were to be given citizenship and their rights to property, and their language preference and cultural practices were to be respected. They also argued that these guarantees were legally contextualized and prefaced by the "Laws of the Indies," that is, the theory and practice of colonial administration that applied to all of colonial New Spain from the 1500s to 1821, which encompassed settler land rights and self-governing precedents. The obvious contradiction of the victim appealing to the culprit for restitution was readily pointed out. Nevertheless, legal remedy could be foreseen in relation to U.S. or ew Mexican land-use laws, restoration of property, or compensation for property taken from rightful owners through misgovernance. These remedies were hypothetically possible with public and legislative support at the appropriate time, independent of Alianza's rhetoric or even existence. Moreover, many people, if not a specific jurist or legislator, could see some historical credibility to Alianza arguments and were ready to recognize land-grant heirs as legitimate petitioning constituencies. Alianza developed a programmatic agenda announced and forged through several annual conferences or special assemblies. A particularly seminal event occurred in October 1967 at which Alianza activists promoted a program of economic and cultural concerns unique to CCM organizing. By emphasizing land and language, culture and history, and self-determination and progressive alliances, Alianza's demands did much to shape the character of the cultural agenda of movement leadership and to historicize for activists their association with the land. To identify the Alianza as a single-issue organization with a narrow nationalist perspective is widely off the mark. Yes, Alianza activists specifically

Tierra y vida

and deeply loved the land, but their intellectual horizons were transborder and trans-America. Alianza worked with a variety of individuals and groups. It also sought an alliance with organized African American and Native American groups, and its outreach and co-participation with Native American groups was remarkable. Moreover the organization developed its own ethnic conceptualization-"Indio-Hispano"-which it believed to be more historically premised and future oriented than "Chicano." Alianza emphasized native and historical rights: its discourse emphasized Indio Hispanos as natives. In the gist of its advocacy, Alianza's argument combined references to biblical texts, natural law, papal bulls, the colonial regime's laws of the Indies, claims to Spanishdescent rights, Mexican Republic citizenship rights, and several treaty rights, including the Treaty of Velasco (1836) and the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo (1848). Using these references, Alianza offered its own understanding of ew Mexico-related legal and historical arguments as well as commentaries on social relations, and in doing so it constructed ideology continually. Alianzistas believed that these arguments would be compelling to public opinion, to elected officials, and ultimately to the courts. Though Alianza spokespersons often referred to the prejudice of courts in the past, the premise of their legal effort was the hope that a judge and a court, or a legislature, would revise the property rights currently held by corporations and the U.S. government. They were inconsistent as to how they would influence several hundred federal congressional representatives, but they tried. Moreover they sought to internationalize their efforts by communicating with and travel to Mexico, Spain, the Middle East, and other countries and regions. Alianza membership peaked at the remarkable figure of fourteen thousand in 1965. Alianzistas staged protests, organized marches, petitioned government agencies, developed international ties, publicized their views through media, sought alliances with organizations, cosponsored community events, and engendered steady opposition and persecution. Between 1965 and 1969, Alianza was probably the most widely active group of the CCM. Ultimately Alianza actions, many of which were planned though some occurred by happenstance, electrified their audiences. On October 15, 1966, a defining moment struck at Kit Carson National Park as Alianza members and others, including women, ative Americans, and student MAYO members, confronted authorities. After the shots and sign burnings, indictments followed. Later, another confrontation occurred at the Tierra Amarillo courthouse. Another

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Chapter 9 followed at Kit Carson National Forest on June 5, 1969. Authorities charged Tijerina again. Eventually after several trials and mediations, Reies Tijerina was jailed and, while in prison, subjected to heavy pressures including psychiatric treatments. Members of his family were harassed and alleged ly assau lted. Alianza-related efforts continued in several places throughout ew Mexico, especially linked to attempts at organizing cooperatives, schools, and cultural events through the late 1960s and mid-197os. Prior to the first trial, Alianza, as a co-partner in the Poor People's Campaign (1968), held the Pluma y Corazon assembly and, four years later, participated in La Raza Unida Convention (1972). Though their standing declined, Tijerina and/or Alianza received recognition and support, including grants and property, during the 1960s and 1970s. Considerations of the equ ities due to la nd-grant heirs' claimants continued through the years at the state level. The gist of the consideration was that in the past ind ividuals had had land rights allocated to them by bonafide governments acting lawfully. U.S. representatives had agreed to respect these legal rights. However, subsequently land-grant possessors and their heirs had been deprived of these rights by individuals, corporations, and government agents or agencies. 1'.1any remained convinced that heirs deserved restoration or compensation, which was possible through federal or state action. Th is consideration was an important achievement, and, at the turn of the twenty-first century, the issue of past land rights was raised in the New Mexico state legislature , still resonating with sources for justice and equa lity.

CHAPTER 10

Justice Constructed

M

exican pursuit of civil rights in courts had been uneven in its effectiveness in the past, a past that dates to Mexican procivil rights efforts and cases of the nineteenth century. 1 Civil rights had centered on citizenship, language, employment, and voting practices. The voting strength of Mexican Americans declined and varied in effectiveness during the midsixties. Moderate and comparatively more activist elements engaged in a variety of civil-rights efforts in the midsixties. Two key conclaves occurred in Albuquerque, New Mexico. One was a multi-participant gathering at a convention of Alianza attended mostly by activists. The other was the liberal-dominated hearings of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) in March 1966, where at last government-affiliated 1-1exican Americans said "jBasta!" (Enough!) and \.valked out. As an outcome, the EEOC appointed Arizonian Graciela Olivarez to the commission. A major event of 1967, the articulation of the Raza Unida concept, signaled a change in the Mexican American temper. 2 Raised earlier, this conceptualization, publicly announced, arose in protest of the cabinet committee hearings held at the conference in El Paso on October 28. In a way, the L.B. Johnson presidential campaign proffered the possibility of a White House conference and provided the impetus for salient Raza Unida- designated activity. To fulfill this promise, or rather to placate the protest that had continued since Albuquerque 1966, hearings were held to coincide with the Chamizal land turnover, a highly symbolic event ironically related to past Mexico-U.S. relations. Considerable debate resulted among Mexican leaders as to whether this meeting should be supported, since it was a hearing and not the "promised White House Conference," and objections arose concerning Washington's selection of the representatives and the direct or indirect exclusion of 109

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many others. Eventually, a larger and self-appointed group constituted and organized preliminary planning meetings. Though some of thesenior leadership complained, it was pointed out that they were not effective in elections and ignored Chicana and Chicano youth, w hich constituted a growing force. At El Paso, a diverse group of activists protested the hearings and adopted a self-chosen name in Spanish, Raza Unida. The name declared the hoped-for embodiment of the effort. Subsequently l,200 people representing fifty organizations organized a meeting in San Antonio, where "Plan de la Raza Unida," a short, seminal basic statement, was generated. The plan's introduction stressed pride and mobilization as well as " loyalty to the Constitutional Democracy." The plan's eight points emphasized organization, job training, education, housing, political representation, the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, police harassment, and cultural rights. Represenratjves of established organizations, as well as representatives from Californja and Texas student groups, and more senior individuals, such as Ernesto Galarza, attended this gathering. The notion of a clearinghouse of information to facilitate local organizing emerged, though not quite a full conceptualizarion of a communication center. In the late sixties a tentative coordinating organization, the Southwest Council of La Raza (SWCLR), was established to provide training and funding support for local organizations. 3 Ernesto Galarza promoted this effort at this time. Significantly, the council received funding from the Ford Foundation for its operation and for resources to initiate local projects because the foundation had reached the conclusion that this community remained a major civil-rights constituency. Later, some churches and unions contributed modest sums. The organization emphasized the coordination and targeting of Anglo power structures, neighborhood maintenance, and civic organizational enhancement. The council initiated the development of fund-generating activity in Oakland, Phoenix, San Antonio, Denver, and Los Angeles. Moreover, SWCLR contributed concurrently to the development of what came to be known as the indispensable Mexican American legal Defense and Education Fund (MALDEF ) and, later, the seminal Southwest Voter Registration Education Project (SVREP). Eventually, both MALDEF and SVREP did yeomen's work in reducing barriers to political participation, specifically in extending the provisions of the Voting Rights acts of 1965 and 1970 to the Chicano community. SWCLR reorganized as the -ational Council of La Raza (NCLR)in

Justice Constructed

December 1972 and established its national office in Washington, D.C., and its program operations office in Phoenix. Under the influence of Ernesto Galarza and directed by a self-selected board, the National Council of La Raza was envisioned as a major facilitator for advocating the integration of Chicano interests into all major facets of society and for providing coordination or clearinghouse activities as well as dissemination of information. Organizers imagined a unique interaction between a national organizational council and a network of autonomous local organizations. Resources were intended to foment key mobilizing projects at the local level and to initiate projects as a consequence. Its publication, Agenda, offered useful information, especially considering the vacuity of some other Latino publications in relation to policyrelated news. Ambitiously, some argued CLR should be projected as the national pan-organizational vehicle for the Mexican American community and as the major voice of advocacy on its behalf. . Yet NCLR did not possess a sufficient number of core activists or the funds necessary to realize the optimal vision of some. Even though encouraged and supported by the Ford Foundation, NCLR was obviously underfunded, and the leadership adjusted its plans accordingly. Its patrons, knowing little of the community's philanthropic patterns, expected that the NCLR, after some seed money, would be off and running, raising monies on its own. NCLR became more frequently a liaison office for federal agencies, gathering data and issuing statements on current issues or pending legislation rather than organizing forces to advance issues. NCLR, among its priorities, eventually concentrated on "economic development" - in effect business projects with potential for development, from mattress companies to franchises, demonstration-housing efforts, an investment corporation, and so forth. Some insiders adamantly believed that economic efforts, rather than the organization's more idealistic and overarching goals, were the key to future Mexican American empowerment. Overlooked were the individual empowerment and entrepreneurial basis and ethos of these projects. However, education, immigration, and employment also remained important priorities. By the 1970s, under the leadership of Raul Izaguirre, who at one time had been associated with the American G.I. Forum (AGIF), NCLR remained recognized as a lobbying agent and as a mediator between corporations and the community. Izaguirre did address issues adamantly. To be sure, as the politics of confrontation ebbed in the eighties, CLR was recognized as one of the major organizations effective in

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lobbying both the government agencies as well as many entities of the corporate sector. In a society with a complex lega l system that is the product of political and economic influences, litigation was an indispensable instrument in the political mobi lization for change. To practice litigation, organizations sought the services of attorneys skilled in specific areas of the law, and preferably experienced and talented ones; they also attempted to establish coordination, informational and resource capabilities, and a centralized office with access to legal support from nationally recognized legal collaborators or associates in both national organizations and law firms. Given the high costs of litigation in the United States, financial resources were also indispensable, particularly in pursuing activities that identified and diminished adverse precedents and established a coherent and continuous test-case strategy, resulting in success in the high courts of the states as well as in the Supreme Court. From the late sixties through the 1990s, with the founding of MALDEF, sustained litigation yielded civil rights results in more areas for more of the subject persons than ever before. 4 Clearly MALDEF obtained major litigation results in education, language, immigration, employment, voting, and redistricting rights. The possibilities for these benefits had a very clear chronology and specific roots. In 1967, Pete Tijerina and Gregory Luna, with the support of the NAACP legal section, secured the financial interest of the Ford Foundation and a grant of $2 million to initiate the Mexican American Legal and Educational Fund. A national board was created, offices were established in San Antonio and Los Angeles, and Tijerina was named executive director while Mario Obledo, then a Texas assistant attorney general, was designated general counsel. Also involved in the establishment of the organization were Vilma Martinez, a young attorney, as well as Morris ]. Baller, Peter Roos, Jane Couch, and the veteran Ed Idar. They did critical work at an important time. Two immediate internal issues emerged: the lack of Chicano civil-rights attorneys, and the enormous demand for individual legal-aid counsel in the lower courts. To have the desired impact, MALDEF needed national visibility and legitimacy, which required, in turn, board members who could facilitate all this as well as associations with prestigious firms, foundations, and national groups. MALDEF supplemented their initial priorities of education and political rights with issues concerning employment, immigrants' and women's rights, and developmental activity related to law schools and to leadership.

Justice Constructed

At all times, intense fundraising was required to maintain the organization and its activities, and this required a working relationship with foundations, with the private sector, and with government. As may be noted, a number of potentially inherent tensions existed within this type of organization. The organization, governed by a thirty-five-member board from different sectors of the community and from the larger society, met once a year. Each member served a two-year term that was renewable. Its extensive activities resulted in valuable specific contributions as well as support for other organizations. Female leadership and staff notably influenced this national organization. Pintos (inmates) and ex-inmateswere a population with firm reasons for reclamations and advocacies vis-a-vis both the judiciary and incarceration institutions. They obviously were at the center of the industrial prison complex. Jailings resulted from police actions, courts, law schools, and lawyers. Prior to 1967, rare would be the individual or group who would interest themselves in the most penalized and maltreated of the Mexican population prisoners, other than maybe the black Muslims. To be sure, campaigns on behalf of prisoners and songs on their plight go back generations. Among advocates, one figure stood out-Fred Arizpe Cruz-who from the darkest hell hole of Texas prisons and in the face of years of harsh intimidation called for justice for both Chicano and black prisoners. For the most part, prisoners organized themselves from prison to prison, including inmates in women's prisons. Prisoners lacked sustainable resources for prison-related organizing and no major organizational support existed to sustain Mexican prisoners' rights. Often prisoner organizing activities and their protests and demands went unheard. To protest prison conditions and prison authorities had immediate negative and harsh consequences for the prison activists. Clearly, though for obvious reasons, moderate statements came from prisons and several groups formed invariably to be curtailed. In this terrain, organizing flowed from the community, the prisoners, and their needs, and the leadership followed the ferment and did not predetermine the initial steps. Prisoner ethics and aesthetics were notable in many cases. Similarly a group and activist code of ethics was understood and followed with a fidelity not seen among other CCM groups. Arts, whether visual, spoken, or written, sparked in abundance within prison walls. In some sites, for a few brief times, pinto activities within the wall were begrudgingly permitted, then uniformly curtailed. Inmate pro-Raza

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activity did not stop, but instead it simply returned to its historical undercover mode and to its creative ways of communication with partners in the communities from whence inmates came. Inmates were both negotiators and confrontationalists, and confrontational positioning was on the rise. Chicana and Chicano efforts to forefront the concern for social justice through the use of courts shaped the context and climate of the CCM. ational organizations like MALDEF moved the agenda forward for civil rights. Notwithstanding, many individuals lacked access to these change mechanisms. Concerns about prisoners' rights and quality of life for ex-felons prompted small circles of activism on behalf of these constituencies. However, change was slow in this area. The rate of incarcerations for Mexican Americans and other people of color accelerated in the '8os and '90s.

CHAPTER 11

Confrontational Ways

or many, political action meant confrontational tactics and a belief that power through truth is a step in the right direction, but that to force power gets attention more quickly.' A frontline fighting and fighter paradigm entailed the following : an objective or grievance was identified, an initial force was organized, priorities were elaborated, the force was enlarged, and demands were confronted; key power holders were targeted and victory was either secured or not. In frontline struggle, you win or you lose. In this process recycled successful tactics were utilized. Some activists repeatedly exemplified these modes in their organizing activities. Confrontation involved a challenge to a state agency or institution, specifically the chief executive and senior administrators. The purpose was to challenge as much as it was to concede. A question stood: how do 1exican Americans organize a format that is aggressively proactive and inclusive of family participation, the political, and the social? One organization particularly appealed as a model, though it was not necessarily a leader. The establishment of the Crusade for Justice in the mid-r96os actually involved several cofounders, including women. The group's roots in part stemmed from a local group, Los voluntarios. This organization did much to provide direction for the politics of confrontation on behalf of Mexican American equities. 2 Its origins sprouted from anti-Mexican discrimination, urban inequalities, exclusionary Democratic Party politics, and the disillusionment with poverty programs. The protest against discrimination by the administration for the city of Denver in April i966 served as a specifically galvanizing event. The Crusade, led publicly by the charismatic Rodolfo "Corky" Gonzales, a former local liberal Democrat organizer and past member of the G.I. Forum, emphasized community participation, an ethical ethos, and consensus decision

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making. Familialism was its most referred to value, more so than any particular political or economic line. The Crusade remained inspirational for many years but could not be emulated outside of Denver. The views of the Crusade and Gonzales were stated in the poem "I am Joaquin" (1967) and also in the less-quoted poem "A Boy, Juarez U.S.A." (1968). 3 The core Crusade group became a uniquely influential band of activist leaders and the most organized public advocates of "Chicano nationalism" on the basis of what they stated publicly. They meant "self-determination" to the greatest extent possible. This influence was espec ially felt among the barrio youth , college students, and the ex-inmate population. Originally, the Crusade's social base consisted of approximately thirty community-based working-class families, and it was directed by an executive board focused on promoting civil-rights activity and cultural programs and advocating against discrimination in the schools and police brutality. This organization consciously addressed a range of interconnected issues in carefully timed tactics in an unfolding strategy involving civil rights, education reform, electoral participation, and cultural promotion. The immediate objective was empowerment through Mexican American participation. Members of the Gonzales family were heavily involved, particularly Gerry Gonzales, an advocate in her own right. Eventually her daughters also exercised leadership. An obvious ambiguity loomed; empowerment meant integration of individuals into programs or agencies but the core Crusade leaders had doubts as to the ethics of this kind of civic participation. At its height, the Crusade's protests often involved thousands, and it held regular weekly activities for its members. Particularly visible was the Crusade "assembly," a convocation of members. The Crusade remained a single-base community organization and, for a few years, it was clearly well organized. Moreover, it developed ways to provide funding for its activities. The Crusade for Justice advocated cultural consciousness and the creation of a society based on humanism rather than on competition; it envisioned a future oriented primarily toward "La Familia" and self-determination. Unlike most CCM efforts directed at changing existing institutions, however, the Crusade's thrust focused on the development of alternative institutions and militant confrontations. Exemplified by its school, Tlatelolco, and by its newspaper, El Gallo: La Voz de la ]usticia, the Crusade stressed autonomy. Significantly, the Crusade had not one but three dramatic occasions to claim national leadership, and on each of these the results were elusive:

Confrontational Ways

The ational Poor People's March (1968) , the National Chicano Youth Conference (1969), and the ational La Raza Unida Convention (1972). Significantly, the Crusade denounced the governing system as a monopoly in practices dependent on racism, exploitation, and militarism, and it offered an alternative vision to replace the sum of ills. There were at-large efforts involving organizing segments beyond Crusade membership. Tentatively, members tried to organize sanitation and postal workers, emphasizing not only job concerns but also political awareness. The group also participated in electoral politics with mixed results. Though the Crusade leadership had severe reservations about electoral practices as a whole, it risked a seeming discrepancy by running Gonzales for mayor of Denver and doing poorly in the election. Among the Crusade's best hours was when, in Washington, D.C., it supplied the need for a national "Chicano activist voice" in a gathering of a cross section of activists in a historic national arena known as the Poor People's March. In a major multiethnic and multisector effort in 1968, a national Chicano contingent composed primarily of the Crusade, Alianza, students, clergy, and some movement newspapers was organized to participate in the Poor People's March in Washington, D.C., initiated by Dr. Martin Luther King. 4 Often with support from Episcopalian and other Protestant clergy, local deputies of the march organized support groups and volunteer participants; they held meetings, rallies, and discussions of demands to foment interest. Several bus caravans were formed. The Crusade, Alianza, defense groups such as the Brown Berets, unionists, and student representatives from the UMAS and MAYO interacted with each other during the mobilization. All of the participants eventually converged on Washington, D.C., at the Hawthorne School, the base of organizing activities for Chicanos. Initially one strategy led by the Crusade was to concretize political unity by advocating economic demands, particularly Mexican, Indian, and black land demands expressed directly to heads of U.S . federal departments. This broad-based initiative was precedent setting in several ways. At the march, Chicana and Chicano constituencies issued the Plan de! Barrio. The plan called for the following measures: housing that would meet Chicano cultural needs; schooling, basically in Spanish; barrio businesses that would be owned within the community; and reforms in landholding, with the emphasis on restitution of community grant lands. Activists also confronted the State Department over violations of the

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provisions of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. March attendees asked the Mexican embassy to intervene on behalf of Mexican American grievances, and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC ) was charged with being insufficiently attentive to Chicanos. Among the many at the March, Chicanos urged more confrontational activities and, if necessary, arrests. The Crusade offered leadership and articulation in a singularly important national multiminority mobilization, which was not to occur again soon. The Chicano contingent participated in a wide range of meetings in Washington, D.C., throughout the spring and summer of 1968, with their actions directed at federal offices and intended to bring about greater understanding and coordination between Black, Indian, Puerto Rican, and women's groups. Though it did not involve very large numbers of Chicanas and Chicanos because of its location, the Poor People's March was a significant and politically enriching experience for the Chicana and Chicano movement as whole. It also ironically was an introduction to Washington, D.C., for those Mexicans aspiring to participate in government programs at entry and middle levels of administration. The Crusade continued as a major force in the promulgation of Raza Unida organizing and, in the seventies, considered political activities beyond the LRU' S parameters. In the decade to follow, the Crusade, of all movement organizations, faced severe assaults and wrenching internal strains in the tough and devised terrains of both local and nationa l activism. They raised a flag that was saluted by the many who did not hesitate to defend the community.

CHAPTER 12

Community Defense

ven a summary history of the Mexican American community reveals an aggressive record of assaults by racist individuals, groups, and agencies against Mexicanos, as well as a record of discriminatory treatment by individual office holders and agencies directed at Mexican Americans.1 This was the case in the sixties and seventies and previo usly. Police presence in all movement activities is verifiable-it is as easy as looking at photos or a film of events. Moreover, Mexican youth in many localities grew up with a constantly harassing police presence in the neighborhood. At one time or another, many Mexican families or neighborhoods have been explicitly assaulted by the immigration services or the Border Patrol. In addition, police or probation personnel attempted to develop informants or even provocateurs in certain neighborhoods. Police, prosecutorial, and judicial misconduct have been identified historically for over a hundred years. What changed in the Mexican American community was that at different sites and levels, activists understood this misconduct as political, with negative political consequences, and not simply misconduct by individual officers. For Mexican Americans empowerment required denouncing and confronting oppressive forces, lest those forces continue to thwart their political, civil, and labor rights. Before, during, and after the largest visible public demonstrations of the Chicana and Chicano movement, police and prosecutorial forces stood out. Violence was a primary means of aggression vis-a-vis the Mexican community, and only in response to it did victims turn to self-defense. Ongoing acts of aggression invariably called for responses and protection of Mexicans by Mexicans. In community memories, individuals and groups could be recalled who accomplished this. The question that was pending was, "How do we protect ourselves?" There were two

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related but distinct aspects: one was the primarily protective and defensive tactic of denouncing and confronting, and the other was an overall strategy of challenging the authority of the state in a variety of ways, including legal action. Young activists eventually came to learn the truth that police could be circumstantial and idiosyncratic and also part of a broader historical pattern, one of state police agency deployment vis-a-vis Mexicans. Youth, a major sector of the Mexican American community of the sixties, needed community defense because they were often targeted. Two pro-action activist strands committed to ending police malpractice intertwined: community-based youth groups and community antivigilante defense groups. Both strands proved protean. In the sixties, several community youth groups dedicated to community service and protection appeared, such as Young Chicanos for Community Action. Community defense groups by their chosen names underscored public assertion- Black Berets, Comancheros, and so forth. These groups were made up of working-class youth in working-class neighborhoods, sometimes gang members and sometimes stellar students . A notable group, the Black Berets of San Jose, California, was led by Salvador Candelaria. Black Beret and Brown Beret groups were active in New Mexico. The Black Beret established several community-oriented initiatives in Albuquerque, Las Vegas, and Silver City. A major effort was the establishment of the Bobby Garcia Memorial Clinic in Albuquerque. In San Diego, California, the Chicano Rights Organization led by Herman Baca formed as a defense group and as a proactive all-purpose local civil-rights group. Organized in the late 1960s, one of several such groups, the Brown Berets of East Los Angeles, a youth community organization, became viewed by some local militant youth as a militancy pacesetter. 2 From their initiation in 1967 through their disbandment in 1972, they developed a range of activities, published the newspaper La Causa (1969), and eventually established a successful hea lth clinic. The senior leaders included David Sanchez alongside Carlos Montes, Ralph Ramirez, Fred Lopez, Gloria Arellanes, Andrea Sanchez, and others. The East Los Angeles Berets represented only one of many similar groups. Though often identified by the media as predominantly male groups, women made up nearly half the membership in several local groups. The prominence of women was visible in many photographs of Beret formations at the time and in several successful activities. Brown Beret groups across the county grew into over twenty chapters. Yet local groups never implemented consolidation as a national

Community Defense

organization during the height of the movement. The Berets actively sought and included both genders and had some excellent women organizers. They were doubtful about whether professionals and business persons could be wholly committed members. They emphasized the right to self-defense against aggressions of all kinds and stood unflinchingly for self-determination. The Brown Beret ten-point program addressed issues of housing, culture, justice, employment, and education. They held, as an ideal, a code of ethical conduct, and they required specific organizational discipline. Along with the Crusade for Justice, they came the closest to articulating an explicit call for selfdetermination. Brown Berets participated in all of the major events between 1968 and 1971, but two were unequivocally theirs. The March Through Aztlan (1971) was an effort to vitalize unity and consciousness in specific places across the Southwest, and the symbolic occupation and liberation of Santa Catalina Island, California, in 1972 was a declaration of self-determination. The latter action was premised on an arguable claim that the island remained sovereign Mexican territory whose status was not decided by the 1848 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. Moreover, several Beret groups and spokespersons initiated antiwar organizing and the subsequent antidraft activities. They were also among the first Chicana and Chicano movement groups to defend undocumented persons. Their activities ebbed and flowed, often affected by their lack of resources and by a style that was on occasion counterproductive to their appeals. However, they were consistent in upholding community interests in any situation. Though the broader Beret program included several priorities, they emphasized in practice school reforms as well as issues of police malpractice and health services. Throughout these years, many groups faced severe harassment, informant infiltration, negative publicity by local press, and internal factionalism. Disbandment of Brown Beret groups was periodically announced but, in practice, Brown Berets continued. Brown Beret groups were among the first to respond to the scapegoating and persecution of Mexican undocumented workers in rural and urban areas and to assaults against workers along the border. Insofar as these actions were conscious extensions of their initial organizational prio rities, these too represented challenges to the state. As the momentum on the issue of the human rights of the undocumented became broader and more intense, the Berets were among chose in early defensive actions who advocated on immigrants' behalf. They also advocated on behalf of those on parole or incarcerated, demanding they

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be treated fairly and with respect and that their civil rights be recognized. The Brown Berets established friendly relations with African American organizations and activists. At one time, leadership in the Brown Berets looked to key African American leaders for support, including Stokely Carmichael, H. Rap Brown, and Maulana Karenga. Meetings occurred between African American civil-rights leaders and Brown Beret representatives. Self-defense postures and lives of resistance led to many being incarcerated and sentenced to federal, state, and county facilities. In the western states, Mexicanos, alongside Native Americans, have been in prisons since prisons were built. Prison time, given the attitudes of administrators and guards, was harsh for Mexicano prisoners. They responded creatively to their own needs. The sixties witnessed prisoner and ex-felon organizing beyond what had occurred in the past. This organizing in the prisons was accomplished under difficult circumstances. As a rule, prison and felon constituencies reflected very strong proChicana and Chicano movement identification. A civil rights movement for the imprisoned or the formerly imprisoned was a lifeline for many. This prisoner and ex-felon population had, in practice, no civil rights. CCM supporters and media outreach were almost the only ways of getting the word out on behalf of prisoners who were falsely imprisoned or mistreated while there. Conditions in the 1970s worsened. The momentum for Chicano community defense continued after the 1970s as organizations such as Union del Barrio, led by Ernesto Bustillos, attests in Southern California. 3 Volunteer watch groups continued and equally salient lawyers devoted themselves to police or judicial malpractice. Through the consideration of community defense, important issues were raised, including what defense was most necessary and who should be responsible for such defense and the importance of anti-Mexican vigilantes working in tandem with covert police supporters. In explicit ways, defense meant safeguarding youth to enable them to progress in their education, and one way to do this was to advance through blocked educational stainvays.

CHAP TER 13

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T

he origin of the student movement of the 1960s and 1970s expressed the realities and condition of the times, a part of the resurgent political mobilization that occurred in society as a whole and the Mexican community in particular. Student mobilization formed an integral part of general Mexican political activity made possible by changes occurring during the early 1960s. As a great increase occurred in the Mexican population, caused by natural reproduction and immigration, an increasingly greater proportion of the population was young and enrolled in schools. For the most part, the young people were tagged for the lowest paying jobs. Chicanos and their fam ilies were behind the income and schooling levels of both Anglos and blacks, and many of them were aware of these disparities. As prosperity was evident for others, the Mexican youth were poorer. The social and economic conditions of the Mexican people heightened the national consciousness of young Mexican political activists. Importantly, during the sixties some Mexican Americans, including the young, experienced the impact of targeted federal programs, both in communities and on campuses. For many youth, the campus was their first direct encounter with those endowed with privileges. Accelerations in both domestic and international civic mobilizations and the populist discourses of dissenters also contributed to renewed Mexican political activity, including that of students. The civil rights movement of the 1960s focused attention primarily on the plight of blacks, but in particular it spotlighted the participation and perspectives of the young. The youth premises underscoring the Kennedy administration's "New Frontier" and Johnson's "Great Society" environment seemed potentially amenable to increased demands by young Mexicans for full and equal citizenship rights. The aftermath of the Cuban 123

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Revolution, and later the African and Vietnamese liberation wan, sharpened Mexican youth's critical consciousness as to the Mexican reality and that of other national minorities within the United States. Changes in international relations whereby the disempowered challenged the powerful contributed to the development of a realistic but critical perspective of the Mexican situation in the United States, while concurrently a U.S. pro- poor peoples' equities perspective was strengthening the civil-rights impulse among young political activists. Importantly, the sixties and seventies were a time of discontent and conflict in the republic of Mexico. These were years of militant organizing by progressives, unionists, intellectuals, and, in particular, activist students who challenged the dominant ideology and institutions. Materials and spokespersons from their struggles impacted Mexican youth and communities in the United States. Whether the ideological orientation was deep or only lightly discussed, from 1966 to the 1970s confrontation politics and heightened consciousness characterized Mexican youth activity in the United States. Youth activists confronted institutions through demonstrations, boycotts, strikes, sit-ins, and street fighting . Gradually a perceptible development in political ideas occurred from protest over the denial of full and equal citizenship rights and gave rise to a vehement cultural affirmation whose logical culmination would seem to be demands for full self-determination in a range of life areas. Youth formed part of the emergence of class-ethnic politics related to prolabor perspectives and pro- immigrant rights concerns. Emissaries from Chicana and Chicano labor and leftist organizers sought to further youth enthusiasm for radical change and the development of ties with the working class in Mexico, the United States, and abroad. Meanwhile, the success, albeit limited, of the Chicana and Chicano youth movement in increasing schooling and employment opportunities and focusing some government and institutional attention on the Mexican population lessened the overt pejorative attitudes of the established Mexican community leadership toward youth militancy. Senior leadership slowly realized that their own interests of self or local group advancement could be served by referring to the "movement" framework as proposed by students. Recently energized political activists from MAPA, G.I. Forum, and LULAC, as well as Democratic Party operatives, changed their attitudes and positions somewhat. Old and new left organizations also decided to join and support the CC student movement. In fact, students were central to the political vortex of 1966

Students Act

through the 1970s in several ways. As pioneers, they broke through organizational modes and ideological barriers, to be sure; later their centrality lessened as other militant organizations came to the fore, often including previous student elements. Indeed, several particular factors and influences contributed to the rise and growth of the Mexican student movement in the late sixties and through the 197os .1 As a result of the civil-rights struggle over admissions, a sufficient number of Chicana and Chicano students existed on campuses to form a critical political mass, and these students were generally a working class and culturally conscious and intelligent sector. Students experienced a sense of alienation collectively within the college/university environment. At other times, other Mexicans had perhaps individually undergone similar experiences, but in the mid- and late 1960s, youth developed a collective political process based on the commonalities of ethnicity, class, and institutional settings. Because of the more frequently articulated critical perspectives in general society and in their own community, the students noted the contrast of conditions in their community in comparison with the situation of the more privileged sectors of U.S. society. Going to college also meant some faced greater contact with the privileged whites of the upper-middle class. Students became hypersensitive to the deplorable political, social, and economic status of the Mexican community and the even starker realization that this was progressively worsening in many aspects rather than improving. Students perceived and felt the political vacuity and thus disillusionment in traditional community politics represented by stalwarts of the Democratic Party and others. The impotency and bankruptcy, tactically and ideologically, of the established leadership were rather painfully apparent and were felt and voiced by students. They saw themselves as the new leadership obliged to displace the old. Youth-related events outside the Mexican community in the United States were internalized by students. Present, no doubt, were the influence of the black and radical Anglo movements-Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), the Free Speech Movement (FSM), and even the early campus political party SLATE. A particular influence was the Student NonViolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), but these were subsidiary rather than primary influences, though to the uninformed observer from outside of the Mexican community this deprioritization may not have been readily visible. However, some who were active in the Mexican student movement had participated in black and Anglo radical youth activity. Lastly, events in Mexico, Latin America, and

Chapter 13

Vietnam were important. All of these were liberation movements in which youth were prominent, and all of these movements were greatly admired. They addressed issues of the day with which Mexican youth in particular identified. Most immediate to the Mexican youth in the United States were developments among youth in Latin America, particularly in Mexico. As mentioned, youth activism in Mexico has a history dating to the nineteenth century. The most immediate antecedent for activity of the 1960s was the impact of the Movimiento Liberacion Nacional ( 1L ) in Mexico, which called for political self-determination and social economic justice for all people. Youth responded, but the MLN deteriorated because of contradictions in structure and ideology. The student movement, however, sharpened ideologically, increasing in militancy and numbers, exploding in bloody confrontations with the army and police throughout the sixties particularly at the universities of Michoacan, Sonora, and Puebla. Mobilizations occurred in both universities and secondary and preparatory schools. Student protests gathered momentum in Mexico City during the bloody days and nights of the summer and fall of 1968, peaking at the encounter of Tlatelolco between students and the army and police units, where over five hundred people were killed on October 2 . The student movement in Mexico, more radical ideologically and more developed structurally than anything in the United States, and its actions dwarfed anything in the United States both in scale and scope. Significantly, student mobilizations involved direct confrontations between students and the state. Over 200,000 students participated in the events of October 1968 in Mexico City alone, and perhaps a larger number participated across Mexico. A few students from iexico came to the United States and met with other students, and some Chicanas and Chicanos met with students in Mexico. The rise of student movements north and south of the border coincided, as did their decline and then their resurgence. In the United States, the Mexican student movement, like the other civil rights movements, sought to advance democratic rights, which gave them all a surface analogy. However, student organizing clearly tapped historical roots and experiences, which were unique to them because of the special relation of the Mexican people to the United States. Mexican American student organizing evolved its own priorities, ideology, rhetoric, organizational tactics, and modes. Of immediate organizational and ideological influence and relevance to the student movement were the National Farm Workers Association of California

Students Act

led by Cesar C havez and Dolores Huerta, the Crusade for Justice of Denver led by Corky Gonzales, the Alianza of New Mexico led by Reies Tijerina, and La Raza Unida of Texas led by Jose Angel Gutierrez. These influences reflected issues, forms, political styles, and rhetoric that appealed to youth and student constituencies. These issues, because of their class and ethnic content, had direct economic and political consequences, and while there was class content there was not an explicit class stand . Immediate circumstances and influences aside, there developed a generational political consciousness and a corollary sense of generational mission among Mexican youth that expressed itself in a wide range of activities. All of this made the CC student mobilizations sometimes larger and denser than those of other campus groups. In northern California student mobilization began with Student Initiative at San Jose and in south Texas under one name or another in 1964. Youth organizing developed in Colorado linked to the Crusade and in New Mexico linked to the Alianza. The immediate beginnings of the student movement and youth activism in Southern California occurred in the summer and fall of 1966 and in the spring of 1967. These beginnings were related to two organizing processes: one that occurred in the community and another that occurred on the campuses. This dual process germinated in college campuses among senior high school students and other youth in East Los Angeles and other parts of the city. They reacted to the increased denial of their cultural ethnic identity, and they shared a vague sense of obligation to their community and an equally vague sense of dissatisfaction with things as they were generally. Thus they shared an emergent political consciousness due to the recognition of the oppression of their community. In private discussions, college students explored their mutual feelings and reactions to their situations, defining in the process a common sense of obligation. A handful of students at East Los Angeles Junior College, Loyola, California State College at Los Angeles, the University of California at Los Angeles, and, later, the University of Southern California, Occidental College, California State College, San Fernando (California State University, Northridge), and other campuses coalesced into groups. Concurrently with college organizing arose community youth organizations. Obviously, not all of the initial student organizers were involved in the two organizational precipitators mentioned here; others were involved elsewhere in sites such as sports and religious, social, and cultural activities.

Chapter 13

During 1966 at different places across the Southwest, Mexican students organized efforts to address their concerns. As part of this trend in Los Angeles, interested adults and city agencies endeavored to encourage youth to discuss problems of "growing up" and to develop a "civic" interest in community affairs. Older adults, veterans of World War II and the CSO campaigns of the 1940s who were now in civil service or in community politics, encouraged youth to discuss their problems. The County Human Relations Council staffed by Richard Villalobos, Mike Duran, Roberto Almazan, and others encouraged youth constituencies to get involved in civic organizing. Parallel with this activity, youth efforts developed related to the Episcopalian Church of the Epiphany in Lincoln Heights, presided over by Father John Luce, and the associated Social Action Training Center, directed by Eleazar Risco. later in 1967-1968, these initiatives led to activity around the publication La Raza, \.vhich had a significant impact on student mobilization. La Raza was an inspiration to other community and student newspapers. Around each of these newspapers coalesced youth activists who played the role of organizational generators in their local areas. In April of 1966 the Los Angeles Human Relations Council hosted a conference at Camp Hess Kramer that involved primarily high school students and adult counselors. Though the adults wished to keep it a social sensitizing session, the youth turned it toward a more substantive direction. A frank, if somewhat idealized, dialogue ensued on the need for organizing youth in order to deal with the problem most commonly debated in the discussions, which was the educational, political, social, and economic situation of the Mexican community in Los Angeles and the need for change. For many this conference was the first experience in a structured all-Mexican youth gathering, which reached decisions on general concerns and proposed action to address these concerns by organizing a group constituted and led by students. The students, among them Vickie Castro, Mocte Esparza, Jorge Licon, Rachel Ochoa, John Ortiz, and David Sanchez, decided to form Young Citizens for Community Action (YCCA); later the name changed to Young Chicanos for Community Action (YCCA). For many who formed the original membership, YCCA was a mixed experience. Among the organization's first activities were food drives and fundraising for the farm workers in Delano, a labor-political issue. Other first efforts involved them with the city bureaucracy and its manipulations, an institutional confrontation. These efforts provided many with the first frustrations of trying to realize ideals within

Students Act

orthodox channels. One project carried out was the Christmas rally in December 1966 at Wrigley Field, which YCCA originated and implemented with adult aid. The Christmas rally reflected their concerns; it was a project that would benefit the community. A less satisfactory experience was Mayor Yorty's Youth Advisory Council. YCCA, in effect, constituted a good part of the original council in addition to black students. The adults of city hall grew alarmed at the insistent idealism of their Youth Advisory Council and belatedly expressed surprise upon realizing the council was made up of mostly Mexicans and blacks. Solidarity among youth of color in this period concerned government officials. The adult advisors to the council soon devised a scheme for easing out YCCA and other minority students and replacing them with complacent Young Americans for Freedom from San Fernando. YCCA continued on its own with wholly Mexican-community projects. In 1967 two events were to have repercussions for the East Los Angeles community and YCCA; both events further stimulated youth action. The touchstone was politics. One was the organizing effort to put together a broad coalition of community groups into an effective force for securing political representation. This effort led to the Mexican American Unity Congress of Los Angeles. The other v.ras, in turn, a product of it-the Julian Nava campaign for a seat on the Los Angeles Board of Education. YCCA was not officially represented at the first Congress; significantly, it decided to meet and select autonomously whom it would endorse and support. The routine work of door-to-door precinct canvassing changed youth perspectives. Youth were convinced that more determined efforts at community organizing v1 ere necessary. Later, in September of 1967, YCCA inaugurated the popular Piraiia Coffee House in East Los Angeles, which came to be a center of activity and ideas for several months. The YCCA received its first police harassment. Eventually, YCCA transformed into the Brown Berets, who in turn fomented other groups. The Berets, a youth organization, was charged with being a transparent facsimile of black organizations, but without the organizational heritage, leadership, and community support that gave the Black groups temporary viability. What was not acknowledged was the Mexican organizational heritage of community self-defense, radical groups in or from Mexico. The Berets made contributions to progressive thinking on a number of issues and they stressed community unity and organizational discipline. Despite the sensational press coverage, which served primarily to draw police attention to the Berets, as they became 1

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increasingly dominated by street elements and a youthful populism they became increasingly marginal to the youth movement process in Southern California. In contrast, the other half of youth activism, in part also stimulated by the earlier YCCA, remained central to the movement for years. In sum, YCCA membership contributed in two areas of the Los Angeles youth mobilization-the community defense organizations and the college student organizations. Members of YCCA joined the fledgling student organizing efforts that had begun at nearly the same time as YCCA efforts. As previously mentioned, student organizing occurred nearly simultaneously in different states, regions, and local areas, as well as outside and within Southern California. To argue or assert which began first is probably inconclusive. Though they were not the only groups or necessarily the first, two key groups developed in Southern California: one at East Los Angeles College (with ties to California State College at Los Angeles) and the other at the University of California at Los Angeles. By fall of 1966 East Los Angeles College was the scene of incipient Mexican student activism as it had been somewhat in the 1950s. In January of 1967, a dozen students, among them Mike de La Pena, Gilberto Cardenas, Art Sandova l, Armando Lopez, Carlos Jackson, Ray Cordova, Jessie Zaragoza, and Alberto Juarez, established the Mexican American Student Association (MASA), which may well have been the first 1960s Mexican student organization in the Los Angeles area. From this membership activists organized several campuses. MASA group members, among them veterans and others somewhat older than most students, were also active in Mexican American Pofaical Association (MAPA) activities. Several were familiar with conventional ethnic politics. They saw the potential of student organization in a wide variety of areas. Some from this group also consciously looked to the organizing pattern common to existing Mexican community associations and their youth affiliates. From its inception, MASA had two overall goals: education and involvement in community issues. Sectors of the campus population immediately labeled MASA "racist"; future organizations heard this charge worded in various ways. MASA continued to be active through the spring of 1967 and later; however, due to membership turnover and because of ideological reasons it did not play a significant role in Los Angeles after the summer of 1967 as one might have expected. However, students from among the initiators of MASA participated in the student mobilization at the California State College at Los Angeles and at the University of California at Los Angeles.

Students Act

At UCLA in the spring of 1967 there were perhaps sixty Mexican American students; a dozen of these were drawing together into a group. This large university was not a friendly environment for Mexican students. Dissatisfaction plus ambivalence about being at the university, concern over identity, and the desire to do something about change drew together an informal group that held long discussions at night in the dormitories. Luis Ortiz was particularly active in this informal organizing. At that time the Mexican American Study Project, funded by the Ford Foundation, was coming to its end, but it had at least one socially positive by-product apart from its research accomplishments. Ralph C. Guzman, later a California State Los Angeles faculty member, who was associated with the project, drew a few Mexican students into it and encouraged students such as Jorge Aguiniga to get together and discuss problems in his office, which in effect became a gathering place for select students. These students took a variety of semina l paths; some became activists, others joined service programs such as Service Employment and Redevelopment (SER), while others went into government or the academy. Many students from both elements at UCLA, in contrast to those at East Los Angeles Junior College, were in their late teens or early twenties. They rejected adult political groups and vented freely a dislike for traditional politics, though their concerns also focused on education and community involvement. Significantly, they looked to the United Farm Workers for a model and inspiration and not to electoral politics . Developments similar to those at East Los Angeles and at UCLA were occurring on other campuses in Los Angeles. As a result of neighborhood ties, school associations, and direct efforts, students from several colleges formed a cross-city circle in addition to their campus activities. In the spring of 1967, these college students, in cooperation with the Human Relations Office of the City of Los Angeles, invited Mexican students at several campuses to a conference of Mexican youth. A series of preconference plann ing meetings were called. Discussion centered on the issues and formation of a steering committee for the conference. Important in the meetings were students from Loyola, University of Southern California, California State College at Los Angeles, Un iversity of California at Los Angeles, East Los Angeles Junior College, and San Fernando Valley State College (now CSU Northridge), as well as recent college graduates such as Rene Nunez. Disputed issues included the nature of the follow through after the conference, social versus educational roles, education prob lems, the

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churches and their social responsibilities, and, of course, how to best confront each of these. Except for the church issue, which was temporarily set aside to be taken up in 1969, these subjects came to be the principal topics at the conference. The conference, held on May 13, 1967, included approximately two hundred Mexican college and high school students plus a sprinkling of black and Anglo observers. They discussed racism, tutoring high school students, increasing college-student attendance, working with parent groups, and support for farm workers. The principal result of the conference was the mandate to form Mexican student organizations on each campus. Three organizing priorities were agreed upon: (1) education; (z.) community involvement and political representation; and (3) social activity. These were to be focal points of student activism for years, albeit radicalization constantly redefined these. The organizing mandate was charged to an ad hoc organizing committee made up of representatives from each campus. Earlier, before the conference, what was already recognized as the UCLA group had prepared a twelve-point program and a structural scheme for organizing the Los Angeles Mexican student activist population. The plan called for setting up a general intercampus body (Central) and charged each member with the responsibility of organizing a campus and holding regular meetings on a rotating basis from campus to campus. The ideas of this group, enthusiastically argued, influenced significantly the conference and the following meetings. Thus, from the first, intercampus regional coordination contributed to the particular strength and force of the Mexican student movement. By chance or forethought the strategy came into being that coordinated action was necessary; one chapter alone was of little consequence in the broader political process, though it was obviously important on its own campus. Student movement impact would have been less if it had atomized at the beginning. However, the role of Central remained a constant issue of debate among activists, and only by persistent struggle was its validity recognized. For the next ten years, the peaks and ebbs of the student movement coincided with the rise and fall of Central and other intercampus coordinating bodies. Throughout the summer the organizing committee continued to meet to explore organizational formats alongside the principal business of receiving progress reports on the organizing efforts at local campuses and to further encourage action. At the same time, the organizers

Students Act

proceeded to constitute themselves into a permanent Los Angeles area student Central with a senate-type body and to adopt a name; it chose United Mexican American Students (UMAS). There were other names used for local groups, such as MAYO, but these considered themselves part of the same general organization. By September a constitution was drawn up and accepted. At the end of the summer there were seven chapters and Central was meeting regularly with elected officers; the first chairman was Alberto Juarez. Central members discussed a wide variety of interests. The formal structuring of campus organizations preceded or shortly followed the Central UMAS structuring. Student organizing activity extended to San Diego and later to the Riverside, San Bernardino, and Santa Barbara areas. UMAS was on its way. The fall of 1967 was an optimistic and carefree period for the student movement. The campuses in Los Angeles underwent intensive enthusiastic recruiting for UMAS. A great flurry of social activities strengthened bonds on campus and between campuses. Among the participants, some of those social and political ties remained for the following years. Love affairs blossomed, marriages took place, and previous love relations broke under the strain of activism. Social relations were (and are) an important aspect of the movement, but they are not as measurable as overt political accomplishments. Chapters increased membership dramatically. A common pattern emerged at meetings featuring guest speakers from a spectrum of viewpoints, and lengthy heated debates on identity and purpose ensued. A growing social hermitism from the rest of campus life also transpired, though political contacts increased. Always to be a point of debate, the fall also saw the first tentative efforts at internal structuring among local chapters: membership requirements, leadership mechanisms, the establishment of standing committees such as community relations, university relations, inter and intracampus relations, and finance and social committees . .Nlembers established formal chapter projects. Specific collective projects always served to pull student organizations together. The first were usually in support of the farm workers, chapter fundraising, and pro-community events on campus. Corky Gonzales, chairman of the Crusade for Justice, and Reies Tijerina, president of Alianza, spoke in East Los Angeles on October 15, 1967. Significantly, this event was an antiwar rally, in the core area of an active community. Both in the community and on some campuses, each leader, especially Gonzales, greatly impressed and influenced the fledgling student movement. In most

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chapters a growing awareness arose that a division existed between those who were moderate and those tending toward militancy. Dividing lines occurred between those who used confrontational tactics and an assertive political identity versus others who favored gradualism and assimilation or, in their phrasings, self-determination versus accommodation, and Chicano Mexicano versus Mexican American. A shift and acceleration to militancy was reflected in several conferences and hearings previously mentioned that were held outside California, which were to impact the Southern California student movement. Sponsored by Alianza, the most important of these took place on October 21, 1967, in Albuquerque, New Mexico. The discussions centered on questions of cross-regional organization, nationaJjsm, objectives, and, importantly, the question of a Mexican, black, and Indian coalition or alliance. A distinction was made between the two concepts. There was agreement in principle, but differences arose as to implementation and the exercise of leadership within coalitions and alliances. Though a rudimentary communications framework was agreed upon at this meeting, few substantive organizational efforts occurred. The first attempt at regional structure, the Committee for Hispanic Emancipation (CHE), was conceptualized and the idea of pan- Latin American unity was articulated from a radical perspective, years later to be exemplified by the slogan "somos uno, porque America es una" (We are one because America is one). Horizons were definitely expanding. Of interest to students, another gathering took p lace on October 28, 1967, at El Paso, Texas, when the hearings scheduled by the emerging Inter-Agency Committee on Mexican-American Affairs occurred abortively. A showcase for the Johnson administration and mainstream organization, these hearings also led to protests, which included students. For those who were observant, events proved that definitely a different wind was blowing in the Southwest. This gathering involved a spectrum of Mexican organizations and leadership; the student representation was a part of the larger gathering. UMAS, the Mexican American Student Confederation (MASC) from Northern California, along with students from other states, held their own caucus where they put forth their demand for recognition from the Southwest Council of La Raza, demanding a student seat on the council and monies to support student activities. In return they pledged adherence to the Plan de La Raza Unida that was promulgated at that time. This event was followed by a conference at San Antonio, Texas, much influenced by MAYO and attended by approximately 1,200 persons. The results were

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a sense of national unity among students, wider contacts, increased militancy, and recognition for students of an autonomous place in the movement. Importantly, the concepts of La Raza Onida-solidarity and the needs for interstate relations-were articulated. Later, in December at Denver, youth activists came together to discuss a major Southwest student conference, and these discussions led eventually to the Chicano Youth Conference of March 1969. During the fall, meetings between representatives of the Southern California student movement, UMAS, and the northern California counterparts, MASC and Student Initiative (SI), took place. These meetings led eventually to a statewide network. Northern students at the time had a richer experience, more carefully delineated goals, a coherent concept of the student role, and, not least, outstanding leadership: Armando Valdez, for example. MASC was strong in the San Francisco Bay area, SI was strong at San Jose State, and also strong was the early Quinto Sol group at UC Berkeley. They had held a successful demonstration in the Mission District of San Francisco on Thanksgiving Day 1968 against poverty and against the war. MASC considered UMAS somewhat moderate, yet promising, because the student numbers in Southern California could be higher than elsewhere in the state. Roles between the organizations changed as the south overtook the north in numbers, but also as initiatives such as high-school student relations, college and university recruitment, curriculum demands, and antiwar activities gained momentum. In preliminary discussions hosted by MASC in Fresno in 1967, an agreement was reached calling for a "Southwest Leadership Conference." The name itself bespeaks the "chosen few " notion then common among students, that is, leaders of the future. It was to be the second general UMAS conference. One of its original purposes was to "define and outline the functions of UMAS." However, that was later changed to "identify the needs of the Mexican American community as seen by students and to plan programs of action to alleviate these needs." The earlier tutorial orientation existed because many wanted to restrict the conference to education issues, but, even in this, the process gave way for a call to prepare for public demonstrations and classes in " Mex ican American" history and a suitable text for these classes. In effect the formulation of community confrontation and Chicano Studies strategies began. The result of these planning talks, not free of differences, importantly led to substantive north-south cooperation among students in California.

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On December I6-17, I967, the second general UMAS conference was held at the University of Southern California. Approximately three hundred persons attended and it signaled a directional shift. The conference framework consisted of general assemblies and topic workshops. Each became the sounding board for the tendencies and issues current in the student movement. Though it was not clear at the time, one element was clearly ascendant: militant activists. The speakers represented the spectrum of tendencies within the movement. One exemplified the traditional youth "model leadership" of the community prevalent a few years back; another represented the liberal moderate view exemplifying the ideas and feelings of some of the original founders of UMAS; a third, the cogent views of a radical community-oriented militancy; and the last element represented was an extremist left. The last two tendencies represented the future as the first two were either displaced or amalgamated into the second two. From then on, at first a minority, the more radical liberals and militants were to be dominant and gain the consensus. As the assembly proceeded, the reception to the speeches clearly indicated where the consensus was moving. Alberto Juarez and Armando Valdez, representing distinct viewpoints, were the best received. The workshop on political leadership was the largest and srormiest. There the issue was joined with friction between the moderates, the radical liberals, the militants, and the extremist fringe elements. A merger occurred between the radical liberals and militants, which meant the first became the second; henceforth it was to be militants versus moderates. In the early years, the ultraleft element, because of its extremism, its poor style of politics, and the poor quality of its leadership, did not develop much of a following in the student movement: this element was recurrently marginalized but did feed the student movement a tough economic criteria and a critique of liberal politics. Thus the political-ideological momentum was always being redefined in constant internal struggle, moving from middle to left and then back to an altered middle. In the process the extremes were marginalized. During I968 and 1969 the political profile was clear, but after that it was blurred for several years before later clearing along classic left lines in I976 and I977· The issues around which the political definition developed remained constant: self-determination, education, labor-economics, culture, the role of women in the organization, and the movement in general. At the end of the December conference, a platform was agreed upon that marked a significant progression from the resolutions adopted in

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May. These dealt with the land issue, college admissions, the dropout rate, the draft, gerrymandering, discrimination in housing and employment, and the plight of farm workers. As can be noted from the two earlier conferences, the issues were clearly political, educational, and economic, not merely cultural. The conference decision for direct action culminated in two demonstrations. The first, called by UMAS, as a whole signaled a new direction. A march occurred, large in numbers for those days, around the Los Angeles Coliseum, with signs reading "La Raza Unida" and "Chicano Power" and putting forward each of the thirty-five issues of the student platform. This put the public on general notice that the student movement had arrived. The second demonstration consisted of a car caravan through the main thoroughfares of East Los Angeles. Placards called for unity and power and stated the issues; this was a call to the Mexican community. One campus chapter, Long Beach, refused to participate because it questioned militancy as an appropriate tactic. During the Christmas holidays, the UMAS UCLA chapter hosted the traditional posadas. For some students it was their first experience in a Mexican cultural festivity, but soon many groups began celebrating social events culturally, which indicated the growing cultural emphasis. As to be expected in the social movement of an oppressed minority, group cultural dynamics gained strength during the following years. The first months of 1968 were ones of multiple activity, stability, and continual growth for the student movement in Southern California. High school strikes and the " blowouts" were seminal among the many activities; high school students organized high schools. In effect, UMAS supplied monitoring and support for the first major confrontations with an administrative bureaucracy and the police. Direct support and participation in the blowouts were the demarcation lines between militants and nonmilitants and between organizational veterans and new recruits. Indicative of increased militancy, many campuses launched local protests. In January, at UCLA and at California State Los Angeles, the first public campus demonstrations occurred over the issue of increased student fees; it fueled the militancy. Adding to organizational stability in January of 1968, elections were held among the individual chapters and for UMAS Central. Hank Lopez of California State Northridge was elected Central chairman and held office for most of 1968, as did several others such as David Bojorquez, Frank Hidalgo, and Susan Racho, along with some of the chairpersons of the Central standing committees, such as Community Relations.

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As a sign of politica l growth, UMAS became more deeply involved in community politics. A major point of debate in early 1968, the issue of endorsement or nonendorsement of the candidacies of Robert Kennedy and Eugene McCarthy threatened to disrupt the student movement at an early stage. Kennedy forces intensified the struggle, first through a Mexican professional and then through pressure from the very top campaign staff. After considerable debate, the issue was settled by the decision to support only Mexican candidates in strong Mexican districts who had a platform in line with UMAS positions. Support would depend on ideological stance. From th is position, Central moved to a visible role in community politics during 1968 through a coordinated effort in the Congress of Mexican American Unity and in the subsequent electoral campaigns, which occurred along with other multiple activities of 1968. UMAS followed through on the electoral endorsements by staffing an electoral headquarters in Lincoln Heights. As June neared, members worked closely with UFW volunteers to "get out the vote," and Cesar Chavez visited the headquarters, including the night of the primary. Not all UMAS members endorsed these activities. Reflecting a consistent development at two conferences in 1968, the student movement clarified its ideology and organizational goals. In June of 1968, the Southern California UMAS regional conference was held at the University of California. The major discussions centered on legal defense, support for the UFW, and on community-university relations. In December of 1968, the third general state student conference, held at Loyola University, organized into four major workshops: organizational structure, educational programs, community relations, and ideology. The issues demonstrated the change: Chicano Studies programs, legal defense, colonialism, international solidarity, and a statewide coordinating council. Between 1968 and 1970 the tentative emerging rudimentary ideology of the student movement could be summarized as: Emphasis on and mystique of active participation in community affairs and the perception of this as fitting a national and international context 2. Dedication by all means necessary to securing democratic rights and justice for the Mexican community 3. Commitment to the development of parallel institutions and the democratization of existing institutions 1.

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4. Solidarity with national and international groups that were viewed

as nationally exploited and oppressed; with these there could be pragmatic political coalitions for the obtainment of specific mutual objectives 5. Recreation and strengthening of culture 6. Adherence and operationalization of La Raza Unida concept and the radical concepts of the Plan de Azrl:in For some time, a variant of Mexican Chicano ethnicism was a pervasive tendency within the student movement; it emphasized Mexican identification and pride. Obviously the CCM was ethnically premised. Ethnicism was argued as the key to organizing, but even in the early phases it was not necessarily the one and only end goal. The Colorado Crusade for Justice was especially influential in this regard, and Corky Gonzales spoke on cultural nationalism as an organizing tool during his 1967 visits to California and restated his views at a symposium on November 13-14, 1969, at California State College, Hayward. The speech emphasized heritage, pride, and obligation. The first widely distributed statement on cultural nationalism to appear in La Raza newspaper was by Luis Pingarron, who was associated with services programs. By cultural nationalism, Pingarron prioritized retention and use of the Spanish language to better serve community needs. In contrast to Pingarron and Corky Gonzales, students at Hayward argued that ethnic populism provided an operative norm for politicalization and community development and provided the rationale and psychological substance for collective mobilization through the vehicle of symbols and subconcepts that had possibilities for wide acceptability and thus organizational enhancement. Accordingly, group mystique offered the potential for binding a heterogeneous and fragmented community, providing the basis for operational unity and the concomitant results. In the phases following 1970, among students, ethnicism was to be challenged as the general subsuming ideology by two forces, one a dogmatic, somewhat basic, class struggle analysis, and the other an emerging, more complex feminist critique by Chicana feminists. From the beginning, within the student movement, there existed a multiplicity of tendencies related to the heterogeneity of political views and class divisions within the Mexican community. This fact, however, was not contrad ictory to an operational unity as a possibility and sometimes a reality, but it was a cause of tensions. The movement was composed of youth united by their ethnic background in solidarity and

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commitment to La Raza, and, accordingly, it developed a general loose commonality of goals, tactics, and organizational structure. But behind this facade of unity it was a heterogeneous collection of organizational biases, ideological views, degrees of maturity, age levels, and class backgrounds, class aspirations, and career goals, all of which influenced activism. The student movement manifested a series of contradictions; principal among these were those that were strictly objectively sociopolitical in character and those that were subjective. Though one could treat it as a case in political psychology, results would be slight; a class and political analysis yielded more substantive results. The student movement had several dimensions or meanings. The student effort was not a super imposition but an integral component of the larger Mexican civil rights movement, which itself had multiple aspects. The student movement represented a creative and revivalist cultural surge; it was a civil rights struggle; it was an effort for political recognition and economic rights by middle-class elements; and it had intimations of an incipient liberation struggle for self determination and local autonomy. The student movement stood against the status quo of the dominant system, but it also opposed the status quo allied with oppressive forces within the Mexican community. A manifestation of youth discontent and the trauma of adolescence to some, the student movement expressed itself in a political generational revolt. It began as a vague protest of a deeper alienation-class and ethnic oppression-rather than of a transference from one environment, the barrio, to another, the university. It involved ethnicity and class. The first was more readily visible, but class was at the core. Among students there was occasionally a misunderstanding of the student situation, its limitations, and its role in a struggle for democratic rights on behalf of an oppressed nationality. Often, the student groups were underlaid with both socially constructive and self-defeating tendencies. The broad divisions were ideological but also ran along rationalist and antirationalist lines. A division existed between those who operated from a conscious political perspective and those who reacted spontaneously from an emotional/subjective position, which translated into circular activity projected onto a group and polernicized as politics. Witness the coinciding tendencies of romantic indigenismo, macho revolutionary, the bato loco syndrome, and hippie drugs as the cultural norms. Each was at best ridiculous and apolitical, and at worst viciously destructive. These disenfranchised and bourgeoisie opportunist tendencies tended to

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obscure, even hamper, the struggle of the progressives versus the accommodationists. Internal struggle characterized each stage of ideological advancement. Other dualities undergirded the student movement throughout, including altruism in opposition to pragmatism and idealist versus materialist tendencies. Ideologically, student politics reflected a mixture of tendencies, reformist beliefs, culturalism, and a rudimentary Marxism. As the student movement dealt with internal contradictions and negative tendencies, it faced threats from without. There were always some allied with conventional civic organizations or elements of the Democratic Party seeking to have influence. An articulated "Third World" tendency attempted to deny the Mexican national thrust and full development of the Chicana and Chicano student movement by subordinating it to black and Anglo movements. In fact, the issue was subordination to rather than cooperation with Asian, Native American, Anglo, or black groups, and it spoke to colonialist mindsets still current, though it did so in radical guise. These views were agitated by push outs or dropouts of black or white groups, especially when whites or others were asked to leave radical organizations. This tendency was defeated, as was the continuous attempt by the Socialist Workers Party's youth group, the Young Socialist Alliance, to establish hegemony. Repeatedly the Socialist Workers Party was a source of divisiveness, as at the 1969 Denver Conference and at San Diego State University in 1971. Other groups attempted to gain hegemony over the student movement, whether Trotskyist or Maoist. Mexican student groups also suffered attacks from the right. For example, at UCLA on May 18, 1968, the Mexican flag was desecrated by a fraternity, and at CSU Northridge, the MEChA (Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano de Aztlan) center was burned, by coincidence, on the night of May 5, 1970. And, finally, administrations and police pursued tactics to undermine the students. In spite of these internal and external pressures, the student movement continued. The high tides of student activism in the first phase from 1968 to 1970 were the blowouts, which occurred in many statesthe 1969 Santa Barbara statewide conference that developed a Chicano master plan for higher education, the 1969 Denver National Chicano Youth Conference, and the 1970 Antiwar Chicano Moratoriums. Significantly, the blowouts, student strikes, and walkouts in the public high schools demonstrated the discrimination against Mexican students within an educational system designed to perpetuate the subordinate status of the Mexican people. Historically, the public

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educational system was a mechanism of culcural aggression and national and class oppression against Mexicans in the United States. Given this relationship, students recognized this antagonism and, when it occurred, they became part of the historical struggle for education and cultural rights. In fact, Mexicanos had long recognized that their children received an unequal and inferior education and struggled through the courts and other channels to demand improvement. Granted the difficulty or impossibility of reform, given the structure and function of education in the United States, the process of protest intensified political development among youth. The blowouts, beginning with the massive 1968 Los Angeles walkout, marked a dramatic leap in the consciousness of Mexican students and the development of new organizational forms. They occurred throughout California and in other Mexican communities from 1968 through r97r. Organizers and leadershjp came from the college groups; the strikers were high school youth. The demands of the blowouts were reforms; nonetheless they reflected opposition to cultural and national oppression. Included among these were demands for classes in Mexican history, bilingual-bicultural education, ruring of Mexican teachers, and Mexican-community control of education. During and after the blowouts, which were public expressions covered by first amendment rights, arrests usually occurred; the best known was the case of the "L.A. 13," which was based on felony conspiracy indictments. The charges were, in fact, without judicial merit. Moreover, according to a law on the books since the nineteenth century, individuals who plan to arrest persons on false grounds are themselves engaging in unlawful conspiracy. Moreover, student arrests occurred at sit-ins of the Los Angeles Unified School District Board. In this and other cases, students directly felt the repression directed at them by several agencies. A major student movement response was directed at California Governor Ronald Reagan, who was responsible for cuts, attacks on admissions, and agitating against student activists. UMAS members confronted him directly and publically at the ueva Vistas Conference plenum, held at the Biltmore Hotel in downtown Los Angeles. Fourteen students, including Adelaida del Castillo, Reynaldo Macias, and Luis Arroyo interrupted and stopped Reagan from speaking, and he called his security staff to clear them out. They were arrested and charged with felonies. UMAS actions were overshadowed by other arrests at the Biltmore, which occurred after the student protests. Secondary educational reform efforts provided the students with an excellent issue of

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organizational and propaganda value, one which necessarily had to be waged through confrontation in the community and one which was clear and readily appreciated by the senior working members of the community. During and following secondary education reform efforts students raised other issues. In 1968, wider relations were being established with black and white groups and with Mexican students in Mexico. Student representatives participated in the Poor People's March, which evolved into a broad coalition, increasing their politica lization. During the summer, Los Angeles' student leaders and others proposed a united effort with blacks and white progressives against police brutality. During the fall of 1968, UCLA and California State at Los Angeles UMAS took active steps of solidarity with students in Mexico by picketing the Mexican Consulate and by other activity. In San Diego, students raised the issues of immigration and the draft. Later in 1971, San Diego MEChA students attempted to actively join the protest of students across the border in Tijuana. Though the stages were not mutually exclusive, from the emphasis on community organizing and agitation followed the emphasis on building campus programs. The first Chicano Studies programmatic demands were put forth in 1968-1969. In the arena of struggle in higher education and development, the resultant El Plan de Santa Barbara reflected a major attempt to consolidate past gains and prepare the ground for future ones. Suggestions for a Chicano conference on higher education primarily focused on student recruitment and were bundled by a core group into a concept emphasizing a power matrix for a total vision of Chicano Studies involving multiple sectors united in the vision of the university as a focus of power that Chicanas and Chicanos must struggle for and appropriate. These considerations resulted in a series of meetings during late 1968 and early 1969 that solidified an existing rudimentary statewide network and sought to systematize the lessons drawn from early efforts at program advocacies. The major ideological thrust of the Plan was to project a unified common philosophy, strategy, and curriculum for Chicano Studies programs. The organizing task envisioned coalescing local programs and student organizations into a force in California higher education, as a whole, and ultimately to encourage national organizing. The Chicano Coordinating Council on Higher Education (CCCHE), embracing students, faculty, and staff from the postsecondary institutions in California who \\•anted to join, formed to carry out these tasks. One hope wa for CCCHE to provide leverage beyond what could be forged

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in a single campus. For two years, the often frustrating attempt to make CCCHE work continued. However, a divorce occurred between the state colleges and the universities due to recognition of systemic differences between the two, including the problems of coordinating over twenty campuses with two separate state central offices as well as community and private colleges, and also due to the indifference of some campuses to continue interactive and mutual support activities. In 1971, the eight University of California (UC) campuses formed an exclusively UC coordinating body, ending for a time the goal of statewide mobilization across all campuses, an ideal cherished by the student movement. The emphasis on campus programs coincided with the most important general political movement event that took place in Denver in 1969. In the late 1960s Chicana and Chicano student organizing needs varied in higher education and were well exemplified by developments in New Mexico led by Hispanos. What was important here was always local politics, local social relations, local subregions, and even local neighborhoods. This context, rich in political history and also rich in its contextual realities, provided a unique landscape for movement activities. Nearly all political spaces were occupied, and these, for the most part, were occupied by Hispanos and/or affected an already existing Hispano interest. Youth activity was part of an already full scenario of organizing and activism. Youth participated in Alianza and subsequent community defense or service activities as they evolved, working alongside older persons. Nevertheless, youth initiated or animated actions in a multiethnic state with a Hispano plurality. At the University of ew Mexico (U M), students organized under one banner or another. For the most part, U iAS and MEChA mobilized in several ways for Alianza, for the UFW, and on behalf of antiwar actions. At U M, for years there had been small numbers of Spanish surname students, staff, and even a few faculty. In the late sixties, aided by a program titled College Enrichment, the number of Chicana- and Chicano-identified students increased, and there were at least five faculty members present in already established academic units, such as math, Spanish, and education. With the exception of the one in mathematics, these faculty in principle favored increased attention to recruiting Chicana and Chicano students and faculty, but not earmarked programs. They were not in favor of a Chicano Studies academic program or of aggressive militancy on behalf of campus Chicana and Chicano equities. They favored faculty like themselves placed in regularly

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established departmental units. Students and community members mobilized for a Chicano Studies program, successfully challenging directly the central administration. At this point, UNM looked more like other flagship campuses. The administration, which did not want Chicanos anywhere, ultimately responded after some hesitation, wrapping itself in the colors of liberal concern for ethnic equivalences. Administrators proposed the ever-favored, one-size-fits-all ethnic-program model. In the UNM case, UMAS was not to be undercut by some group going around its back and subordinating Chicano Studies. It quickly rejected the ethnic studies model and demanded Chicano Studies. As in other places, student militancy gained an ambiguously defined program, underfunded for its overarching intentions and weighted toward minimal student services. The "new" program had no permanent faculty or regular bona fide academic senate-recognized curriculum, though it did have a minor listed with uncoordinated classes, which was likely to be ignored by students. Frustrations were predictable, and class curriculum and focused research floundered. The "la Chicana" course went back and forth and there were only anemic Chicano efforts. The first director was mathematician Dr. Richard Griego, followed by Antonio Mondragon, a student services specialist, and eventually by a Chicano Studies person, Dr. Tobias Duran, but the curriculum had been linked to the American Studies program. The number of faculty in established departments such as anthropology, government, history, and sociology increased, and so did courses. Understandably, these faculty members preferred a research and public policy program. Thus, a Southwest Hispanic Research Institute emerged with funds for faculty research and some student stipends. The Chicano Studies academic program remained an attachment to a college, staffed through several departments. Concurrently, the campus, enrollment, and faculty grew. At New Mexico Highlands University at Las Vegas, New Mexico, developments differed somewhat from UNM, and its service area was 80 percent Hispano and its faculty was 97 percent white. In I969, a Spanish American Student Organization (SASO) put forth a campus governance agenda that called for student participation in campus decisions, the hiring of Hispano faculty, the naming of buildings on behalf of historic Hispano figures, and the preservation of culture and language. The mobilization began by leading a boycott on grapes and lettuce in solidarity with UFW, and later activists published a newspaper, El Ma chete. SASO formed working partnersh ips with black and Anglo students. Tak ing over the student senate, they called for an

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investigation of discrimination at Highlands and issued complaints on campus inadequacies vis-a-vis Hispanos, including lack of faculty and inadequate counseling. SASO soon had allies uncommon to student militants - the district attorney's office, electoral democrats, the American G.I. Forum, and some Republican Party members. When a legislative committee began to investigate the allegations of discrimination, the president of the campus resigned. As the presidential search ensued, Chicanos favored the most self-declared Chicano among the candidates, John Aragon. The university committee selected as future president what seemed to be his very opposite, Charles Graham from Wisconsin. The students occupied the administration building. The administration called the police, and the students called the district attorney. The district attorney filed charges of discrimination against the university regents and issued a restrain ing order against the regents and Graham. The lieutenant governor supported the students . In a novel move, Graham resigned the presidency before he had the position. Students seemingly had the initiative to not only build Chicano St udies but also to change the campus for the better. A new interim president appeared; concurrently the governor appointed five new regents, three of them favorable to the students, one of whom had been a behind-the-scenes ally. There was new funding and more faculty appointments and the first inaugural conference of the National Association of Chicano Social Sciences (later Chicana/o Studies) opened its sessions in spring of 1972. SASO changed its name to CASO (Chicano Associated Student Organization). Particularly active in these developments were the women students, for example Adelita Medina, associated with El Grito de Norte, and Sylvia Gutierrez, associated with the Alianza Federal. A new president took office- Francisco Angel, who at the end of the search process had the support of CASO. Angel strengthened the bilingual education curriculum, endorsed ethnic studies, promoted minority faculty appointments, and made it possible for the faculty to eventually be one-third Chicano. An activist director of Chicano Studies, Pedro Rodriguez, was named to head a Chicano Studies program. Emblematic of the new energy, not one but six murals were painted on campus. At a certain point the music changed and the director of Chicano Studies was denied tenure by a faculty committee; it proved to be a serious oversight to have hired him without it. The students mobilized, and this time they were arrested . Though they had lost some allies, the students nevertheless had community support to the extent of $soo,ooo

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in property bonds for their release. In 1973 in a town like Las Vegas, that was a serious amount of money. The regents agreed to consider student demands. Highlands was not to be another California State San Francisco. One result was that Juan Jose Pena, an activist, became the new head of Chicano Studies and pushed for program expansion. Next, President Angel retired and the long awaited "Chicano" John Aragon was named president. Almost within the year, Aragon acted as an anti-Chicano studies president, setting a precedent of sorts. This was startling to activists, as they witnessed student activism being denigrated. With CASO and La Raza Unida marginalized, Chicano Studies and ethnic studies dramatically lessened in campus endorsements and support. Now the strategy was for the placing of faculty in traditional departments, and finally the activist instructor, Professor Juan Jose Pena, was encouraged to leave and the six murals were defaced and then destroyed, not to be replaced. Ultimately, conservative faculty, now including Hispanos, dominated campus units, committees, and discourses. Aragon turned out to be more conservative than his three predecessors. As in the case of other campuses, changes had taken place, but also conservatives and moderates had regained ground. Highlands University was not that different from other campuses, and confrontation had become a movement hallmark for some.

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Youth Forward

he Ch icano Youth Liberation Conference held in Denver Colorado, in March 1969, was particularly significant in bring: ing together thousands of Mexican youths from all parts of the United States and in the development of a strong progressive ideological statement. A national youth conference having been discussed since 1967, the Denver conference signaled the break on a national level from the assimilationist "Mexican American" politics of the previous decades. While organizationally and ideologically framed, the Plan Espiritual de Aztldn issued by the conference provided the initial thrust for much of the subsequent ideological political development of movement activists. Following the Denver conference, antiwar activity quickened with campaigns to resist the draft and campaigns to protest the war directly. Mexican student draft resisters came forth in 1969: Lorenzo Martin Campbell, Fernando Chavez, Manuel Gomez, Rosalia Munoz, Jose Sanchez, and eventually others. Protest activity centered on these draft resisters and on the series of protest marches organized in different regions, local moratoriums, culminating in one major national protest in Los Angeles. The massive August 1970 Los Angeles moratorium march protesting the Vietnam War involved over twenty thousand. The mass protests following the march culminated the activity of Mexican youth in the United States during the 1960s and marked the first phase of the movement. It signaled a new international, potentially radical phase, and it also highlighted the inadequacy of previous styles of leadership, organization, and ideas because, in the aftermath of the police suppression, the movement was not able to respond politically beyond progressively smaller protests and participation in the inquest of the three killed during the August march .

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Departing from an approved motion at the Santa Barbara Conference in I969, most UMAS California student organizations between I969 and 1970 changed their name to Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano de Aztlan (MEChA). The new name signified the continuing commitment to confront society's inequities and the rejection of assimilation into the dominant society; commitments to be borne out through militant activities were conducted by students both on the campus and in the community. From within the student movement various feminists and Marxist currents began to emerge. Women's conferences were held at various campuses beginning at UCLA in the fall of 1969. Perhaps the strongest women's effort was at San Diego. Important in building consensus, enthusiasm, and visibility were the widespread symposiums, community days, Semanas de la Raza, or marches of solidarity (distinct from protest or confrontation). Notably, through educational initiatives and cultural activities Chicana women sought to be more inclusive and reach wider public audiences than those already belonging to organized groups. In fact, these activities were intended for the community adults and youth; all campuses had them. Of significant importance to women's student organizing were the February 1968 symposium at UCLA, the I968 California State Los Angeles Community Day, the I968 California State Long Beach Semana de la Raza, the 1969 Corazon de Aztlfo Conference at UCLA, the 1969 San Diego camp-out, the I969 San Diego Dia de las Madres March, the Santa Barbara and San Diego high school conferences in 1968, and the major and continuing demonstrations for what became Chicano Park in San Diego in I969. These events were among the first and had seminal impact on those that followed. Also important were Chicano commencements (graduation ceremonies); the first was at San Jose in 1968. These activities by necessity were chapter projects and strengthened cohesion among student constituencies. Some negative features were present by late 1968, when the student movement reached a peak and generated multiple activities. Nonetheless, forthright opportunism in higher-education circles was apparent as entrepreneurs of one sort or another appeared to reap advantages. Individuals were sometimes opportunistic in relation to programs, staff, and faculty, exhibiting irresponsible and exploitive attitudes. More serious problems resulted from irresponsible actions. Chicano Studies programs and the new national attention on bi lingu al projects, both of which the students bad spu rred through their militancy, meant program monies. A center of a somewhat disruptive, cooptive process

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occurred on one campus and served as the conduit for a strategy emanating from an office of the U.S. Department of Health, Education, and Welfare into the student movement and Chicano Studies programs. lt involved members of the student sector and members of the new faculty and staff sector. Similarly disruptive were the incidences of ultra militants seeking to provoke students into foolhardy actions and stances, which alienated students from the process of the Mexican community and put them into the hands of the police and rightist forces intent on destroying the student movement and its accomplishments. Equally destructive organizationally and depoliticalizing was the propagation of drugs among students by other students. Provocateurs and informants nmv present in the student ranks, as well as psychopaths and misfits of all sorts, closed in on student organizations. Rather than the disciplined commitments of a Cesar Chavez, it was the "bato loco" (w ild and crazy guy) that was upheld as a model; in effect, radicalized bohemian tendencies appeared rather than the youthful dedication apparent in the beginning. Further, crude attempts were made to split the student movement and individual campus organizations through demagoguery and the fomenting of antagonism . Rump groups emerged whose sole accomplishments and goals were to disrupt the existing organizations. The fomenting of local chauvinism, personal or organizational antagonism, and the attempts to splinter groups were always the trademark of those who were in fact hostile to a strong student movement and whose ideas or leadership, because of their political poverty, were unable to win over the students. Good sense counseled that if legitimacy and organizational viability were destroyed, so would be the student movement, and hence this would erase the positive steps made possible through the student movement. One frustration of the student movements stands out. Despite the many activities and national distribution of groups, no national structure developed, though there was talk of its need and a few tentative attempts. The CC students did not transcend regional bases and organize nationally until the 1980s. During 1968 the Mexican student movement in Southern California established major local areas of strength and by 1969 began to blend into the next major areas of student participation. The major places, as indicated, were Los Angeles, Santa Barbara, San Diego, and the Riverside-San Bernardino areas. Each of these places had a major center of activism, though in Los Angeles, because of its size, there were several. Strong student activism coincided with strong programs because these in turn helped to maintain activism. California State

Youth Forward

University at Northridge, California State University at Los Angeles, and UCLA stood as strong centers in Los Angeles. The MEChA chapter at the University of California at Santa Barbara, from late I968 through the early seventies, excelled at statewide coordination. In San Diego, the state university chapter was exceptionally strong from I968 to 1972, but the smaller MEChA chapter at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD), was consistent over a longer period of time and beginning in I968 was more active on a variety of community fronts. At UCSD, activists waged a persistent principled struggle with few equals. Both UCSB and UCSD faced difficult challenges to their program demands and, in response, organized strong protest efforts. In the San Bernardino-Riverside area, the student group at the University of California, Riverside (UCR), was consistently important. A new sector increasingly intervened in student politics after the summer of I968 and especially after 1969: the recently recruited Chicana and Chicano staff and faculty. CSU campuses after 1970 developed more extensive curriculum and their Equal Opportunity Program (EOP) staffers were usually attentive to the needs of Chicana and Chicano students. CSU orthridge eventually had the strongest department. Faculty increasingly figured in importance, though not all had been recruited. Be that as it may, this sector was, in many cases, a strong influence on student groups. As the student movement blended into Chicano Studies so did it blend into the antiwar effort, the protest against the Catholic Church (Catolicos Por La Raza, 1969- 1970), the quixotic efforts of La Marcha de la Reconquista (1971), the initial organizing of La Raza Unida Party (1969-1972), the San Diego Chicano Park mobilization (1970-1971), and the various teatro initiatives leading to TENAZ (1970-1973). Similarly, students were to be central to the rise of Marxist groups after the early 1970s. This blending meant that the profile of strictly student activism blurred, which was both a problem and a result of success . As 1971 ended, many MEChA chapters lessened their militant momentum; some membership assemblies became debating and social clubs rather than centers of agitational action. Some continued to be decidedly influenced by Marxist ideas. Complacency, nonetheless, pervaded many student organizations. Some of the reasons for this decline included: (1) a loss of organizational direction and purpose, ironically caused by an inability to develop viable goals after achieving initial success in increasing the numbers of Mexican students and establishing Chicano Studies programs; (2) the organ izational inability to deal with the increasing heterogeneous class makeup of Mexican students;

Chapter 14

(3) ideological cleavages; (4 ) increased institutional undermining of student political activity; a nd (5) stronger and more varied political organization in the community. The period of slowed momentum lasted from r97r through 1975. This decline was relative to the high tide, because activism continued strongly on some campuses, but the rate of participation, momentum, and negative factionalism worsened. Significantly, however, the student movement did not collapse, though some people thought it did simply because the groups ceased to participate or were no longer at the center of action. Eventually in the r98os numbers increased. Activity continued sporadically at different campuses, including California State University at Northridge, UC Santa Barbara, UC Los Angeles, and UC San Diego, as well as others. Significantly, there was only one statewide mobilization during these years and this was only partial, involving UC schools in a Thanksgiving fast and protest demonstration of three days in r97r at University Hall at Berkeley. This struggle gained some immediate objectives- putting pressure on the UC administration- but did not revive the student movement. An indication of the state of things was that this demonstration was for statewide program resources, and the Berkeley Chicano Studies effort, not yet a program, was in a very vulnerable state, yet t here was no participation from Berkeley. Ironically, many of the mobilizations that occurred were against internal opposition such as at UCLA, California State at Los Angeles, California State at Fresno, University of California at Santa Barbara, and San Diego State University; each of these, it will be recalled , were key campuses where there had been strong student chapters and a st rong commitment to programs. California State at Northridge and UC Riverside were among the few campuses to weather this storm of internal protest. Splits within many campus organizations occurred. Factionalism, a feature that had only been consistently common to Berkeley, now hit many campuses including one of the strongest, UC Santa Barbara. A particularly destructive split occurred at San Diego State University, the st rongest campus of the far south. Faculty, programs, and organizations nearly all went down in a flush of naive sectarianism. CSU San Diego, previously known for its vitality, recovered over a long period. Particularly notable during this period were the pointless intercampus rivalries and antagonisms. One easy generalization is that campus rivalry never helped the student movement, that it was as unnecessary as it was destructive to unified mobilization. Unfortunately, its fomentation was the easiest of demagogic tactics.

Youth Forward

What were starkly apparent in this transitional period were its positive features. People of commitment to the student movement were still active. In 1971, an effort was made to reorganize Los Angeles MEChA Central. While the Chicano Press Association, an association of movement newspapers (at one time over twenty) suffered nearly 90 percent casualties, the student press continued through El Popo, La Gente, Sal Si Puedes, and Voz Fronteriza. While other student groups disappeared to become footnotes in the social history of the sixties, the Mexican student movement continued. CCHE issued calls to meetings through 1971, but it lacked purpose and projects. The last major meeting took place in June 1971 at Deganawidah-Quetzalcoatl University, which also included discussions on Chicano moratorium discontinuance. Twenty-one workshops were held but no coordinated strategy resulted. More specifically positive was the activity on behalf of clear Mexican programmatic demands of the University of California Chicano Steering Committee (UCCSC) involving students, staff, and faculty in advocacy before a complacent and unresponsive university statewide bureaucracy. The UCCSC had a focus and an agenda. It maintained statewide coordination through able leadership not exclusively student, monthly meetings, a committee structure, and persistent advocacy. Further, it secured the 1975 UC Chicano Task Force Report, a documented public statement on the continuing discrimination against Mexicans in the University of California system. In a sense it was the last but nevertheless an important statewide organizing hurrah of the student movement of the sixties. However, there was a tendency to divorce educational issues from general political issues, which made for clear but delimited objectives but sacrificed the positive aspects drawn from wider participation. Given the time, though, the last is a moot point. In fact, the UC Chicano Steering Committee was a reaction to the negative trends and it endured because of its structure, as well as the ability and dedication of people willing to sacrifice to meet monthly across the state at a time when the euphoria was gone, which underlines its tenacity. Since its limited agenda could only be repeated, eventually this committee stagnated, but it contributed results and a heritage as well as a format to the next phase. As in each of the phases the roots of the next were in the earlier one, and again the process was not abrupt but dialectical and dynamic over time. The struggle between the Marxists and the accommodationists dated from the UCCSC 1974 meeting at Riverside. This struggle was to continue through 1977 and then become a struggle against an ultraleft and a vacuous liberalism. Between 19 75 and 1977, the student movement reaffirmed itself and

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gained some of its previous momentum. There were several contributing factors. Crisis was sharp again nationally as a result of the Watergate scandal and a general reactionary trend, which in particular affected the democratic gains of the sixties. Gaining acknowledgment among a few, then many, the notion surfaced among activists that U.S. institutions and its limited electoral democracy had reached their limits, that increasingly conservative government was a possibility, and that people must take a stand or share responsibility for a deteriorating democracy and exuberant empm.verment of the elite. Socialism received greater serious consideration. Internationally the declining fortunes of the capitalist countries were more apparent and translated into economic dislocations. Vietnam was a lesson in tenacity. Rene\ved struggles for liberation occurred particularly in Africa, and socialism strengthened generally. The worsening conditions in Mexico engendered renewed mass discontent and ties across the border between the Mexican communities. Within the student movement, the desire for renewed momentum was so evident that it motivated persons to specifica lly reverse the negatives. Campaigns were waged against drugs and the persecution of the undocumented worker. The issue of the undocumented workers stimulated consciousness and organization, similar to the extent that the farm workers' issues and other general class-nationality issues had motivated the students in the sixties. Mexica n student groups had previously supported worker causes; from the beginning they supported the farm workers and several other pro-worker efforts. However, in the midseventies there was a strategy to link the students with labor as an outgrowth of the consciousness developed through the undocumented worker issue. Marxism was now consciously and actively being propagated by able spokespersons from inside and from outside the student movement. These aspects coincided with the lessening of accommodation by the university and direct cuts in the programmatic and admission gains of the sixties. Now the students had to struggle to defend what earlier they had struggled to achieve. At the same time it was recognized that internal reform in student organizations was imperative, as the existing leadership was ba n krupt and program staff was inept or blatantly accommodationist or both. The limits of reform apparently were being leaped. In this "toma de conciencia" (critical self-evaluation) by student movement reformists, progressives, both left and right, were sorted out analytically. These conditions engendered actions integral to them, but there had

Youth Forward

to be actors. These were both students, the leading element in the process of revitalization and, as earlier, nonstudents. The thrust came from several ideological political organizations that propagated Marxism, but one in particular, Centro de Acci6n Social Aut6noma-Hermandad General de Trabajadores (CASA-HGT ), actively pursued the revitalization of the Mexican student movement per se in the several places it had chapters. A revitalization effort also came from the Comite Estudiantil de! Pueblo (CEP), led by Nativo Lopez (California State University Dominquez Hills, CSUDH), which was made up of students who were eventually associated with Centro de Acci6n Social Aut6nomaHermandad General de Trabajadores and to a lesser extent the Alianza Por Unidad Obrera y Estudiantil. Indeed CEP made significant attempts to revitalize the Southern California student movement through the actions of its members on particular campuses and in general regional gatherings. CEP called a statewide forum on the undocumented worker-in effect a statewide conference- on February 22 and 23, 1975, the first in over three years to carry out this purpose. Its effects, though not readily seen, were felt in the long run. At first what was visible ·was bewilderment by the less experienced students as national liberation was discussed and work urged on behalf of political prisoners and the undocumented. In the case of students, as with the movement in general, the undocumented worker and all the ethnic and class implications that followed from it galvanized activity and consciousness. Simultaneously students on their own sought to revitalize campus organizations and, as in earlier times, indispensable for a "movement," sought the revitalization of state coordination, statewide unity, and mobilization. Many campuses such as the University of California at San Diego, University of California at Santa Barbara, UCLA, California State at Los Angeles, and California State at Northridge went through a process of self-criticism and reorganization. Study groups formed at different campuses and a more rigorous ideology was introduced. Obviously there had been an ideology before, whether persons were conscious of it or not, but now the emphasis was on a scientific approach and on the explicit ideology of historical materialism with the goal of socialism. In May of 1976 the important effort to rebuild the Los Angeles MEChA Central led to its first meeting in over two years. For the general revitalization, the fortuitous alliance of three campuses-UCSB, UCLA, and UCSD-was key to the future. First, the right opposition had to be cleared before the stagnant UCCSC , the only functioning statewide body, could serve again as a political arm of the

Chapter 14

student movement. Seco11d, a unity of basic principles had to be hammered out. Both were done despite stiff opposition that threatened the possibility of any kind of future. What was needed was a focus and a common agenda for action. At this time, the revitalizing process was strengthened by the issue of the Bakke decision, a California Supreme Court decision that declared unconstitutional the special admission of minorities. This issue galvanized the students as no other campus issue had done since the program issues of the sixties. The Bakke case, threatening to drastically curtail the admission of Mexican students into the colleges and universities, provided the specific agenda for mobilization. The anti-Bakke mobilization was initiated in ovember of 1976, in accordance with an invitation extended by the UCCSC. A spectrum of California State campuses, community colleges, and University of California campuses met together for the first time in many years. The group named itself La Raza Statewide Student Coalition and agreed to principles of unity and adopted a broad plan of action. Similarly, a national women's conference, Nlujeres Unidas, was called in March 1977 at East Los Angeles College, which also contributed to the mobilizations of 1976 and 1977· As this happened, opposition surfaced not from the right but from the extreme left, one which in a more advanced form suggested commonalities with the opposition and subversion faced by the student movement from marginal and Trotskyite elements in the past. However, this opposition was different in ideological content. It advanced an intellectually questionable ultra leftism and at each step proceeded with deception, dissension, and disruption, usually through crude intimidation and dogmatism. In practice, this un ited with the divisive tactics of the Socialist Workers Party (SWP), which once again, as before, tried to divide individuals. Despite the new frustrations, confusions, and disappointments, the Southern California student movement, with the historical issues of education, labor, and self-determination, was on the rise. However, it took six statewide meetings to deal with the question of speakers, routes, posters, fliers, and participation commitments and to finalize a statewide demonstration. In the process the student movement was rent with division and the Bakke mobilization was sidetracked by a minority. These problems stemmed partially from the loss of the tactical heritage of wide student mobilization of years past and the inability to mediate between reformism per se and ultra leftism. Nonetheless,

Youth Forward

demonstrations against the Bakke dec ision occurred throughout California with Mexican students in the forefront and in the majority, culminating in a demonstration of two thousand at La Prnza in central Los Angeles on May 7, 1977· Many students had united, but it was on a tenuous basis. Beset by resource limitations and by a persisting political liberalism, students had difficu lty in taking a stand and more difficulty in implementing stands even when faced with opposition that was clearly destructive to the student movement and its ideas. On the same day as the demonstration, May 7, at Ontario, California, movement elements from California, New Mexico, and Texas met to map a national movement mobilization on immigration, education, and labor issues. Previous to the demonstration, plans were discussed for a national student mobilization against the Bakke issue in the fall; however, there were again divisions fomented by the ultra left, but plans were agreed upon for demonstrations in October. Also there was once again discussion of a national student conference . Negative aspects aside, the efforts at revitalization and the Bakke issue, as envisioned, had mobilized the student movement for at least a year. The Mexican people, in solidarity with other forces, continued the struggle for democratic rights. The question was whether the student movement, modest in scope and participation in comparison to the late sixties, was on firmer ground . Confrontation politics, negotiating relations, and cultural assertions engaged by youth characterized the emergence of the Chicana and Chicano student movement at many campuses. This phenomenon spread across California, Texas, New .V1exico, Arizona, and the Midwest. In many areas some type or form of youth activity, precursory to later, more defined organization, occurred through the early and midsixties. Predominantly from working class families, Chicana and Chicano students organized in many colleges and universit ies from California, New Mexico, Arizona, Texas, and eventually the Midwest, to the orthwest and the East, including Rhode Island at Brown University. Usually, at first, there were relatively few in membership numbers on each campus. Organized groups such as the United Mexican American Students (1967), the Mexican American Student Confederation (1968), the Mexican American Student Organization (1967}, the Mexican American Youth Organization (1967), and others flourished ben:veen 1967 and 19 77· In the existing literature, these groups were often only identified as willing to sponsor cultural activities and as struggling to increase educational

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opportunities for Mexican people. Only a few worked to establish academic programs for the study of the Mexican experience. Actually, CCM student group impacts extended beyond college programs or educatio11 issues because of their strong initial participation in community affairs. However, they are also, too often, conflated with community groups of which they were only momentarily aligned. Student activism had a wide impact on many activities, including community politics, where they challenged the older leadership and political practices effectively. Student groups varied widely in cohesion and militancy. Some at certain campuses stand our in particular for their activism over a decade or much longer. Nearly all share an adamant commitment to progressive politics and to their own organizational independence. Ideologically, prior to 1970, Mexicana and Mexicano student politics exhibited a mixture of contradictory tendencies: a combination of liberal civil-rights beliefs, cultural nationalism, feminism, and a rudimentary Marxism. A "Third World" tendency was based in the northern California Bay area with some SWP influence, that is, multicultural advocacy and organizing under black and Asian leaderships attempted to deny the Mexican American national thrust and the full development of the Chicana and Chicano student movement by subordinating it to other minority and white radical movements, with the Chicanos as subcolonials. This was perceived by Chicanas and Chicanos as antiethical to the student movement and the CCM itself. The issue presented under cover of "Third World" solidarity was read by Chicano activists as subordination to Asian, Indian, or black groups- not rejection of cooperation with them. The Socialist Workers Party's Young Socialist Alliance (YSA) also sought to establish hegemony among Chicano student organizations and to distribute their material. Repeatedly, the student organizations have had to defend their organizational autonomy. Heeding the call issued at the Plan de Santa Barbara, beginning in 1969, many student organizations changed their name to El Movirniento Estudiantil Chicano de Aztlan (MEChA) and emphasized campus programs. The new name signified the commitment to confront social inequities and to reject assimilation into the dominant society, a commitment to be fulfilled though student militant activities both on campus and in the community. Importantly, from within the student movement various feminist currents emerged because student organizations fostered critical dialogue, which opened the space for feminist critiques. By the late 1970s, however, the militant stance of many

Youth Forward

MEChA chapters had transformed into program focus, and membership responsibility became little more than what was the norm within college social clubs. A few chapters continued the tradition of militant activism while becoming influenced by Marxist ideas or by the activities of more ideological and community-based organizations. Though periods of stagnation and disorganization occurred, the student movement also moved forward, continuing to evolve while other efforts dissipated. At its most militant, the work of student activists had been seminal in its influence on much late activity as well as generously courageous in its militancy; at its worst, it has been anarchic and self-indulgent, given to rhetoric, organizational inconsistency, and sexism. The high tides of student activism were expressed in protest mobilizations and major conferences. Foremost among these are the 1968 school strikes; the blowouts that occurred in many states and later the Winter Garden Project (1969) and the Crystal City walkouts of December 1969; the 1969 Santa Barbara conference, which developed a "Chicano" Plan for Higher Education; the 1969 Denver National Chicano Youth Conference, which issued the Plan de Aztlfo; the University of New Mexico, University of Arizona, and Texas A&M campus actions of 1968-1970; and the 1970 Chicano Moratorium, which entailed direct mass resistance in Los Angeles. Long-term student involvement supported activity on behalf of La Raza Unida Party (1970-1974) and the protests against the Bakke case in 1976- 1977. Student advocacy for the rights of undocumented workers continued in the early, mid, and late seventies. Eventually students engineered successful attempts at state and even national assemblies. Much youth activity focused, of course, on the institutions most immediate to them: schools and universities. In Texas, Chicano student political stirrings occurred during the early 1960s and flowed into the larger waves of the late 1960s. Particularly salient during the early 1960s were those from Laredo, Texas, to Corpus Christi, Texas, including community colleges such as Del Mar Junior College, the locus of a group called the "Mexican American Student Group." There were also politicizing circles at Texas Southmost College. During the succeeding years, student participation stemmed from consequences of electoral campaigns during several contests involving Mexican American candidacies, even as early as the 1958 electoral try of Henry Gonzalez to as late as the 1968 campaign of Gonzalo Barrientos. Student political awareness and organizational incentives drew from the calls and

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activities of farm worker organizers and their associated calls, petitions, pitches, and marches. Later, progressive developments involving labor rights superseded the importance of regular party elections and Texas farm worker organizing. For example, in the dramatic Humboldt Oil Refinery Company campaign (1967), students fought against the company's discriminatory practices and supported the Economy Furniture Company strike (1969); students also publicized workers' grievances in Houston, Austin, and San Antonio areas. Three major campuses, plus one modest-sized campus, emerged as seminal sites for Chicano student action in Texas during the mid to late 1960s: University of Texas at Austin, Texas A&M University at Kingsville, University of Houston, and St. Mary's College at San Antonio. The developments of the electoral party Partido de la Raza Unida in 1969- 1970 have been narrated often as have been the unprecedented and historic South Texas High student walkouts of 1968- 1969. Indeed, high school protests, electoral politics, and campus advocacies were central. At all of these campuses specific individuals formed Chicana and Chicano student pro-movement organizations, beginning in the mid196os with the University of Texas at Austin. A lead group was the Mexican American Student Association that evolved in 1966 from a group known as the Laredo Club (1964-1965). Later, the designation became Mexican American Yo uth. Individuals leading these efforts, among others, were Jose Limon and Alex Moreno . These organizers called for an initial organizing meeting and nearly one hundred students showed up. Key offices were established as were basic committees for education, farm workers, and o ther cultural, social, and political committees. Jose Limon was the founding chair. By 1970, women held the chair and the group was composed primarily of women. In a resolute fashion, if there were gender contestations, the question was solved by the women asserting themselves in the group. Austin was exceptional in that a senior highly respected academic, Americo Paredes, was among the faculty through the 1960s and 1970s. In 1971, he and Jose Limon organized a major Texas conference on Chicano Studies, which impacted several campuses. Dating from the Political Association of Spanish-Speaking Organizations' (PASSO) related activities in 1965- 1966 at Texas A&M, Chicana and Chicano students from 1967 and for the following years influenced electoral contests involving the evolution of La Raza Unida Party. Initiators included Carlos Guerra, Efrain Fernandez, Jesus

Youth Forward

Ramirez, Alberto Guerra, Guadalupe Youngblood, and others. Actually, individuals not regularly enrolled at the campus influenced student politics. Activists reached out to organizers in Washington, D.C., Colorado, and other parts of Texas and had a vigorous arts branch with noted young artists such as Carmen Lomas Garza and Amado Pena Murillo, and an active teatro as well as other performance arms. As the Santa Barbara conference took place in California in April I969, Texas MAYO women and male members presented a uniquely comprehensive set of Chicano Studies demands directly to the campus president: budget line-item status for programs, a department or center, and Chicano Studies courses as part of the regular catalogue curriculum. Also included were requests for work-study slots for students, employment desks for students and alumnae, and administrative positions, including one for an academic director. Matters did not go smoothly, but the MAYO members did name energetic provisional staff such as Victor Nelson Cisneros, Emilio Zamora, and others. For several years the dominant influence among students remained electoral politics. These too were important at the University of Houston. A major leading figure was Tacho Mendiola. At Houston, though electoral politics and immigration rights advocacy were salient, a steady strong emphasis underscored academic services, campus priorities, and gains in relation to these. Student numbers increased along with greater support for students, and eventually a relatively solid Chicano Studies program consolidated with strong public-policy interests. Chicana and Chicano students at Yale University succeeded in establishing a student-movement base that impacted their important home campuses as well as influencing several other important eastern seaboard universities. The impact began by presence, followed by increased representation, campus programmatic concessions, and steady interactions with other campuses, all of this during some five years of steady work by students beginning in the academic year 1969-1970. Key student motivators were Luis Aragon and Alberto Alvarado. The first hailed from Calexico High School (Southern California), the other from Salisian High School (East Los Angeles, California). Aragon worked in the east Los Angeles 1966 voter registration drive involving college or ex-college activists who later figured in the Santa Barbara conference, and Alvarado worked with UMAS, and later MEChA central, and participated in the Los Angeles Board of Education, where he targeted pro-Chicana and Chicano activ ities.

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At Yale in 1969, the Chicano group was comprised of two seniors, two sophomores, and several freshmen. They called their group " Los Hermanos." While changing the name to UMAS and then MEChA, they initiated advocacy efforrs to increase Chicano representation by securing support and recruitment slot possibilities. They identified seventy applicants and secured twenty-two offers, sixteen of whom were accepted for the 1970-1971 academic year. This effort increased the Chicana and Chicano population to a total of approximately thirty or more. MEChA now constituted a modest visible force on campus. They actually organized more effectively than either Puerto Ricans or blacks, who were more numerous . In fact, there were now to be distinctions between those who were Chicano conscious but moderates and those who were Chicano conscious and militant and who called for more militancy and activism. Commendably, the group discussed the responsibility of students situated as they were to further Chicano visibility on this campus, but to include in their horizons Washington, D.C., the political capital, and New York, the economic capital. A step toward greater visibility consisted of a speakers' forum for several years, which, as it proceeded, included fairly diverse speakers, such as Cesar Chavez, Graciela Olivarez, Bert Corona, Reies Lopez Tijerina, Alicia Sandoval, Esther Flores La Plann, Hank Lopez, and several others. There were several intramural projects. An initial one was with Puerto Ricans, at this time probably a precedent in an actual collaboration effort of two Latino groups, in contrast to simply concurrent rhetorical appeals. The objective was a joint work-study program primarily developed and secured by the Chicanos. The upshot was that, when the program was funded, Puerto Ricans argued , it should be theirs exclusively. Chicanos were more successful with a College Information Fair and with eight to ten positions during the summer. In fact, later, two students from Yale participated in the East Los Angeles incorporation study project preparatory to the important cityhood organizing effort. Keeping up the recruitment advocacy through their actions and those of others, the number of Chicanos at Yale reached ninety. Off campus target projects were several. As at many campuses, labor issues received attention with some degree of success. MEChA initiated their own campaign on behalf of UFW activities in the surrounding area. These were attractive to the UFW and appreciated for obvious reasons. On campus, MEChA secured a UFW lettuce-only pledge from the university and, as at some other campuses, the administration at

Youth Forward

first agreed but then broke the pledge without consu lting or even informing the students. The students responded. They worked with the VFW and secured 2,400 signatures and arranged for VFW speakers to come, including Cesar Chavez, and the university ultimately reinstated the VFW lettuce agreement. MEChA also actively worked on behalf of the Farah workers' strike, getting campus student and staff support as well as, importantly, conducting a store picket far from the Farah factories but effective enough that it was noticed by Farah executives. Yale students were also among those who campaigned for the release of the too-often overlooked and incarcerated community hero, Ricardo Chavez Ortiz. As 1976-1977 approached, Chicana and Chicano students at Yale could point to significant gains during previous years. One clear achievement was their increasingly felt presence at Yale and their contributions to activities at other campuses. They also found that, up to a point, given their backgrounds, most at this time were from working families . They represented a range of views found generally in Mexican American communities. They also concluded that matters did not settle by themselves. They asked out loud if the CCM was beyond the simpler or easier issues, but education issues continued to be a high priority.

CHAPTER 15

Schoolhouses

n the 1960s, :rvlexican parents and students demonstrated dissatisfaction with an educational system believed to perpetuate the subordinate status of t he Mexican people. 1 Because parents for generations had repeatedly sought positive responses from schools and school boards, the prevailing indifference during the six ties by school officials was striking. Historically, the public educational system provided one more means of practicing cultural and ethnic subordination of Mexicans in the United States. Mexican American families and groups critiqued, with few positive results, educational inequities and school malpractices from the nineteenth through the twentieth centuries. Nevertheless, some favorable court case rulings occurred on behalf of Mexican Americans. In fact, these cases served as precedents for the widely recognized Brown v. Board of Education (1954) case, wh ich ostensibly ended black/white segregation. It did not. Actually, segregation continued for years. Furthermore, the Brown court did not address inequalities of funding, teaching, or access to materials or, for that matter, integration. Mexican American concerns went beyond integrated student attendance at schools, which in practice meant busing black or brown students to white schools. When Mexican American efforts succeeded it was not because of Brown v. Board, but in spite of it. The Brown decision made one difference: the public came to think of education reform as black focused, stressing busing and later black admin istrators. In any case, Chicana and Chicano youth activists identified what needed to be changed : the culture and institutionalization of education. Transformation of educational structures would not result from busing and not for a long time. Multi-operative critiques characterized Mexican American educational thrusts. Mexican Americans critiqued the sociological,

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psychological, and cultural impacts on Mexican American children stemming from a biased educational system. Funding practices shortchanged schools attended by Mexican Americans. Moreover, poor teaching attitudes and practices of white teachers and the biased materials inculcated white superiority views that degraded the experience of Mexican Americans in public schools and added insult to injury. Critiques demonstrated that to "convert" Mexican Americans from their own family cultural values to some alleged mainstream model produced negative educational results. Eventually, efforts led to greater sensitivity in the development of textbook materials for all minorities. In the early and mid-196os, only a few Mexican American academics were available to participate in public education reform efforts. Their fewness was itself a result of the state of Mexican American education. The Mexican American advocates for bilingual-bicultural education in the public schools facilitated the possibilities of multicultural reforms. They built on pioneering scholarly works dating from the Late 1920s to the mid-196os of a cadre of PhDs-George Sanchez, H. T. Manuel, and Thomas Carter-and the reform advocacy of Ernesto Galarza. As precursors to educational reform, these individuals were seminally important. In policy matters, bilingual education was seen as harmless because of its intended innocuousness, language sensitivity, and outreach. The Lyndon B. Johnson administration favored bilingual education programs as part of the integration of Mexican American communities into U.S. society. According to Johnson, all Mexican American children needed educationally was exposure to English in a classroom setting. Actually, U.S. Senator Ralph Yarborough supported the bilingual education legislation and Lupe Anguiano of the U.S . Department of Health, Education, and Welfare (HEW) did the lobbying. The bill was introduced in 1967 and passed in 1968. Presumably, politicians intended for this national bill to benefit Mexican Americans, yet it was barely funded and was primarily supported by the Hearst Foundation. After the 1972 elections, the backlash accelerated against bilingual education. For a few years the real success of bilingual education was a group of staffers in Washington, D.C., who now had a base in the Beltway and took credit for any advance in education outreach while concentrating on promoting their careers. Wide-ranging and significant loca lly based advocacy by individuals, ideas, and events contributed to securing educational equities and better educational opportunities for the Mexican American community. Given these uneven but important realities and relationships, it was virtually inevitable that many contemporary

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Mexican students of the sixties would declare their antagonism to school administrations. Mass civil-rights activities by Mexican American students at the high school and college levels made education accessible to students and others. The threshold Chicana and Chicano programmatic advancements entailed the causes and achievements of the high school student "walkouts," such as those in Crystal City, Texas; Denver, Colorado; and East Los Angeles, California, which stressed equality and quality for Mexican American youth. Alternative schools, such as La Escuela Tlatelolco of Denver, Colorado, and La Academica de La Nueva Raza in Dixon, New Mexico, helped promote the in-depth benefits of bilingual-bicultural and academically relevant education programs for community children. Student strikes, walkouts in the public schools, blowouts, and protest demonstrations reflected a growing criticism directed at schools and educators by Mexican Americans. Students were the change makers, and they began with themselves. The blowouts or high school student protests occurred across Mexican communities, particularly in regions of south Texas and Southern California as well as in northern New Mexico, and in cities such as Chicago, Denver, Phoenix, and others. High school students themselves were the primary motivators, agitators, and organizers; these protests could not happen simply through adult advocacy and certainly not by manipulation. The outstanding adult figure of the Los Angeles Blowouts-the admirable teacher Sal Castro-would repeatedly say as much. These student actions remained the standard for massive, peaceful, successful urban advocacy by Chicanas and Chicanos. Students electrified the community, while Sal Castro exemplified a model for self-sacrificing yet articulate undeviating leadership on behalf of altruistic ideals for an entire generation. In several states, massive walkouts involving thousands marked a dramatic leap in the consciousness of Mexican students and the development of new organizational forms through which these youths made history. The blowouts and other youth organizing reflected contextually the opposition to cultural and ethnic oppression. Students demanded classes in Mexican history, bilingual and bicultural education, the hiring of Mexican teachers and counselors, and Mexican community input and control. In the initial stages, what was striking was that the youth, rather than professionals, were the major instigators leading these educational-reform mobilizations. To be sure, a few professionals involved themselves as supporters here and there.

Schoolhouses

Walkouts accomplished a very public underscoring of the failures of schools, school boards, and personnel vis-a-vis Jv[exican Americans. The youth waged protests, the only means available to them, to publicize school inequities; in doing this they learned and matured as young persons and citizens. School protests invariably called attention to the lack of Mexican Americans on staff. Protests preceded an upward trend in the hiring of Mexican Americans in school districts. Changes in teaching styles and curriculum materials and proactive parental involvement occurred more slowly. For years high school principals nearly ignored Mexican American access to colleges, thus recruitment of highschool students into colleges was actually and tellingly a result of postsecondary institutions. Changing the professional culture of K-I2 would take decades; high-school student dissidents soon graduated or otherwise left the campus. For those committed to equities in education in the midst of an increasingly militant rhetoric, activists placed emphasis on educational reforms in three K-12 areas: administrative reforms, counseling services, and the promulgation of a bilingua l-bicultural curriculum. Subsequently, K-I2 activists raised the issues of access for student, faculty, and staff in higher education. Often, this work involved long-term community representatives working through committees, whose recognition came by way of school boards or superintendents due to public pressure. One example would be the Los Angeles Unified School District's (LAUSD) Mexican American Education Commission (MAEC) that persisted for years after I968. In time, young adult participants of the I968 walkouts would work in continuous ways to improve education in these communities. In total, schooling reform agendas constituted a constellation of efforts aimed at a major issue, namely, quality education for Mexican American youth. The educational thrust scored some successes, but also involved some failures as the state of education in the seventies and eighties would attest. More important perhaps was the fact that the prioritizing of educational quality and educational achievement as a means for personal and group enrichment and social progress remained pervasive commitments for the following decades. The insistence on quality, equitable, and effective education was a legacy of the CCM, and one further concretized in some Chica no Studies programs.

CHAP TE R 16

Studies Evolve

n the late 1960s, higher education became an unprecedented area of struggle for Mexican Americans; it became a matter of strategic importance because its structure was readily accessible to organized efforts. The entry of Mexican American students into college and universities in numbers beyond a handful characterized an innovative process of the sixties. Many student activists believed that success in higher education influenced personal and group progress. The institutionalization of a Mexican American site in postsecondary education signaled one clear accomplishment of Chicano higher education activists and one whose trajectory continued for years. In the process of struggle for higher education for Mexican students and the development of Chicana and Chicano Studies programs, two events stand out due to their significance and impact: the 1969 Santa Barbara conference and the 1969 Plan de Santa Barbara.' The 1969 Santa Barbara conference formed a precedent by being an all- Chicana and Chicano organized and directed conference focused on higher education. The Plan de Santa Barbara, a significant ideological statement, reflected a major attempt to provide conceptual cohesion, to develop common guidelines, and to consolidate past gains and prepare the ground for future ones in higher education. Preceded by six months of planning and followed by a year of meetings, the conference and the plan, led by a steering committee, involved selected participants from participating campuses . The major thrusts of the plan included stimulating the growth and operation of Chicana and Chicano Studies programs along movement premises, coordinating politically and organizationally local campus programs in statewide efforts, and furthering a particular vision of education- one with a particular purpose. Unprecedented, the plan provided for a cohort fra mework for a

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culturally and community-centered higher education program at a campus. In a conference lasting several days at Santa Barbara, California, in 1969, faculty, students, staff, and community representatives formulated the initial seminal statement on Chicano Studies, the Plan de Santa Barbara. The organizers of the conference included Jesus Chavarria, Armando Valdez, Juan Gomez, Rene Nuiiez, Jesus Leyba, and Paul Sanchez. The plan, assembled from general propositions, involved contributions by all, who actually attended workshops and then quickly synthesized the results into workshop summaries with prioritized points. Subsequently, editors organized the plan according to assigned issues or focus areas and at first revised it in general editorial sessions. Juan Gomez and Armando Valdez completed the final editing, correcting, and additions and selected the art, typography, and cover. Ruth Robinson of La Raza Publications finalized the copy set. The statement of a Chicano philosophy of education was inclusive and progressive, a unique concept beyond the usual statement limiting university concerns to a selected few. Thus, the plan's primary importance was its concern with, and focus on, the Chicano community: The goal for Chicano Studies is to pmvide a coherent and socially relevant education, humanistic and pragmatic which prepares Chicanos for service to the Chicano community and enriches the total society. Students will be prepared to work and live for the purpose of realizing political, social, and economic change. 1 The concept of self-determination and self-definition undergirded parts of the philosophical ensemble of the plan: Chicanas and Chicanos, as people, must lead themselves and direct their own destinies. This was crucial. Anything less would support and reta in the present oppression and manipulation of Chicano communities, socially, economically, and politically, by the dominant Anglo society. This was not to say that Chicano Studies programs and courses were closed to non-Chicano students; Chicano Studies participants would work with well-intentioned colleagues. They were to be open to all, but the direction, content, and control would remain with Chicanas and Chicanos. In this spirit of self-help, of "by Chicanos and for Chicanos," many Chicano Studies departments, cultural centers, colleges, and institutes formed across the country over the years. By 1969, as a set of institutional units within a college or a university,

Chapter 16

Chicano Studies represented a tentative overall conceptualization of the Chicano community's aspirations as they involved higher education. They were defined as including: r. The recruitment, adm ission, and counseling of Chicano students 2.

3. 4. 5.

6. 7.

The recruitment and hiring of Chicano faculty, administrators, and staff The formal study of Chicano culture and history in all of its unity and diversity in terms of recognizable cultural categories Support programs for Chicano students Chicano research programs Chicano publications programs Cultural and social action programs in and for the Ch icano community3

The objective programmatic contents of the plan are set upon certain philosophical preludes. The institutionalization of Chicano Studies within the college or university, by creating parallel academic units (departments, centers, and institutes), meant the freedom and latitude to carry on the above objectives. A Chicano Studies effort would also include sensitizing the college or university members to the Mexican American community. This required challenging racism against Chicanas and Chicanos within institutions of higher education. Impacting the university involved changing those parts of the college/ university (for example, teacher-training programs) that impacted the overall Mexican American community as well. Eventually, programs established at many campuses represented a gain; but these programs developed according to the rules of the university game. Nevertheless, as initially envisioned, campus actions continued concurrent with community actions . As the Santa Barbara conference inquiries showed, Chicano Studies played different roles: teaching, recruitment, social services, consciousness raising, counseling, materials dissemination, and research. Coexisting with these curricular and program efforts was a tendency on the part of administrators to curb and restrict or modify these programs. Eventually, in the mid197os, there were perhaps one hundred programs; more than six hundred Spanish-surname faculty in colleges, not all associated with Chicano Studies; and 150,000 or more Spanish-surname students, not all participating in Chicano Studies programs. These incremental achievements and contradictions integral to

Studies Evolve

unprecedented mobilization of the Mexican American raised the issues of community rights and equities in higher education particularly and the public support of institutions. Due to its impetus and formative beginnings, Chicano Studies was academically innovative and \Vas not initially integrated into an exclusively elite-serving sphere. This resulted in it being the target of those covert anti-Mexicanists who attempted to deny Chicana and Chicano equities. As there was institutional discrimination against Chicanas and Chicanos, it followed that so long as a community-oriented ethos influenced Chicano Studies, it would be unwanted by many in higher education. Initially Chicano Studies programs demonstrated radical strains by definition: by the subject area and guiding ethos, they challenged what heretofore had been the norm of exclusion and denigration and, in this process, they were creative. Specific campus Chicanas and Chicanos took responsibility for the implementation of Chicano Studies and an equally great promise for the Mexican American community. The early years of Chicano Studies, the late sixties through the late seventies, had a character distinct from the realities of the late eighties and the nineties in that the late sixties and early seventies were program-building years, and the later years were ones of transition and adjustment on many campuses. Students called urgent attention to securing financial resources, campus or academic recognition, and faculty lines. Later, simply demanding larger programs proved to be a devil's bargain in some cases. Epistemological validity for Chicano Studies as argued by activists entailed self-knowledge, community knowledge, and knowledge for bringing about social change. This interactive set of objectives was argued in 1969 and argued again in 1979· For someone to alter this pedagogical interrelationship meant vitiating the ethical justification for initiating Chicano Studies. When individuals neutralized this interactive set in curriculum and programs as it happened, Chicano Studies indeed duplicated other academic endeavors consistent with traditional university practices. Critical Chicano Studies embodied resistance at the university level to the historical condition of exploitation, racism, marginality, and cultural genocide. The range of reactionary objections to the ethos of Chicana and Chicano Studies included accusations of a lack of professionalism, integration, and certification as well as allegations of reverse racism. A commonplace "defense" to cover up the earlier lack of participation or careerist self-interest was to charge that the statements of the Plan de Santa Barbara were "vague" or "romantic." They were as clear and concrete as policy statements were and as

Chapter 16

pragmatic as called for by the reality of the time . The fact was that some individuals were not comfortable with the statements, which represented a reproach to their usual practices. As years passed, the implementation of objectives continuously demanded incremental complexity. When authentic to the historical conditions and the contemporary state of the Mexican American community, Chicana and Chicano Studies, indeed, mirrored a call to action on campuses for a decade. One of the earliest calls was for greater numbers of Chicanas at all levels. Chicana feminists ' criticisms of male-centered discourse foretold the development of dynamic Chicana-centered activities and Chicana Studies. Chicanas demanded a greater inclusion of courses centered on women's experiences . Moreover, they advocated for greater coverage of women-centered subjects in the existing courses. Following the innovation of programs and with significantly increasing Mexican American student numbers, the numbers of faculty and staff increased in higher education. 4 Programs related to Chicano student needs and demands led to initial and significant entries. As Chicana and Chicano Studies unfolded, some organizers became increasingly frustrated by a series of dilemmas or contradictions. The universities trained and/or certified persons to be professional educators and professional administrators; they were oriented to be a part of status quo society, not transformers . Universities provided entry into the middle class. At best, only modest or indirect benefits accrued to the majority. Mostly, only part of the lower- or upper-middle class benefited from a university education. Graduates need to be trained for the better functioning of society and for a more equitable and democratic society. As presented, the Chicano personnel "problem" dictated not a need for Chicana and Chicano mediators but for progressive engineers. Thus, Chicano Studies increased the size of the Chicano middle-class directly and, at best, only partially and indirectly did service benefits accrue to other Chicanas and Chicanos. Since Chicano communities were overwhelmingly working class, to secure justice required major changes. If consistent with its original goals in teaching and research, the objectives and purposes of cultural affirmation and social change of Chicano Studies departments stood in contrast to the functions of other departments and programs at universities. Too often, when conflict was resolved within this framework, it meant changing the objectives or purposes of Chicano Studies, certainly not those of the universities. To be sure, when CCM activists were not satisfied with progress made in

Studies Evolve

advancing Chicana and Chicano Studies programs, they contested or integrated. Historically identical to all other progressive features of U.S. society, Chicana and Chicano Studies resulted from organized and consistent struggle . The broader crises made possible the particular struggle to develop and implement Chicana and Chicano Studies. The abatement of the general crisis affected Chicana and Chicano Studies. As Chicano Studies was a result of struggle, it was also a concession to placate struggle. A dilemma that disrupted more than one faculty or student group was the tension between those who excelled in advocacy and those who leaned toward acquiescence within Chicano Studies. The acquiescence trend remained strong. This was buttressed ideologically by self-serving, straw-man arguments premised on the lack of efficiency or professionalization by CCM Chicana and Chicano Studies adherents. The historical origins, purpose, and objectives of Chicana and Chicano Studies, as discussed within circumstances where Chicana and Chicano Studies were diminished, certainly changed. Chicana and Chicano Studies programs became contested terrains in various ways. Often any internal differences that escalated to open dissent within Chicana and Chicano Studies increased the dependency of programs. During internal crises, power flowed to the top administrators, which further impacted programs. Top administrators-overwhelmingly male, moderate conservatives, sons of middle-class families or above, and often from the eastern United States-preferred "their kind of person. " Worse, regardless of denials to the contrary, senior administrators held notions of what was really "best for Chicana and Chicano Studies" and what "Chicana and Chicano Studies really should be." They gradually imposed their choices on the existing program or they integrated Chicano Studies into middle-level frameworks, which gradually changed the programs. Too often, more than one Chicana or Chicano appointee failed to see that there was not much difference between the two ploys. The guiding norm among universities is integration-the "melting pot" model implemented in faculty and curriculum decisions; they get theirs and you do not. A novel phenomena, Chicana and Chicano students, professors, and some staff occupied a privileged position vis-a-vis the Chicano communities. The Chicana and Chicano community was not in a privileged position vis-a-vis U.S. society-rather it was in a special relationship determined by ethnicity, class, gender, sexuality, and history. Institutions paid the Chicano Studies sector to study, read, think, write, and certify

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itself. These "privileges," which some thought ought to be the rights of everyone, were not available to Chicanas and Chicanos generally. For those involved in Chicana and Chicano Studies, a potential dual alienation developed from the Chicano community and toward the university and the elites of society. Often Chicana and Chicano's class and cultural expectations remained in contradiction to that of university personnel at that time because of university preferences for east-coast graduates in their hiring practices, and also because the university's avowed hierarchy privileged persons from certain social and educational backgrounds. These persons often favored depoliticalization and moderate positions from minority faculty. As a sign of this tendency, course content tended to be interpretively moderate rather than sharply critical as time went by. Notwithstanding, some campus activists called for Chicana and Chicano technical expertise and the need for more Chicano analysis as major necessities for the future of the Chicana and Chicano community. Though the Chicano Studies sector was privileged in relation to the community, the general relationship between society and Chicanas and Chicanos operated in regard to Chicano Studies and the university-exploitation, racism, and marginality. The Chicana and Chicano Studies sector was composed generally of people who one way or another had coped with society's and the university's demands. Thus, the sector was in an advantageous position to understand this relationship between dominant society and the community. They also faced the challenge of effectively broadcasting their understanding. Greater numbers of student slots, courses, programs, and faculty and administrative positions accrued progressively to Chicanas and Chicanos from I968 through 1977 and beyond. This growth varied among institutions. Early minimal progress did not mean that continually there was active, aggressive instituting of programs, a heavy effort to recruit Chicana and Chicano students, or a high demand for faculty or administrators. Progress appeared slow and always through pressure. Actually, the institutionalized pace moved fast, especially if the lack of Chicano intrastructural resources are noted as compared to women and blacks. In some institutions, Chicana and Chicano Studies program courses did not increase significantly; faculty and programs were being "integrated" and less undergraduate or graduate recruitment involving student groups occurred than before. Further, numbers of programs, courses, and faculty did not indicate the marked differences in character, organization, or objectives between the programs. Nor did they indicate differences of opinion among Chicanas and Chicanos participating in Chicano Studies

Studies Evolve

or the continuing division among others concerning Chicana and Chicano courses, programs, and faculty recruitment. One bottleneck was the low participation of Chicanas and Chicanos in graduate doctoral programs. This reflected the selection practices of senior white male or female professors on graduate admissions committees at the major doctoral-granting research institutions and, if admitted, Chicana and Chicano students were not awarded full graduate financial support. Furthermore, once these numbers improved, there usually were no added Chicano Studies program resources to service graduate students. Certainly two substantive achievements of the Chicana and Chicano movement of the sixties and seventies were the efforts to unionize rural workers and the Chicana and Chicano Studies' impact on colleges and universities. Threatened from without and within continuously, Chicana and Chicano Studies organizers made some significant contributions. Increases in students, faculty, staff, and courses stand out. One major contribution of Chicana and Chicano Studies has been greater awareness of ideological struggle-its ideas, critiques, and history. Regardless of the future of Chicana and Chicano Studies, never again will the level of information or analysis or the lack thereof fall to pre1966 levels. Nor will the anti-Mexicanist liberals define our community without ideological contestation as was the case prior to 1966. Chicana and Chicano Studies, further, has strengthened, enriched, and deepened cultural awareness among all sectors of the community, not only among students as populist hypocrisy would have it. Importantly, Chicana and Chicano Studies programs have trained some technicians and, of more immediate importance, teachers for the young. Regardless of varied political differences, a net increase of Chicana and Chicano teachers has benefited the community. Obviously, Chicana and Chicano Studies' related efforts directly or indirectly increased the numbers of students and professors in all parts of nearly all colleges. Chicana and Chicano Studies helped augment the availability of professionals. Further, the process of Chicana and Chicano Studies enabled persons to question and influence the program and to think about future community-centered educational directions. Those active in pioneering Chicana and Chicano Studies in 1968-1970 did the job one way or another. Those active later significantly expanded the possibilities in several directions, particularly fomenting the availability and density of scholarship and an overall greater participation in universities. In all circumstances, specific responsibility for success or not belonged to top university adm ini strators. They, not students or the

Chapter 16

community, strengthened or undermined programs. Though some Chicanas and Chicanos understood that conservative administrators were not to be trusted with the welfare of Chicana and Chicano Studies, no one could have guessed how tenacious anti-Chicano Studies' players were to be or that these could and would include Mexican American or Latino players. A fashion among administrators became to place the blame for internal problems on the lack of "student understanding" of "academic" programs or, even more amusing, on the gaps between "old" and "new" students. The self-serving intent of these critiques became patent. Students were labeled to be a persistent "problem" by some administrators or faculty who were not doing their job of offering students effective curriculum and counseling. Often problems reflected the fact that Chicana and Chicano Studies programs were vulnerable in relation to expectations-insufficient resources and flexibility and overtaxed committed faculty and responsible staff. The relative shortage of committed faculty compounded problems. The few could not make up fully for the indifference of the many. Chicana and Chicano faculty members provided academic guidance and activities, mentoring, and validation, but, at one time, the ratio generally was one facu lty member for over one hundred students. Initially, Chicana and Chicano Studies faculty often became overtaxed, which resulted in delays in course implementations, student dissatisfaction, psychological attrition, and a steady rate of turnover or displacement. A major set of challenges stemmed from internal factors. Some Mexican American administrators lacked the integrity or perception necessary to strengthen Chicana and Chicano Studies programs. They collaborated with senior administrators to subvert programs. Often they were abated, when not outright supported by Mexican American faculty who were unconcerned with strengthening Chicana and Chicano Studies- ironic and mendacious attitudes since the large majority of them would not have had their positions without Chicano Studies advocates. Equally bad, however, was the threatening of Chicana and Chicano Studies programs through populist, anti-intellectual attacks by speakers who claimed to be "community oriented or progressive." More insidious were the program frustrations generated by the questioning of Chicana and Chicano Studies academically and intellectually in university circles. The challenge to the Chicano university effort was continuous. The need for Chicana and Chicano Studies became questioned perhaps as much then as before, and the counter attack became better organized and better rationalized . The challenge was both

Studies Evolve

offensive and defensive in the late 1970s. Some campuses simply did not achieve a Chicana and Chicano Studies program. In some cases, activists made do with what was granted, whether an Ethnic Studies or an enlarged Latino Studies and later Latino or Hispanic Studies program with the Chicana and Chicano facet curtailed or subordinated or simply subsumed under a large American Studies banner. The burden of proof for the academic validity of Chicana and Chicano Studies belonged to committed Chicana and Chicano scholars. Initially, the standard academic argument of the unconvinced was as follows: knowledge is knowledge of the majority culture according to majority culture criteria, canons, and theory. Anything else was not deemed knowledge, or it was promoted that whatever knowledge existed could be obtained through majority culture study, including whatever Chicana and Chicano Studies might encompass. To study a complex society of over ten million people was not enough. Sometimes attached to this argument was the notion that Chicana and Chicano Studies should involve a standard or evaluative reflection of majority culture; that is, whatever Chicano paradigm was used must be premised or integrated- that was the fulfillment of educational responsibility. The prosaic idea that Chicanas and Chicanos represented culture as daily life and that they had a right to explore that humanist history preference did not suffice as legitimate. The fear that this minority presence would be subversive reflected ignorance of the fact that, in itself, ethnic minority identity was resistance to, or felt militant rejection of, majority culture. To critics, it was beside the point that challenges to the study of Alabaman society or of Alsatian society might be similarly asked, or that rejection notions were not raised when Anglos instituted Latin and Asian Studies programs for Anglos, or that Jewish Studies were actively promoted by Jewish faculty guided by Jewish Studies priorities. Of course, these fields were by "faculty" for "faculty" to study "appropriate" cultures. Moreover, disciplinary objections would, of course, occur; that is, the charge that Chicana and Chicano Studies was not a discipline. Yet who challenged the separate study of philosophy apart from history or history apart from economics, or adamantly opposed the separation between sociology and anthropology or questioned the doubtful analytical substance of "geography" as an alleged "discipline"? Whether motivated by underlying racism or self-interest, questions about the legitimacy of Chicana and Chicano Studies formed part of the perennial campus turf competition and contained one major unstated

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assumption among others. The assumption was that knowledge of both the majority culture and Chicano cu lture was absolute and thus completely valid. Further cross-cultural analysis was possible within the universe of current paradigm methods and theories. Thus, in effect, majority representative academics could discuss relationships and extrapolate generalizations from the majority culture to the Chicana and Cbicano case. When exposed, the assumption fell on its own ignorant pretensions to challenge these assertions. Somewhat optimistically, Chicana and Chicano Studies advocates continued to argue that ignorance concerning Chicanas and Chicanos was lack of complete knowledge of the United States. This proposition actually required strategic thinking not common to academics or at least some humanist academics. In effect, to know Chicano culture increased knowledge of the majority culture, knowledge of which the majority was in desperate need. This need for knowledge of the Chicana and Chicano was there and would continue to be. In this quest, experience and sensibility were valuable academic assets. Consequently, students argued that knowledge should be provided by those who were best equipped to understand Chicana and Chicano communities on its own terms: Chicanas and Chicanos. Empirically and analytically, the Chicano community, because of its demographic size, spatial circumstance, culture, and historical evolution, provided the opportunity for an in-depth, interdisciplinary acquisition of knowledge. Up to a point these pro-Chicana and Chicano Studies arguments became tolerated among a few on campuses. To be sure, there was not much experiential understanding of alternative ways for achieving optimum education goals on campuses overall. Student-centered and community-based learning were hallmarks of El Plan de Santa Barbara. Therein was a philosophically premised argument soon to penetrate the U.S. academy, often credited as being engendered by so-called postcolonial studies. Pro-community and pro-student reverberations were anticipated, stemming from embedded intuitive pensamiento {thinking) of El Plan de Santa Barbara. The plan anticipated the exemplification of the truism of theorists that philosophy is struggle. Perhaps as time passes the innovative precedents of El Plan de Santa Barbara are not the minutia of program building or even program priorities, which are perennial responsibilities for any field or discipline that wants a future. The enduring precedents are the raising of questions pertinent to epistemology and critical humanist epistemology inherently encompassing critical ethics and pedagogy centered on student caring and learning.

CHAPTER 17

Alternative Schooling

ialectically, as Chicanas and Chicanos encountered discrimination in institutions and suffered internal problems stemming from institutional constraints, they sought alternatives to existing institutionally based education.' Owing to a sense of responsibility to the younger generation, Chicanas and Chicanos established alternative schools that offered a critical point of departure in K - 12 education. These schools made it possible for children entering public schools to be free of damages inflicted by discriminatory attitudes and approaches. The failure of mainstream institutions to educationally elevate many Chicana and Chicano youth had potent social, economic, and political consequences. The high "push-out" rates and limited college attendance rates of Chicano youth underscored the negative outcomes of existing K-12 public education. Chicano alternatives sought to develop academic skills among their students and participants critical to high school completion. Additionally, they explored teaching attitudes proper to the successful education of Chicanas and Chicanos. While seeking to transcend existing public education, they also emphasized the recruitment, retention, and channeling of future Chicana and Chicano teachers. Their funding varied from minimal to little; their administrative support went from none to some. Chicano alternative schools varied in approach, organization, and level of education. The most successful alternative in terms of curriculum instruction, numbers of alumni, and longevity was the Crusade's commendable Tlatelolco: Plaza de las Tres Culturas school in Denver, Colorado. Several attempted higher-education programs. Among the earliest were Colegio Jacinto Trevino in Mercedes, Texas, and La Universidad de Azthin in Fresno, California-these lasted briefly, but

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were the ones more pedagogically unconventional. Juarez-Lincoln in Texas sought to offer adult-centered education and a curriculum and research development site. Two tried to be operating campuses: Colegio Cesar Chavez in Mount Angel, Oregon, which operated for several years; and Deganawidah-Quetzalcoatl University (D-QU) in Davis, California, which continued for over twenty years. None of these had adequate funding or sufficient staff and most lacked appropriate facilities. In many communities, organizers made attempts to start preschools or elementary schools. The support and the success varied. La Casa de la Raza in northern California, after some initial difficulties, showed precedent-making successes. However, its funding was abruptly cancelled because of alleged noncompliance with certain federal agency guidelines. Escuela y Colegio Tlatelolco in Denver, Colorado, began as an elementary school and soon achieved significant success validated by its continuing operation for more than two decades. La Academia de la Nueva Raza in Dixon, New Mexico, was unique. The academia had a sharper independent pedagogical-efforts focus than others. Many of the participants had significant professional or organizing experience. La Academia set out to be a documentation center that sought to preserve and disseminate local history and knowledge. The discourse of the center was the documentation in practice. The center consisted of associates devoted to collecting oral history, folklore, and popular wisdom from the surrounding villages. Emphasizing discourse, they disseminated materials through presentations, publications, and community meetings. They did not concern themselves with accreditation, nor did they need large sums of money or a large staff. The Academia did not organize "students" in the orthodox sense; all participants were learners and teachers. They were, moreover, involved meaningfully in community-oriented education. For many Chicano parents, alternative education was proactively attractive. However, for basic but not readily apparent reasons, alternative schools faced the same problems and dilemmas of Chicano Studies programs. They were efforts on the right track to correcting educational deficiencies for Mexican Americans in that they were critical responses to educational realities that deserved thorough criticism. Societal and institutional constraints concerning accreditation, funding, and sufficient human resources hampered the prospects of Chicano alternative schools and programs. Moreover, in the crush of the inaugurating moments, there was nearly always insufficient time for

Alternative Schooling

adequate planning. They would be free of board of education or university politics, but they encountered the more intense and immediate politics of the local area. Naturally, differences of opinion emerged concerning how to deal with the dilemmas of funding curriculum, work assignments, and so forth, and thus internal schisms developed. Rather than strikingly different from those besetting college-based Chicano Studies programs during their initial stages, the problems alternative educational approaches faced were somewhat parallel. Unfortunately, there often existed a distance between those involved in alternative schooling and Chicano Studies, not because of direct antagonism but due to priorities, staffing, and lack of resources. Actually a reciprocal relationship would have strengthened both. In the coming years, there did develop means for supporting each other. Often disillusionment and organizational problems characterized the more socially conscious and progressive elements in education. Chicanas and Chicanos examined but did not resolve the underlying reasons or the circumstantial reality of the educational institutional situation. Attitudinal expressions of subjective self-indulgent idealism appeared. Challenges mitigated the operationalization of political consciousness into effective schooling in several alternate schools. Some organizers exaggerated the obstacles and the strengths of opponents. The uncritical rejection of accommodation to basic schooling practices, as reflected by funding patrons or by conventional institutions and schooling organizations, undercut the strength of alternative schooling efforts. In some cases, schooling leaders minimized changes in the Chicano community and in the society at large and, as the years passed, they did not seek new avenues for alternative schooling. The total situation of Chicano schooling offered some patterns in the late sixties and early seventies. For any seemingly difficult dilemma or contradiction involving schools and communities, there were two or more sides or parties and possible resolutions. If there were negative or positive aspects for one, negative or positive aspects existed for everyone involved-students, parents, teachers, institutions, and society. The general character of society and universities continued, but these were not static. Ebb and flow characterized ongoing change within institutions and communities. Crisis never quite abated. Schooling issues and challenges continued, though they altered in some p articulars-quality for students and accountability for the community. Despite setbacks and defeats, the political momentum in the community was improving. This could not be otherwise, unless

Chapter 17

its demands for change related to race, gender, sexuality, and class also changed. Yes, internal negative problems remained a feature of Chicana and Chicano education efforts. They reflected an ongoing maturation process, and they were also artificially induced. Eventually there were better conditions for operational unity at the institutional, local, state, and national levels than before. Unity was possible through clear programmatic premises. State and national officials tried to manipulate Chicano education programs, groups, and individuals, but also positive steps ensued from more progressive educators. Depending on consciousness and political maturity, one-sided manipulation became less likely to succeed, and positive gains slowly occurred at the hands of proactive community members and educators. Often progressive community elements had more energy and creativity than did their opponents. From the very initial conceptualization of Chicano education mobilization, progressive advocates of Chicano education produced the more innovative efforts, programs, insights, research, writings, and displays. The accommodating element did have some program concepts-emphasis on basics and teacher evaluation for example- that, [f not fully sound, whether one agreed or disagreed, did accrue some benefits to Chicanas and Chicanos. Innovation in any area of education, at any level, was difficult. Eventually access to authority figures and institutional centers happened. The rhetoric alleging professionalization became common. The progressive elements remained composed of the better and more conscientious students, staff, social scientists, humanists, educators, and administrators. Ideological visions for the future that were influential to activists came not from the college classroom but from community pro-education activism.

CHAPTER 18

Better Times

C

CM activists represented a series of variegated perspectives and stances, whether populist, poetic, pragmatic, theoretical, indigenous, or partisan. The sum and the parts of these comprised composite visions, different from the reality that existed but also somewhat different from the readily available visions common to most civil-rights activists of an urged participatory democracy or a proffered socialist utopia. 1 The CCM stances tentatively or explicitly indicated a movement critique of the dominant society, which would continually evolve over time. Indigenismo at an introductory level appeared in various guises here and there. However, an informed critical indigenismo with indicated historical continuities and social anchors developed over the years. Jose Angel Gutierrez pointed out that, even more than in written language, Chicano ideology manifested itself in speech and oral compositions. Visions and critiques reverberated in the rhetoric of meetings and the confidentialities of political conversations. Certainly participating Catholic priests and nuns preaching their visions pinpointed the possibility of a world free of malice, guided by love, and absent of domination and exploitation. Clearly and emphatically, Chicana artists drew and colored a world of self-acting, self-determining \Vomen through their artistic representations. Two early persisting populist visions, one of the family and another of the individual, influenced the ethos espoused by some Chicana and Chicano movement articulators. An imagined stable, harmonious, loving, supportive family was repeatedly upheld by spokespersons. Maintaining or achieving a basic benign family for some offered a spiritual, social, and political survival necessity; though many asserted that this was not a reality, it was an ideal that was felt should be achieved. 183

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Conflicting representations of what constituted the family institution arose very early on in the CCM. Chicana feminists sought to critique and dismantle heterosexist, male superiority and male-centered notions inherent in some representations of the Chicana and Chicano family. Chicana women advocated for healthier social institutions that extended beyond the heteronormative nuclear family. In addition, the work and dignity of the individual, particularly as worker, was insistently upheld on argued claims for the social value of respect. The value of the "I" or the individual's experience as a feeling, knowing person reflected a philosophical personalism that coexisted with abundant claims and calls for collectivist practices of one kind or another. This consideration was followed by the need to be a better self, a better person as a resource but also as a value. 1v1any who disagreed on other matters, particularly leaders, chimed in in unison on the family sanctity and individual-worth ideals. To make a society whole involved joining family (community), love (ideals), and individual worth (respect). In some populist views expressed within CCM, exploitations and disparate treatments were related to specific implementations, which activists believed made reality go around- technology and control. In some circles, an overarching theme of CCM rhetoric underscored the effects of technology on Chicanas and Chicanos. In their addresses and writings, Chicanas and Chicanos addressed critically the positive and negative aspects of technology and sciences, the social science attack on identity, and the significance of self-help reactions . Invariably, growing urbanization foregrounded a skeptical reaction as to its consequences and a fictive yearning for the rural; the critique was a reflection of a deeply held imagined ideal. Chicana and Chicano activists articulated in their terms and reasonings the faults of antihumanist living. In their views, progress and order in the modernistic aspects of life provided gauges for measuring the impact and consequences of technology. The modern technological order linked the overwhelming importance of the city and the process of political internationalization and economic globalization: Just time to hear the wind blowing through a quiet meadow this is all I ask, this is all I need. But now I must go back to the schedule that ties me down to someone else's dream. . . . Si,

Vine de muy lejos, a ninguna parte,

Better Times desinclinadamente arrastrado por ese gigante, monsrruoso, tecnico, e industrial llamado Progreso . .. (Anonymous)2 In this vision, intimations of optimistic social possibilities mediated through traditional and contemporary song lyrics infused with critiques of current society. From opposition to a perceived technologically driven oppressive society and demands for reforms emerged a community-driven, life-affirming credo, " in our own way." Repeatedly, this liberating attitude revealed a rejection of structural complexities, which is to say oppression. Often statements admonishing self-help, or "in our own way,'' reflected responses to the crisis of technology and its globalizing impact on working people who had little access to formal education. A telling document, an article titled "Reports on the Mexican American [National] Issues Conference" (19 70) and issued from Sacramento, California, outlined the problems most directly affecting Chicana and Chicano communities during the late sixties. 3 A resolution in the document called for less discrepancy between wages of a factory worker and a farm worker; moreover, this specific disparity was seen as part of a larger scenario. This demand could clearly be interpreted as a challenge to perceived dictatorial technology and powerful corporations, which determined work relations and pay scales. The analysis went as follows: the factory worker's place in production resulted from technological advancement, and worker and technology conditions resulted from corporate decisions and actions. Consequently, the disparity between wages was a direct consequence of technology and corporate power. The worker's oppression not only makes profits, but this in turn reinforces further technology and control. Therefore, the wage inequality and the corporate structure produced the marginalization and alienation (dehumanization) of the farm and factory workers. In effect, the resolution called for re-empowerment of the worker on the basis of a human-rights critique. Science and technology stripped the farm worker or the factory worker of his/her humanity through marginalization. Corporate power meant relegation to an inferior wage, which reduced life to bare survival. For some in the CC!v1, the resolution regarding dehumanization called for a negation of this technology conjuncture. Chicana and Chicano activists identified corporations as the most visible centers of power beyond government. In fact, corporations, sustained government actions, agencies, politica l operatives, and the super

Chapter 18

wealthy represented the basic real powers in society. Their motive was power through profit. Quite pla inly, activists identified corporations as pervasive in their policy influences and power exercises, governmentally, civically, and institutionally. In activists ' eyes , these entities thrived through profits, and through greater profits they sought greater power for themselves >vith little regard for the negative consequences to others. Chicanas and Chicanos sought to address antisocial power concentrations through direct and modest corrective actions aimed at corporations. Yet with all the negative notes underscoring the worst of corporations and views advocating a nonexploitive private sector, the lure of economic profits for some undercut the trumpeting of human rights . There were those who argued the practices of large for-profit businesses could be improved to the benefit of all. Moreover, in nearly all instances community small businesses were upheld as being positive for the community. To be sure, small business owners, a traditional sector within the community but one that was also changing quantitatively and qualitatively, sought support from activists, and, in turn, this sector allied with corporate representatives. A CCM debate arose concerning economics, living space, and social relations. A vision of working together as a cohesive community in a hectic and alienating place (the city) was a poignant negation of the isolating aspects of the modern city. The resolution required fashioning a less technological, more communal setting for life. This possible happenstance was a daring vision. Early Chicana and Chicano reactions against technology, calling for a mutualista-type organization in the midst of modernity, offered a historical referent to indigenous communalism and a blueprint for something other than the then-present alienation. Collectivity, often depicted though metaphors espousing the nuclear and extended family, glorified male and female roles. Chicana activists contested static views of gender and gender role representations. They articulated sharp critiques of socia l institutions such as the family, the church, and marriage, and they took issue with definitions of collectivity or carnalismo based on male prerogatives. Their visions reflected a sharper examination of institutions that upheld the subordination of "vomen's work, personal expressions, and intimate desires. Some men who benefited from the glorification of rigid men and women's roles criticized Chicana feminist organizers, yet women-led critiques enriched CCM ideology and made it more responsive to future developments. In effect, voiced summaries of needs indicated a critique of

Better Times

modernity, which premised many CCM objectives. Issues pertinent to women could be addressed in antitechnology and antimodern stances. Women's calls for self-determination encouraged Raza women's groups to rise up and demand to be included in all decision making. Women particularly stressed cooperation between enlightened men and free women. The approach to free women was not through readings of tracts but specific facilitations for women. For example, a platform addressed needs for women in the areas of childcare, decent work, birth control, and useful education. The participants called for distribution of "birth control and/or abortion counseling." Birth control, a direct result of technology, in this case represented a positive resolution. Taking into account the fact that women of color have been used as guinea pigs to test birth control tools, this memory moderated the word "liberate" and denoted, in fact , repressive practices. On the surface, birth control, when self-determined, liberated women from the roles of caretaker and nurturer. On the other hand, birth control made possible the crippling of women used as guinea pigs by medical researchers as occurred in Los Angeles. Thus technology "liberated" some humanity in some life areas, but it did so at the expense of others. Women remained at the forefront of critiques about the modern family and the effects of modern technology. Several CCM poems depicted technology as destructive to Chicanos as a people and as a culmre. Poets, at times, conveyed a dual sentiment of attraction and repulsion to technology. The city represented technology because it contained the most dynamic and contemporary forms of human organization. In one poignant example, Alurista reported: And she cries en las barrancas of industry her children devoured by computers and the gears Must be the season of the witch I hear huesos crack in pain 4 This poem demonstrates both the rejection of order and the embrace of organization. Gears move, bodies break, and the contradiction provides an explanation: cultural roots are preempted by technology. Some Chicana and Chicano activists identified that technology

-i

s:

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brought on the ability to transform minerals and "rocks" into "windows," objects indicating a premonition of the future . Nature was physically withering away. As this happened, persons suffered a spiritual death. Some Chicano activists, by giving hope for a natural and simple existence within a communal setting that exuded humanist meaning and joy, offered a further critique of the pervasive domination. In their views, to offer fulfillment in a peaceful setting meant rejecting the benefits of war, which also entailed technology. Addressing the poisoning of the earth in English and addressing the racism affecting Chicanas and Chicanos in Spanish lent itself to understanding technology as affecting both the dominant society and Chicanas and Chicanos in parallel yet different ways. Technology affects society as a whole because all people suffer polluted air, deadly waste, and industrial blight. For Chicanos, the consequences of technology doubled because racism multiplied environmental problems. Moreover, technology contributed to the persistence of racism because its supposed objectives subverted attention away from those most detrimentally impacted by its consequences . The negative consequences of technology appeared so overriding to some that the dominant system shifted the focus from racism to other issues emphasizing pragmatics and progress. Many Chicanas and Chicanos reached a conclusion that technology exacted a high price and did not benefit everyone equally. Women had a more complex view of technological advances in regard to health because the issue of birth control affected them in a particular way. Means of information transmission globally communicated activists' perspectives of power and technology. Confrontations with modernism, rejections of modernism, and insistence on the assertion of the pre-modern all existed in the poetry of the late sixties and seventies. Poetized negative aspects of technology addressed environmental pollution, ethical/moral dilemmas, and wagebusting inflation, all related to corporations. Indeed through corporate technology emerged an order of consequences: poisoning of humanity, destruction of environment, control of women's bodies, routinization of labor, and socially pejorative complexity. To farm workers and maquiladora workers, the pernicious results of corporate actions and technological poisoning were not a matter of sensitizing through college readings and health workshops but through firsthand knowledge from everyday work. Chicana and Chicano poets emphatically denounced "The Bomb" and nuclear war-making technology, which were indeed the culmination

Better Times

of antihuman technology. One felt the anger at the maquinas and, more importantly, toward those who created machines. Optimism that technology could be used in productive ways was shared nevertheless. Chicana and Chicano activists viewed society as in a state of rapid technological innovation without awareness or sensitivity about nature. However, some activists believed that such awareness could be acquired. Therefore, harmony with the natural was desired. Writers articulated concerns that technology, particularly war implementation (exemplified by Dow Chemical), devoured nature, and they criticized premises of state violence, which underpinned the rationale for military technology. In the articulations of the period, a discernible pattern emerged that identified the increasing degree to which corporations and technology impacted Chicana and Chicano communities. This can be measured by the responses (or reactions) to the effects of modernity. The severity of the reaction speaks to the intensity to which Chicanos were being informed of and affected by technology. For example, the response in 1967 to technology was a "self-help" reaction. This initial attempt at coping with the transition from postwar to postorder was an imagined form of "carnalismo" within the Chicano community. The next reaction to technology was aggressive self-determination by preservation of Chicana and Chicano culture. This response resulted from being marginalized by the dominant society. Chicanos increasingly reacted to the expansion of technology and power and their ramifications. Activist responses to technology can be divided in terms of social reactions and environmental reactions. Some reactions to the social problems caused by technology include yearning for the simple, striving to preserve culture, and an assertion of humanity. Environmental responses were aimed at preventing the poisoning of the earth and the destruction of the natural environment. In New Mexico, environmental organizing intersected with the planning of the first Earth Day event in 1970. Arturo Sandoval, a Chicano activist, was captured in a photo insert in Life magazine calling attention to the inaugural Earth Day in Washington, D.C. 5 It was found that in order for corporate technology to achieve its optimum state, corporations must exploit natural resources and ultimately inevitably destroy them. This begged the question for activists: can technology in reality be manipulated to be in harmony with nature? Actually, the awareness led to questions about whether in fact technology represented power, not only over nature but ultimately over human beings.

""2

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Some Chicana and Chicano writers and thinkers perceived technology as destructive at times and at other times as a source of progress. They argued that although there were attempts at "cleaning up" technology, they insufficiently addressed the problem that technology thrives and expands at the expense of humanity and the environment. Activists linked this expansion with a visible sponsor, corporations, and, in turn, associated them 'vvith exploitation and discrimination. Corporations at every turn loomed as the major economic, political, and social entities after government and as certainly more pervasive and powerful than churches. When activists became concerned about electoral empowerment, they soon reckoned with corporations; when they targeted stereotyping and discrimination in the media, corporations were the culprits; to some, corporate power loomed everywhere. Like other social movements, the CCM continually remained a contested site for discussion over objectives, tactics, strategies, and visions. The initial arguments occurred over designation of group activities. Consequent arguments were over moderate initiatives versus some kind of direct action. At every issue juncture these arguments occurred, and they always did so with a range of right, center, or left options. These debates were not about cultural options; they were political discussions about priorities and tactics. To be sure, the discussions involved persons who rhetorically took a pro-cultural stance while in fact they knew, as did their audience, that they were arguing a political stance. Culturally, these debates were already positioned within the movement, that is, in community survival. One momentous debate occurred and recurred that reflected multiple currents among the Mexican American populationliberation from oppression, or humanism over dehumanization. Individuals were identified accordingly. For example, corporate antihumanist agencies, no matter how many art shows or playground events they sponsored, were seen as profit centered and promoting commoditized life and even death and destruction through their product promotion. Support and criticism of the U.S. armed intervention in Vietnam denoted a subject in its own right and was also seen in relation to other matters. A portion of activists, overwhelmingly male, in almost every CCM sector, had served in the armed services. Among these veterans, some were still enrolled in National Guard units. Women, of course, had some ties to armed services personnel, but, in their case, often the association made them antiwar critics rather than war supporters. A salient example of this was Delia Alvarez of California, a very adamant

Better Times

antiwar activist and pro-Chicana rights activist. War criticism mounted and became concretized with the coming forward of Chicano activists who refused to serve or be drafted. Many activists envisioned a world without military violence. Early in the movement years, a holistic vision of society and nature, a repudiation of violence and intendant technology, led some activists to be markedly antiviolence. For others, these views only formed part of their perspectives. The major organizations and many, though not all, of the local leadership questioned the Vietnam War or repudiated it. On the other hand, many members of the community supported or tolerated the war. As the war concluded, other issues that had been current all along, such as worker and immigrant rights and education reforms, superseded "peace" concerns and more logically fitted reflections on a better, more equitable society. Certainly, when the Crusade for Justice called for the Chicano Youth Liberation Conference {1969), an unprecedented national assembly encompassing broad questioning and reflection took place. Individuals and representatives of organizations with diverse views and beliefs converged at a mass intensity much beyond the discreetly correct banter of isolated study groups or the musings of an isolated single writer. The conference, held in Denver, Colorado, in March 1969, concept ualized the most memorable ideological statement of the Chicana and Chicano movement, memorable and meaningful because of its collective context and overt mass dynamics. The collectivity of participants, and not individual leaders, was the principle protagonist. Two thousand Mexican participams from all parts of the United States attended the Conference. 6 Significantly, the emergence of a strong cultural nationalist sentiment or an incipient cultural nationalist ideology occurred at the conference. In this respect, the Denver conference signaled the break at a national level from the accommodationist posture of Mexican American consciousness and politics of the previous decades. In Denver, Chicanos adopted El Plan Espiritual de Aztlan, a vision, which repudiated the dehumanization of exploitation and domination for a vision of communalisrn and solidarity. Cooperation was identified as an instrument for self-determination to achieve a humanist society. The plan's preamble called for liberation through solidarity based on culture and mutual aid. More explicitly, the manifesto section detailed demands and adjunctions in major life areas achievable through organized civic activities. Significantly, these were linked integrally to a specific geographic heartland and to the rights of toilers and the rights vouchsafed by a claimed historical heritage. Collectively, there was no intention of being

Chapter 18

mythic or even indigenous; the intention was one of explicit political posturing. The plan was also not the property of individuals; it was a collective statement and its value was as a h istorical representative voice. The document clearly identified the dominant society as an oppressive, dehumanizing, usurping, and occupying force. Later the plan became an immediate target for the right and the left; the former considered it an outrage and the latter a pipedream. Later, some interpreters of El Plan de Aztlan denied its radical interpretation and st ressed its alleged romantic idealism, reduced the concept of Aztlan to a psychological ploy, and limited advocacy for self-determination to local community participation in local matters. The plan is clear enough for its endorsers. However, its abbreviated contents allowed its language about issues to be translated into reformism. While ideologically abbreviated, El Plan Espiritual de Aztlan, \vith its assertion of autonomy for the Bronze Nation of Aztlan, substantiated the initial thrusts for many of the subsequent ideological and political developments of cultural renaissance among many young Mexican people in the United States for the following years. Major polemical influences para lleled major collective statements, which offered critical cues and directions for visions of society. Certainly major spokespersons with their continua l schedule of articulations provided much ideological inspirat ion, often notably impactful, whether in the dynamic lengthy speeches of Reies Lopez Tijerina or the critical and agitational polemics of Corky Gonzales, the searching compelling messages and actions of Cesar Chavez and Dolores Huerta or the acute pragmatisms of Jose Angel Gutierrez. Indeed there was a remarkable rhetorical charge to the CCM that was not limited to senior males but was certainly endowed by these. Verbal and written critiques by women and men punctuated meetings, publications, conversations, and organizing drives . Jose Angel Gutierrez's A Gringo Manual on How to Handle Mexicans memorializes the sarcastic and sardonic side to the rhetorical practices of the movement.7 Not to be overlooked, the second and third Crusade-init iated conferences, the conferences of Alianza and, certainly, those of Santa Barbara, Sacramento, and H ouston, and the early and later San Antonio conferences provided ideological material. Women pointedly made crit iques related to sexist values and practices in the CCM universe but did not publish written critiques of how this related to the dominant socia l economic order, and nor did they address how this could be radically changed. Critiques of rhe dominant culture came in some instances in

Better Times

politically modest intonations. Academics in more modest voice than organizational leaders offered or insisted on their prescriptions or nostalgias. Americo Paredes's "With His Pistol in His Hand": A Border Ballad and Its Hero (1958) summarized in its opening pages a society of moral and etrucal constructs once a reality, "the simple pastoral life." 8 These short pages were v.ridely read and anthologized in several collections, yet readers could be hard put to interpret what his critique actually was. In more denouncing tones, Octavio Romano-V, in his two widely read essays, condemned historical and stereotypical views of Mexican Americans and subtextually outlined the moral and civic virtues possible for Mexican Americans. 9 Ernesto Galarza vehemently advocated civil rights and workforce unionization. Yet these articulations did not explicitly endorse a particular ideological stance. Estela Portillo Trambley offered a feminist voice to counter male domination and repressive society. The academically grounded vision that encompassed some CCM worldviews most logically was a Chicana and Chicano conceptual reworking of a model that had some Mexican elements in its particular application. When the Mexican scholar Pablo Gonzalez Casanova initially articulated the model, he was thinking of Native enclaves in the Mexican republic. Mexican Americans applied the internal colony construct to themselves. "The Internal Colonial Model" dealt directly with the facts and consequences of conflict, oppression, exploitation, discrimination, and subjugation, and its logic led to the conclusion that these realities must be changed thoroughly and immediately. Several thinkers had contributed to this model, but the person who popularized it among CCM adherents was professor Rodolfo Acuna in his seminal 1970 work Occupied America. The person who sharpened the internal colony construct ultimately and logically was professor Mario Barrera in his 1979 work Race and Class in the Southwest. This work was preceded by a much more widely read essay that he co-wrote with professors Carlos Muiioz and Charles Ornelas, "The Barrio as an lnternal Colony,'' in l97I. The vision the three professors offered was achievable through direct political action of a society freed from historical oppressions, repressions, and inequities, a society for whom liberation was achievable . The negative social characteristics identified by the authors were positive in that they provided the "dos" or points of advocacy for change by Mexican American organizations and activists. o sooner was the internal colony model articulated than it was contested, because it did not fully

::a

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fit the realities of a complex developed society and these realities, in any case, were changing. 10 A more potentially global and cosmopolitan possibility could be inferred or extrapolated from the rhetoric and literature of indigenist thought developed during the 196os-r97os. To be sure, the more complex development of this was to occur years later with the advantage of direct material and direct influences. Indigenous articulators from indigenous communities and pro-indigenist circles and groups in the United States linked into a network of indigenous groups across the hemi sphere. In the 1960s and 1970s, contrary to some exaggerations by critics of CCM, indigenismo among Chicanas and Chicanos, with notable exceptions, relied on limited English-language translations and the visible motifs and alleged style in the available visual Mesoarnerican representational arts. Early activists studied the works of academics such as Miguel Leon Portilla and Jack Forbes, who were particularly important; later, indigenistas had several Mexican scholars to draw from. Organizers obtained their books and circulated or mimeographed and disseminated their articles. At one campus, UCLA academics such as H. Nichols, R. Beals, and P. Carrasco, whose political affiliations were unknown, argued on behalf of indigenous recognitions and equities. Nichols provided a distinct view of Aztec society and also codex materials on Aztlan to Chicana and Chicano students, and the others in their classes urged students to be sensitive to the equities due indigenous peoples. Beals severely criticized the state of material vis-a-vis the indigenous and urged a reconstruction of historical narratives to account for Native presence through to the present. At other campuses there were likely similar faculty messengers. However, contrary to how indigenistas have been characterized, indigenist-inspired Chicana and Chicano activist intellectuals had no illusions about seeking to reconstruct the past of five hundred years ago. Their social visions were about the present and the future and certainly about the easily questioned faults of the present and potential ones of the future, if the present faults were not corrected. Indigenistas looked to the possibilities of a better future. They argued that an accurately informed sense of self, history, and community could strengthen the intellectual foundations of a future progressive society. For activists, two broad alternatives remained that had been there all along: Marxism and liberal pluralism. Quasi-Marxist operatives of white leftist groups regarded Chicana and Chicano critiques as simplistic, even "dumb," in part because of their supposed rejections of white ideas or writings. Actually, some Chicana and Chicano activists did

Better Times

read Marxist ideologues, both in English and Spanish, quite obviously, and clear Chicana and Chicano Marxist circles formed within or aligned with CCM. Chicana and Chicano activists criticized Marxism for what they saw as its obvious shortcomings and for its notable inapplicability-for example, Engels's classification of Native societies and his assertion that industrial workers were to be a vanguard. Until updated, this body of political literature critical of nineteenth-century European political economy, for some Chicanas and Chicanos, had little to say about the domination of non-European people by whites, about racism or sexism, or, for that matter, about the problematics of organizing in the complex multicultural contemporary United States. Chicanas and Chicanos found Marx odd for his praise of U.S. economics and politics during the mid- and late nineteenth century. Some of Marx's commentaries were judged racist and Eurocentric. Moreover, Marxist recipes for organizing were seen as simplistic for a country such as the United States in the 1960s and 1970s. Marxism, with some updating, worked okay as a critique for some, but its proffered solution-radical change led by energized workers-seemed unlikely to many, if taken to mean whites as a vanguard. In the United States, Chicanas and Chicanos did not foresee these scenarios being enacted. Understood as classless, earnings-less, and government-less, for many the basic Marxist future vision seemed overly simple and certainly hypothetical. Moreover, if socialism and certainly communism required perfect human beings, many Chicanas and Chicanos saw Marxist groups and their numbers duplicating the dominant society in their behaviors and biases. To be sure, some Chicana and Chicano activists took up Marxism, but with critical attitudes, and this was Marxism filtered through African, Asian, and Latin American theorists. Ultimately, for many, liberal plural ism-that is, organizing specific constituencies for specific reform and support-became the fallback position. The sanctioned demands are constitutional rights. Whatever currents existed for reform in the society at large, pluralist reform tenets and their directness appealed to the CCM audience in the face of increasingly aggressive and invidious conservatism among whites. In any case, there was no full acceptance for any proffered solution within the movement's national process. The CCM was a social process, neither a conspiracy nor a dream in a society not propitious for radical change. Activists had to make choices in serving their local constituencies, while paid overseers watched and sometimes interfaced with plans and dreams.

1

CHAPTER 19

Policing Police

A

s the events of the sixties and seventies unfolded, surveillance by government officials impacted CCM political developments, organizations, and leaderships. 1 FBI documentation has verified that police surveillance occurred among many groups, targeting many individuals throughout the Southwest. However, these materials do not provide the full picture of police activities. Selected and subjective reports outlined the scope and the subjects of police surveillance. Prosecutorial and police officials determined targets, devised strategies, and conducted tactics to weaken not only the militancy but also the political viability of organizations of all types and also individual activists. Covert activity occurred in tandem with the more visible and understood overt activity of indictments, arrests, and beatings . Police provocation to commit not only violent acts but, more frequently, to head counterproductive actions led to the promotion of dissension within groups and between groups as well as between individuals. Surveillance continued throughout the seventies, as did the more malignant tactic, which had become standard: the infiltration of groups and leadership. Several activities and activists within the United States drew stateside notice, but officials also followed activists abroad. As yet, there is no information on agencies establishing or training entire groups of militants from the inside out. On the basis of research results, apparently several movement groups and individua ls received intense governmental attention and, according to public news, police staged arrests and district attorneys instigated investigations. Police and prosecutors targeted education reforms and school strikes as they occurred and were also involved in initiating loca l issues protests. As local Chicanas and Chicanos stimulated organization in the communities around a number of high-visibility political issues, police 196

Policing Police

agencies followed. For police, one issue stood out: Chicana and Chicano activists denounced aggression in Vietnam, where Chicano casualties stood disproportionately to their number in the stateside population. Activists emphasized the brutality and aggressiveness of the war in conjunction with the need for establishing solidarity with the Vietnamese struggle for their national liberation. In the aftermath of the 1969 Denver conference, Chicana and Chicano antiwar activists organized a series of individual and group actions across the country around the Vietnam issues. These resulted in a larger set of efforts focused on draft counseling and draft resistance. Several Chicanos courageously became proactive draft resisters. Setting aside pro-peace antiwar articulations going back many years, the late sixties efforts were somewhat an innovation within CCM ranks in comparison to la bor, land, and service advocacies. The issue provided niches for organizing and leadership that added to the spectrum of CCM activities. These also contributed challenges in a more public and visible way than some other activities in regards to logistics and coordination. The 1970 National Chicano Moratorium activities represented a precedential effort against state agencies upholding social inequities for Mex.ican Americans and other peoples of color. 2 But its real potential was not in denouncing an unpopular war and a widely criticized draft system, but in its public statement of peoples' politics. Its potential was foretold in its logical populist resolution, already visible weeks before August 29, its mass celebration of peoples' empowerment, and its fiesta ambience so often commented upon but whose meaning is seldom reflected upon. The moratorium also represented a major practice of police and prosecutorial oppression and blatant law breaking by public officers involving conspiratorial joint planning by the Los Angeles County District Attorney, the Los Angeles Police command, and the Los Angeles County Sheriffs, probably joined by federal agencies. These were the real conspirators, not the vulnerable peoples' advocates and organizers seeking to express their first amendment rights. Foremost among them were District Attorney Evelle Younger and his assistant deputy district attorney R ichard Hecht, both key players involved in the indictments of the "LA-13," the prosecution of college activists at California State University, Northridge (CSUN), and the promotion of the conflict between the US organization founded by Maulana Karenga and the Black Panther Party at UCLA. Their activities exemplified the state's practice of criminalizing activists. Given the consequences, presumably these officials conspired to violate activists' constitutional

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rights and to bring about their arrests. Obviously rights were violated and unwarranted arrests were made . A notable organizing achievement on August 29, Chicano antiwar activists staged a large march and rally to protest U.S. intervention in Vietnam and to publicize the disproportionately high rate of Mexican casualties. Records indicated that approximately thirty thousand people attended the demonstration; more than an antiwar protest, the mobilization represented a significant public assembly in support of the Chicana and Chicano movement. Though a significant achievement, the moratorium also indicated the insufficiency of the leadership and organization, whose personnel, resources, and actual responses did not match the potential for raising political demands, given popular arousa l in this instance . The moratorium culminated the major momentum from the early sixties and signaled two more marked tendencies, a stress on ideology and on internationalism, but it also underscored a distinction between the militant and the reformist elements w ithin CCM that could be more clearly understood after August 29 than before. The moratorium differed in two aspects from spontaneous militant minority activity: it stemmed from conscious planning based on clearly perceived goals, and it revealed in its achievement the growing and potential strength of the activist sector. The unique historical and cultural context set the moratorium apart from protest actions in the country at the time. Although the moratorium drew obviously from the youth movement, as well as from the United Farm Workers and the Crusade, it differed from other CCM activity because it targeted the government-the state- rather than an institution or a locality. Its ethos emanated "power." The moratorium was preceded by, consisted of, and was followed by a unique sequence of organizing and protest activity, which led to an articulated militancy unmatched since the strikes of the 1930s and the people's reprisals of t he 1914-1916 period. Several underlying causes prompted the East Los Angeles protests of January r, February 28, August 29, and those that followed on September 16, 1970, and January 9 and 31, r97r. Protest actions responded to widely and deeply held grievances stemming from a long-term record of sufferances . Salient symbols, such as Aztlan, provided references emphasizing cultural roots and broadcasting the blatant and illegal actions of police agencies. Above all, however, these protests countered political subordination, "ya basta." Severa l convocations and preliminary marches, as well as the customary planning meetings, preceded the major march of August 29. An ad hoc committee engaging in intense

Policing Police

discussions directed these antiwar activities. The organization never developed membership stipulations or agendas, nor any structure or even an elected permanent leadership. Thus, the situation invited infiltration and manipulation. A January l, 1970, East Los Angeles protest, which involved supportive youth and older citizens from the immediate area around Whittier Boulevard and was not explicitly associated with moratorium organizing, indicated the Los Angeles public temper. 3 Reportedly about one hundred persons, primarily Mexicans, marched shouting movement slogans after a New Year celebration by a crowd of five thousand. During two hours, participants gathered and partied, and some sheriffs reported complaints of looting in the Whittier business district. While the actions occurred, sheriffs arrested eleven persons. A month later, on February 28, 1970, five thousand persons marched in the rain for three miles, receiving noticeable support from East Los Angeles residents. In March, at the second annual Chicano Liberation Conference held in Denver, a date was selected for the major march in Los Angeles. In addition, activists planned and staged marches in Fresno, Riverside, San Francisco, San Diego, Santa Barbara, San Antonio, Austin, Houston, and Chicago. Meanwhile, in Los Angeles, police agencies planned their efforts to curtail mobilizations by the Moratorium committee. Though interactive communication with Los Angeles County officials ranged from poor to nil because of official attitudes, the Moratorium Committee kept the police authorities fully informed of its intentions and programs. The committee provided for over two hundred monitors-many of them lawyers or law students as well as clergy-to accompany the marches and to maintain order. Sheriff's officials were to clear the parade route, communicate with the staff of the Moratorium committee, and direct traffic at cross streets. On August 29, 1970, approximately thirty thousand persons, mostly Chicanas and Chicanos but many others as well, attended the well-publicized National Chicano Moratorium March. Many representatives from Mexican American organizations across the Southwest supported the event and many attended. The march stressed resistance against the draft, commitment to social justice, and Chicana and Chicano rights within the United States. A subtext at stake was the denouncement of local officials and agencies' support for the imperialist projects of the late 1960s and their policing of civil-rights activists. The state response was immediate and consistent. Major public officials and

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police administrators denounced the large numbers of "militants" in Los Angeles, declaring that they were going to teach them a lesson. In contrast to the grotesque official intimidation, the people's rally, held at Laguna Park, had a festive air. At 2:30 p.m., police reported that a disturbance had erupted a block away from the park and rally. The sheriffs and Los Angeles police intervened; using the disturbance as an excuse, they ordered the crowd to disperse. The majority of the crowd could not hear the order; what the crowd saw were officers attacking with clubs and gas canisters. The sheriffs did not go to the center of the stage or use the microphone. Mistakenly encouraged or ordered by sheriffs, the march monitors urged the crowd back, causing confusion. Monitors should have confronted the aggressors for safety's sake and thus protected the participants, in particular the women and children, who were being rushed and pushed and, in some cases, trampled by police and sheriffs. Police immediately continued to move into the crowd, swinging clubs and firing tear-gas canisters. To their surprise, showing little fear, frontline resisters from the crowd, particularly the neighborhood youth, responded aggressively even though the open ground of the park put them in a disadvantaged position. The tactic emerged of drawing police down Whittier and using the cover of street stuff including trash cans, cars, and the advantage of side streets and corners to continually harass police. Protesters put one moving car out of action by driving large pieces of lumber through the windshield. Activists, using nearby houses with the support of residences as safe sites, ridiculed police as they passed down the streets. At the peak of the turmoil a dozen fires burned along Whittier Boulevard. The boulevard, from the park to the cemetery, was briefly cleared of sheriffs. About five hundred police were involved in the melee: forty officers were reported injured and twenty-five police cars put out of action, while three people were killed and four hundred arrested. The numbers of those injured are not known. There were scores, including those injured by deputies while in custody. The Castro family of Santa Monica reported the death of a relative after he was released from jail. Clashes with police also occurred in another area of Southern California. That same night, four policemen were shot in the Chicano area of Riverside's Casablanca district. Inspired by idealism, the moratorium climaxed in the terror of police brutality and the reality of blood-stained streets, but even so there were frontline proactive responses. Unaccustomed to large militant demonstrations within the Mexican community and unable to tolerate the

Policing Police

political expression of the march, local law-enforcement agencies overreacted, going beyond legality and even rationality. By nightfall, scores of demonstrators had been violently attacked by Los Angeles police officers. Three people were dead: Gilbert Dfaz (25), who was electrocuted while being pursued by the police; Lynn Ward (15), who died from wounds caused by a police canister; and the Los Angeles Times columnist Ruben Salazar (42), who was killed by a sheriff firing a missile at his head. The police singled out Corky Gonzales, Crusade's chairperson and an invited speaker, and arrested and jailed him, eventually sentencing him to several months jail time on a groundless charge. With the fervor that sometimes accompanies a crisis, youth in the Mexican community organized during the next several months, staging a series of demonstrations throughout Los Angeles. The momentum of the moratorium ebbed in a series of staged hearings conducted by Los Angeles County agencies and concentrated on the death of one person. Clearly, the hearings were a ploy. The hearings' results were predictable, given how they were controlled by officials and advised by police and prosecuting agencies. As was amply known, the verdict or judgment would be mediated by the county district attorney through one appointed "hearing officer" who managed the hearing directly. His only "power" was to bait community witnesses who, consistent with Los Angeles County district attorney practices, had no attorney to advise them while on the stand. There was neither a people's representative attorney, legitimate jury, nor an empowered legitimate judge, or, in fact, any rules of fa irness. The hearings emphasized that the moratorium participants were guilty of being activist Mexicans. This "hearing" was a farce and should have been declared so by the community leadership and responsible media, and its findings should have been declared null and void. The whole matter was farcical theater written, directed, and acted by the district attorney's office. No elected official came forth to demand an investigation of the actions and decisions by public offices that led to this egregious example of mass police and sheriff misconduct or to denounce the failure of the district attorney's office, led by Younger, to protect the rights of citizens and residents even if they were Mexican. Concurrently recriminations occurred among activists, as well as red-baiting by the heads of two Mexican American organizations. In vain, a few politically informed community organizers made calls to harness Chicano popular arousal and to direct it at city and country misgovernance in order to articulate community priorities. The lack of response by officials to the

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grievances of Chicanas and Chicanos stood in sharp contrast to their expressed concerns vis-a-vis black or white demonstrators when those groups complained about police misconduct. The moratorium could now be added to the Los Angeles litany of the Zoot Suit, Bloody Christmas, and Chavez Ravine travesties. As m entioned, moratorium rallies followed in the aftermath of August 29. After months of inconclusive gatherings, at a meeting at D-Q University in Sacramento, California, in June 1971, Ramses Noriega, a cofounder of the moratorium, called for a halt to further counterproductive actions, saying, "Aqui se quebro la taza, todos a su casa" (The cup is broken, go home). The injunction was to go forth and organize with the energy of the moratorium as the fuel, but in a variety of ways and with diverse objectives. Eventually, more structured and specifically targeted efforts followed from the moratorium. In California the movement's options, as they unfolded on the surface, entailed priorities among militant proactive protests, organizational developments, and electoral activities. To some, police or prosecutorial actions seemed far removed from the sanctioned electioneering so much commended in rhetoric. However, the possibilities of electioneering changes favoring Chicanos prompted negative investigative actions by agents whose jobs and power could be affected by electioneering results. The conspiracy to subvert Chicano rights had one result. The date August 29 and the memory of the march were immediately granted iconic status by the people themselves and by artists, beginning with David Siqueiros. Throughout the duration of the CCM, presumably most groups and activities received some police agency surveillance and interceptions of one kind or another. The major investigatory federal agencies continued to be active, but activities by local and state agencies remained more persistent and less noticed in a variety of ways. Conservative groups or entities gathered information on CCM activists and activities and also lobbied institutions, office holders, and police agencies against CCM activities. Negative speculations arose as to the practices of infiltrating undercover agents posing as activists who were jailed and then who used the acquired legitimacy as a vehicle for police needs. These were practices used in other countries. As has been documented in several instances and reported, informants and provocateurs appeared in several situations across the Southwest and several covert practices were employed. One was the practice of "bad-jacketing," deployed for neutralization of targeted activists. Less institutionalized efforts also took

Pol icing Police

place. Local police would identify someone on parole or under indictment or a person who had a dear relative in the power of the police and pressure them to act on behalf of the police in various ways. Sometimes, police agents antagonized activists for purely personal reasons, which Jed to internal strife. Police continually tried to collect recordings, photographs, notes, and files on movement activities or activists. Once officials seized or collected materials on CCM activities, they kept them and denied that they had them or claimed they were lost. In the instance of one midsize organization, there were over twenty informational reports obtainable through the Freedom of Information Act. Other larger or longer-lived organizations may have had more. Probably, as time goes by, information on these subversive actions will be made even more public than they already are. As far as public agency associated initiatives, many will be exposed; what may remain undisclosed are nongovernmental activities vis-a-vis movement activists and activities, such as those of ultraconservative groups. Certainly we have published and publically available information that police activity directed at African American and Native American activists had devastating consequences. Less known and understood were police interferences, which went beyond information gathering, harassments, arrests, or even shootouts and included seeking out information on organizational activities and even leadership in covert ways or targeting entire communities or constituencies. Presumably there may be further information on the cases of police-driven actions but, in all likelihood, little or no information ultimately on the political players who sought to do harm to movement efforts and individual activists through various strategies. The planning by district attorneys, police, county and state police agencies, and the happenstance of collaborative work with privileged media personnel was in itself egregious, but worse were the consequences in some specific and Lifelong ways . Writers regularly used nearly verbatim police agent accounts or descriptions of legal charges or interpretations of police arrests as the source or core of their journalistic descriptions. These counter-organizing practices had consequences. They certainly encouraged public views of police interceptions as exceptional rather than as a decipherable set of patterns. Far from being balanced and rather than being critical, journalists and newspapers regularly served police agency propagandist ends. In practice, these activities represented political patterns enacted by prosecutorial, police, and judiciary players against CCM activists not ever noted in the major press.

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Undisclosed or less known were thwarted police or prosecutorial efforts, when charges were \Vithdrawn or dismissed, which meant the full police agency plan or strategy did not unfold and thus remained unknown by activists. Many public matters targeting activists were visible only in part; activists did not know the whole of the suppressive strategy because the strategies were thwarted before their completion and, of course, for a strategy never reported there \\•as no public exposure. Moreover, practices of high police officials intimidating elected or organizational leaders occurred often in one way or another to politically injure movement efforts and spokespersons, and these were not reported even if the official rejected the overture. Presumably, some public officials did not respond to community concerns over police actions because of police pressure of one kind or another. Police, prosecutorial, and court actions had very telling effects. Cases transpired where police agents lured activists to their deaths, and family members of activists were persecuted, harassed, and intimidated-or worse. Instances of rape and harassment of female movement participants were reported. For those who suffered from police, informants, provocateurs, and indictments, the movement was not a party. The movement had one long-term political prisoner from the beginning, Richard Chavez Ortiz, and there were several cases of group charges instigated by district attorneys. All the major figures were persecuted, detained, or arrested several times, and their family members were also targeted, including wives, husbands, and offspring. In many demonstrations, police arrested from a dozen to scores and finally many were killed during the course of movement activities. In Colorado, >Jew Mexico, Texas, and California, several were brutally murdered, as in the case of Ricardo Falcon and the activists ambushed in Albuquerque, ew Mexico. In approaching the history of these strategies, the analytical problem at the onset was that police-generated material is tainted one way or another, thus affecting CCM analyses at several points and in several ways. We know very little about all of the above even after several dissertation studies and considerable amounts of agency materia ls gathered through the Freedom of Information Act. Police intervention, in its myriad forms, in the Chicana and Chicano movement revealed reactionary responses on the part of the state and its allies as consistent realities. Chicanas and Chicanos who used the means within the law to demand social change faced repressive state actions sometimes encouraged by some elements within the community who hid their ways, but activists had at least one civic way of contesting-electoral changes.

CHA PTER 20

Electioneering

A

fter the political surge of I960, a noticeable and gradual change occurred that affected Mexican American political sentiments for a short period of time. 1 Mexican American electoral politics reflected a complex set of dynamics shaped by national and local events. The biggest structural obstacles to greater electoral representation revolved around the realities of the customary political domination in the various ways of electoral politics by the two mega parties. In the Southwestern states, not particularly strong party leaders ran for and won elected office at the primary level. Anglo incumbents served many terms in office. The formation of organizations such as PASSO and MAPA and the Crystal City, Texas, elections of 1963, when five Mexicans were elected to the city council, signaled hitherto unprecedented Mexican American electioneering in South Texas. Indeed Mexicans did not always support their own candidates or even incumbents strongly. They did not always support someone who had favored them, and they did not always remove those who deserved electoral punishment. Moreover, in several places where Mexican Americans held office, CCM organizers criticized them as obstacles to community equities. Moreover, in several localities Mexican American voter registration and voter turnout remained weak when it could have been stronger even under discouraging circumstances . True voter patterns and electoral successes varied among regions of Mexican American voter concentration in the Southwest and Midwest. Electing Mexican Americans to office remained difficult in the 1960s and 1970s. When voter turnout increased in several places in more significant numbers than ever before, they voted for Mexican American candidates, but also for liberal, moderate, and even conservative Anglos. Eventually electioneering trends and electoral representations coalesced 205

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in the project to form a national Latino elected and appointed officials' organization in the seventies. Instead of electoral rhetoric and erratic voter registration drives, an organization with a new type of politics and proactive dissent began to attract the attention of some l\llexican Americans in several states, a trend particularly vibrant in Texas. Over time, electoral politics followed several tracts. But in Texas, as elsewhere, some of the innovations unfolded within the Democratic party while others sought radical alternatives. La Raza Unida Party advocated for an autonomous political representation for Mexican Americans. 2 This electoral organization arose in 1967 from the Mexican American Youth Organization (MAYO) in San Antonio and south Texas, whose leadership was, from the first, heavily influenced by Jose Angel Gutierrez, a well-educated son of a professional family. Gutierrez, Mario Compean, Ignacio Nacho Perez, and Willie Velasquez-all members of MAYO in the late sixties-conceived a program called the Winter Garden Project (1969), which sought to redirect political, social, and economic resources in a ten-county south Texas area to benefit residents and ultimately to maximize Mexican political representation. This project received support from the Ford Foundation and later from VISTA and the Office of Equal Opportunity (OEO), both federal projects. Initially La Raza Unida Texas principally targeted the electoral possibilities of the Crystal City, Texas, local council and school board. Activists had identified these possibilities through an earlier Political Association of Spanish-Speaking Organizations (PASSO) effort of 1963. In 1970, LRUP won three school board seats and two on the city council. Once again, the Mexicans won elected voices on the Crystal City council and school board. The impetus eventually extended to the mayor's office and the county despite the Anglo-controlled economy and politics in this area of Texas, whose population was over twelve thousand. LRUP also won in the south Texas townships of Cotulla and Carrizo Springs. LRUP, a rising force between 1970 and 1972, won additional positions in Crystal City, Cotulla, and Carrizo Springs.3 Activists initiated registration drives throughout Zavala, Dimmit, La Salle, and Hidalgo counties. These drives increased the party's adherents. The party convention of October 30, 1971, voted to field state candidates who opposed the alternate, a contrasting strategy to develop greater strength at the south Texas regional level. On June ro, 1972, LRUP held the first nomination convention with five hundred delegates from twenty-five

Electioneering

counties in San Antonio. The delegates named the respected Mario Compean state chairman and elected a slate of candidates headed by Ramsey Muniz, a young attorney running for governor; they also elected a slate of candidates for selected counties. The effort produced 215,000 votes, an excellent turnout. In Zavala County, LRUP won the races for sheriff and county attorney, as well as one county commissioner seat. Chicana women actively participated in the LRUP. While traditional party politics largely excluded women, LRUP became a site for gender contestation and empowerment. In July 1970, Martha Cotera led a women's informed caucus at the Raza Unida Conference in Austin, Texas. Women such as Martha Cotera, Yolanda Birdwell, Carmen Lomas Garza, and Gloria Guardiola led democratizing impulses within LRUP by advocating for women's leadership opportunities. Martha Cotera became the first women's candidate for the Twenty-Third Congressional District in 1972. Even while participating in LRUP, Chicana women continued to push their own political lines by advocating for gender equality. Chicanas organized the Mujeres Pro-Raza Unida Conference on August 4, 1973· Conference organizers pushed for Chicana representation at all levels of LRUP as ,..,ell as among candidates for elected office. Women organizers at the August 4 event included Ino Alvarez, Chelo Avila, Evey Chapa, Martha Cotera, Juanita Ivera, and Irma Mireles. LRUP women put forth Alma Canales as the youngest women's candidate for the office of lieutenant governor of Texas. Virginia .M uzquiz served as the national head of LRUP from 1972 to 1974· In February 1974 six LRUP women ran for political office in Crystal City. Later Maria Elena Martinez won the Texas LRUP chairpersonship in 1978. At one time, La Raza Unida Party was heralded as the political form of the Chicana and Chicano movement. In fact, LRUP only partially represented the movement and only partially realized its protean potential. LRUP drew upon the work of PASSO and MAYO, the civil-rights activity of the sixties, the heritage of Mexican-Anglo relations in Texas, and certain past electoral efforts associated with Democrat candidates in Texas. LRUP's membership was drawn from the smaller towns in South Texas and from the San Antonio area as well as from the lower middle class and students, including some workers and older citizens. In practice, LRUP emphasized citizen and voter rights. In effect, LRUP combined historical antecedents, civil rights organizing techniques, and Alinskyean methods with a heavy component of ethnic cultural identification and regional pride, which some characterized as "nationalism."

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With sound reasoning, the "party" originally sought to mobilize in areas where Mexicans made up the majority population. South Texas represented LRUP's primary social base. Expanding beyond this region, as the party attempted to do, was either not entirely and effectively possible or premature for the moment. In any case, statewide and national organizing caused tensions and disarray within the group. Party protestations to the contrary, LRUP remained local, electorally focused, and very much dependent on the leadership of Jose Angel Gutierrez; while liberal, the party was short on analysis, ideas, organizational discipline, and structure. As long as the party remained restricted to South Texas and opposed only by archaic Democrats or by "movement" figures whose following was even more limited than LRUP's, such shortcomings were not starkly apparent. Its electoral emphasis led to propagating the two-party system as the source of domination and elevated the question of electoral participation and party loyalty to the level of principle rather than that of a conditional strategy or of circumstantial tactics. Actually, new electoral players benefitted from this stress in the sense that the advocation of changes in party lineups were offered as the route for change. Nationally the concept of La Raza Unida Party model spread. 4 It had spread since r967, when the Plan de La Raza Unida materialized in El Paso, Texas. Party-building efforts and participation by Mexicans traced back to the Partido del Pueblo of the l88os and the Partido Liberal Mexicano of the l9IOS. In addition, there were the more contemporary existing third parties such as the Partido Constitucional del Pueblo, the Peace and Freedom Party, and various left "parties," whether claiming to be socialist or communist. The left's "party-building" efforts were the immediate inciters; no one took note of how uneven these efforts were, including those of the Black Panther Party (BPP). In fact, LRUP's envisioned potential had no precedent in the United States. LRUP caught the imagination of Chicana and Chicano activists across the country; many were outgrowing, or graduating from, student organizations while others were leaving the stage of pseudo paramilitary regalia. LRUP's orga· nizing committees began to function in the spring of r970 in Texas and Colorado, in 1971 in California, and, by 1972, in New Mexico and Arizona. A testament to its appeal, by 1972 nineteen states, including the District of Columbia, bad formed La Raza Unida Party organizations. At the insistence of many adherents, in particular Corky Gonzales, members called for a national convention. Representatives from

Electioneering

eighteen states and the District of Columbia responded. Student activists, movement newspapers, defense groups, and the remnants of the Alianza and the Crusade for Justice were particularly responsive. The Crusade's leverage on LRUP would have been perhaps far different had the party been launched at the National Chicano Youth Conference of 1969 held in Denver or the one in 1970. The facts for many were that the Raza Unida Party model was associated with Texas initiatives and achievements, many activists in different parts of the country had Texas ties, and, importantly, since 1971 had been elected school board members. The de facto Raza Unida Party national organizer had been appointed urban federal commissioner. Moreover, Gutierrez initiated the notion to have the party headed by a senior leadership consisting of Cesar Chavez, R. Lopez Tijerina, R. Corky Gonzales, and himself. For several reasons there were only two viable candidacies, Gutierrez and Gonzales. In any case, members of these groups came together in a convention of three thousand delegates, some quartered at El Paso de! Norte Hotel, on September l, 1972, to "declare" the organization of the National La Raza Unida Party. 5 Women made up nearly half of the attendees. Two factions contended: the Raza Unida-MAYO Crystal City group and its allies, and the Crusade and its allies. The California, New Mexico, and Midwest contingents stood in between the two factions with delegates favoring one or the other or neither. As a whole, these delegates were not clearly identified as being in one camp or another. Individuals trying to become peacemakers or brokers ended up being considered questionable by the two contending elements. From one criterion, the opposing factions could be seen as consisting of various subgroups: an ideologically left element versus an ideologically liberal element. In practice they were both reformist, program-oriented persons versus populist organizers, visionaries versus pragmatists. Anti-Marxism was common among convention participants and the nonleft element actually predominated. The timing of the convention occurred in the midst of one of the more clearly articulated and ideologically partisan election campaigns waged between the forces of progressive liberalism (those of Senator George McGovern) and right conservatism {those of President Richard ixon). In regard to electioneering, the proposed party was seen as an electoral vehicle by some and by others as an ideological force to influence the articulation of issues and the operationalization of popular forces. Seemingly, the LRUP, as a party inspired by electoral hopes and motivated by electoral gains in two counties in South Texas,

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was dependent electorally on citizens and voters with generational, familiar, and residential ties. Actually the debate was not clear. A redundant compromise was proposed that was available in the I969 statement: where Chicanos were a majority, they elected; where they comprised a minority, they secured influence. This vacuous statement answered no real questions of real local politics. With all the populist rhetoric, insufficient attention was given to the opposing view of whether the "party" in practice was inclusive or exclusive of diverse movement elements and what really was a party, which is both an interpretive and ideological question . At the end of the four-day convention, the following resulted from La Raza Unida convention: no candidate was endorsed for president in the regular national elections; Jose Angel Gutierrez was chosen party chairman over Corky Gonzales; a Congreso de Aztlan was to represent literally and figuratively "the nation," and was ostensibly established with Gonzales as presiding officer. What had basically been decided and acted upon was a split in the party, one presented from the first in the opening activities of the convention. All sides felt that they were in the right, and so all of them were aggrieved. There \'Vere no permanent operating funds, no office quarters, no staff, and no operative authority. For the length of the party's short national public viability, Jose Angel Gutierrez served as chair and Corky Gonzales was appointed to the presidency; shortly thereafter Gonzales resigned. History and national leadership had been stymied. Eventually, when Gutierrez chose to vacate the national chair office, another person, a woman, was designated. Party activists remained locally focused; nevertheless the national effort remained a worthy and important aspiration. The preamble of La Raza Unida, stating its principles and its thirtyone-plank platform, went slightly beyond El Plan de Aztlan. Not unexpectedly, since this document was forged three years later, the LRUP document supported a guaranteed annual income, national health insurance, no land taxation, bilingual education, parity in federal employment, an increase in admissions to medical schools, parity in jury selections, support for organizing farm workers, women's equa lity, worker's rights, and a call for the enforcement of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. Somewhat redundantly, it also declared its "independence" from the traditional parties. However, the preamble consisted mainly of system demands and participation guidelines, many of which later were contradicted by LRUP actions. The uncertainty as to what LRUP had become was evident in the preamble of LRUP's statewide Texas

Electioneering

program. The Texas program laid the basis for subsequent statements issued from the 1972 El Paso conference. These statements were not only incomplete, they were nor responsive to the circumstances of the moment, and no memorable statement was sounded during this conference. In the 1970s, as the new party emerged somewhat in Colorado and more in Texas, LRUP seemed to some Chicano leaders elsewhere to offer them the possibility of expanding their political voice by countering the dominance of the two major parties. In several states certain candidates ran for office by espousing the ideals of La Raza Unida as their platform, but they were a lso fueled by resentment directed at entrenched leadership in the two major parties. In fact, Chicanas and Chicanos took the lead in criticizing the practices and priorities of Democrats and Republicans, which certainly deserved critical questioning. The two-party dominant system protected the law, the courts, the media, and the wealthy. In practice, the majority of Mexican voters had been convinced that the existing flawed two-party arrangement was the norm for electoral choices, but many of these voters also believed the two parties ignored their needs. Moreover, since the 1960 general election they had become more invested than ever in the Democrats. Mexican American voters, in effect, had been targeted in an unprecedented effort by a national candidate, sometimes over the lead of standing party arrangements; they were targeted again in 1968, 1972, and r978 even more than they had been in r960. In response, LRUP activists denounced electioneering racist biases; the system was poor for nearly everyone other than the power holders. Focusing on criticism of the two-party system was or should have been LRUP's national task. LRUP victories proclaimed in Colorado and New Mexico did not comprise 20 percent or better of the electorate; these showings simply were not electorally significant. 6 However, the visible numbers of seven thousand votes in Denver and twenty-four thousand statewide indicate a committed base. La Raza Unida efforts in New Mexico, beginning in 1972, were focused on Bernalillo and San Miguel counties. Some community members, youth as well as Socialist Workers Party (SWP) members, were involved; in fact, some who claimed to be LRUP were actually SWP members before LRUP and after LRUP. In one county, LRUP garnered some two hundred votes and lost to the traditional party candidates. In 1974, they were more successful with 25 percent of the vote, though they split the community vote, which resulted in an uncommon development: the victory of a white conservative in the race

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Chapter 20

for a normally Mexican-held Board of Education liberal seat. In the 1974 New Mexico elections, the core group set aside its LRUP identity and ran as the "Pueblo Unido." Although the liberal Chicanos lost and three conservatives, rwo Anglos, and one Hispano won, LRUP proclaimed a victory with an 8 percent vote total for municipal seats. Some victory. Juan Pena was the last designated LRUP national officer and he thereafter confessed his closeness to the SWP lines, of which he had been an ardent defender for years, which defense he rationalized as his practice for self-determination. LRUP could not claim in all seriousness that it contributed to New Mexico politics simply because La Raza discourse and participation, both right and left, were long present in this state. The failure to gain the required number of signatures in Arizona , a state with a strong concentration of Mexicans, was one more setback to the recognition of La Raza Unida as a plausible national electoral party. Salvador Baldenegro ran for the city council seat in solidly Mexican American west Tucson and lost decisively. The disappointments here along with those of Colorado and New Mexico meant that no so lid supportive block developed in the Southwest. The Midwest activities, whether in Illinois, Wisconsin, Michigan, or Ohio, were enthusiastic and, at the base, well led, but the numbers were not there in absolute or relative measures. Here because of Texas ties, LRUP did clearly sow the ground for the future, in that their experiences and enthusiasm resonated in Chicana and Chicano activities to follow for years in constructive ways. A likely viable national party had to be strong in populous California. In 1970, Oscar Zeta Acosta, a respected movement attorney, ran for sheriff of Los Angeles County and garnered 100,000 votes. Jn California events plainly exhibited not only the limitations of La Raza Unida's electoral party concept but also the limitations of leadership outside Texas. LRUP organizing efforts moved forward in California fairly quickly but also unevenly. In 1971, activists identified the goal to register some 66,ooo members by the end of the year, which would qualify the party for the 1972 primary and general elections, the route to being a state party and force. They registered approximately a third of the votes necessary. In the very large community of East Los Angeles, the bedrock of the Southern California movement, the high point in one contest was seven thousand votes, and party organizers experienced difficulty in organizing rallies. In the best race the LRUP received 6 percent versus 46 percent for the democrat, and in the worst it received a low vote

Electioneering against a weakened democratic candidate who won. The campaign for a city of East Los Angeles should have been won because some polling had the yes side ahead at the beginning. This effort also provided a unique possibility for a multiethnic coalition. East L.A. cityhood lost by roughly 60 percent to 40 percent, which could be read as losing rather than increasing votes during the campaign. LRUP did not improve in demographic areas in which they should have had a strong base. California evidenced mixed results. When the Black Panther Party ran Bobby Seale for mayor of Oakland and Elaine Brown for City Council, he secured 45 percent of the vote and she 37 percent. It was a significant showing- clearly their candidacies impacted the black community. Alongside community members, supposedly Chicana and Chicano students made up key adherents. California LRUP did not even secure a majority support among students or the endorsement of most student organizations, and in any case the building of a viable base obviously should have been in the community. Moreover, sometime in 1973, many activist students turned to the left or to now conventional electoral forms and objectives. Certainly, the students who had career interests in electoral politics left LRUP believing it a dead end. In California, the CCM was quickening the political pulse, participation, and, to some extent, political visibility of the community. LRUP contributed modestly to CCM political impact, however no nationally visible leaders or campaigns emerged though there were several high-tension issues. The darkening panorama of La Raza Unida nationally was foreclosed by Colorado activists' 1974 split from the national LRUP. Eventually, by the midseventies, electoral disintegration of LRUP became evident when in Crystal City, Texas, the LRUP split into subgroups. There and elsewhere, La Raza Unida Party was an idea whose time had come and had momentarily served. ow when the community, deprived of a voice for so long, elected its candidates, they were not from La Raza Unida, which in some cases meant less community accountability by these candidates. By the midseventies this third-party option disintegrated and for the next two decades would not be revived meaningfully until the advent of the Ralph Nader campaigns. La Raza Unida could have been a leader for third-party politics across the country. Nevertheless, the momentum for Mexican American representation continued through the seventies, and both LRUP adherents and Democrats shared in it, with the impetus for greater representation provided by movement persons. Particularly notable among them were

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women politicas at one time affiliated with LRUP or close to its lines. Clearly, La Raza Unida contributed to a more accessible, more representative, and indeed more participatory electoral context in several states and civic deployments. In this quest allies were important, and for Mexican American equities, churches could and did have some leverage.

CHAPTER 21

Church Choirs

hurches were omni-visible in communities and were primarily concerned with religious services to their parishioners and members of the congregation and, of course, with collecting money for themselves and their mother institutional affiliations. 1 Here and there, a clerical person or even a parish might briefly flash as socially or politically concerned. Generally, church people were moderate to conservative and quite pro- status quo, provided the status quo protected them and bowed in their direction once a year. The Christian church as an institution provided an interactive and continuous bridge benveen social sectors. The churches were multifaceted in their activities, from the religious to the political. The Protestant churches, especially the Episcopalian, Methodist, Baptist, and Presbyterian, mobilized resources and support to alleviate urban problems. In contrast to the Catholic Church, Protestant clergy often were more socialJy sensitive and more politically skillful. Many of them were part of the leadership establishment in the community and were linked to them by kinship. Efforts by the Protestant churches, especially by the Presbyterians, were directed at farm workers as well as urbanites. The migrant ministry, established as a vehicle to provide support to traveling crews of farm workers, attempted to solve problems as they arose while also seeking to bring Mexicans within the Protestant fold and to enhance its constituents. Protestant churches directed their energies toward support and social services and also lobbied for some social reforms within the political system. Similarly, but for a lesser period, the Catholic Church carried out initiatives, but often in the past it had taken the Mexican Catholic allegiance for granted. After years of neglecting the social ills of the Mexican community and after facing confrontations, the Catholic

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Church, influenced by Pope John XXIII and the Vatican Council, reinvigorated the Bishop's Committee for the Spanish speaking that had been established in the 1940s. Founded in 1948, the Secretariat for H ispanic Affairs has been increasingly active since the midseventies. The group essentially functioned for Mexicans at the national political level as a lobby and support group. Their efforts on behalf of the NFWA and of migrant labor generally were important in ameliorating the farm worker's social and economic situation. One major and potential institutional conflict remained latent: the common pro-choice position of women's groups led to some polemics with the church. Christian church efforts on behalf of several CCM-associated projects occurred through the 1970s. Several churches engaged the UFW and migrant labor generally and assisted somewhat in ameliorating the farm worker's social and economic situation. 2 The support of Protestant churches looms large because Catholic support was so modest. Mexican and Latino Christians comprised an increasingly important constituency for the U.S. Catholic church at a time when some churches debated social issues at least moderately. A few radical theological groups emerged to promote discourse on Mexican issues. Their energies have been directed more toward a continuing dialogue and theoretical discussion on the potential intersections of Christianity and socialism, while stressing so-called Christian humanism. Others concentrated on interdenominational cooperation and social issues in Latin America, particularly Central America. The discourse emphasized social solidarity and mutually supportive action for quality of life as well as spirituality expressed in daily life. The more ideological took up the dialogue of liberation theology while others focused on Protestant-Catholic relations in specific localities. Some activists sought financial support primarily, as several churches had grant-making offices and, in some cases, were the only available source of monies, resources, space, and endorsement. Specific congregations did extend help. In any case, some progressive clergy remained visible on some community issues, whether Protestant or Catholic, but for the most part churches, ministers, and congregations were conservative . Moreover, Mexicans were institutional orphans of their main church membership. Catholic Chicano activists did not have "their" Christian church as a bulwark for "their" civil rights or for "their" greater public services. Developments within the Catholic Church and some outside of it moved the institution toward a more attentive position. Stemming from an impetus at San Antonio, Texas, and from Bishop

Church Choirs

(later Archbishop) Patrick Flores, concerned religious Mexicans organized in 1969 to form their own national organization, Padres Asociados para Derechos Religiosos, Educativos y Sociales (PADRES). Importantly, they agitated for pro-Latino change within the church and also expressed reform-advocacy tendencies . Out of this group came several elected Mexican bishops of the seventies and eighties, including the Archbishop of New Mexico, Robert Sanchez. In the mideighties, among the nearly three hundred bishops in the United States, the Mexican bishops numbered eighteen, divided evenly between liberals and moderates. Among their main activities, they focused on strengthening their presence and increasing their numbers in the church. But more, their activities included giving salient support to the UFW. They also provided some lobbying for the improvement of social and educational conditions in the Mexican communities. Some staunchly stood for ending discriminatory practices by government law-enforcement agencies. They also contributed to major efforts on behalf of immigrant rights. PADRES addressed the significance of cultural and community un ity from a perspective that emphasized the strength of religious beliefs and an association with the church as an institution. In an attempt to agree on agendas of action, PADRES held several national and regional encuentros, convocations of religious and lay persons, into the 1980s. Groups of nuns and laypersons also formed around progressive social causes . During April 2-4, 19 71, Las Hermanas, the Sisters, formed in Houston, Texas . The main promoters were two sisters, Gregoria Ortega (Victory Knoll) and Gloria Gallardo (Holy Ghost). This group, though certainly concerned with gender and race issues, initially targeted issues of poverty. The national and international networking of this "Chicana" religious group was notable. Members included Mexican and Latina nuns dedicated to pro-people services and advocacy and also religious propagation. Lay Catholic people also formed various groups. Years later, the 1986 pastoral statement, "Catholic Social Teaching and the United States Economy," reflected a reasonably socially conscientious statement voicing a commitment to economic and social justice, as well as to international peace. In one Southwest city, the most sensational effort to shake the church and galvanize its energies on behalf of Chicanas and Chicanos began as early as 1968 and, certainly, by 1969, and lasted two years. At San Diego, California, community and student activists staged demonstrations and sit-ins, proposing that the Catholic order, as well as the sponsoring bishop of the order, cede buildings and grounds to the community

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for a center. Styling themselves "Cat61icos por el Pueblo," though some stated "Raza," they gained their demand. Later, two or three groups in contact with La Raza Publications in Los Angeles considered protests against the Catholic Church officials for their indifference to the needs of the Mexican American community. Included among veteran community activists critical of the church were experienced women activists, including Alicia Escalante, and, among the men, Joe Razo, Richard Martinez, and Antonio Salazar. They researched the matter and secured some support. Eventually members of these groups came together and worked to minimize their differences. These activists, as well as others, believed that churches were major institutions with major resources and that these resources should be made available for community needs; even Cesar Chavez had said as much. The law student among these activists printed a publication as ambiguous as any as to what its aim was;]usticia O? was soon dubbed by other activists the "y que?-nada" publication. The militant direct actions used by Cat6licos por La Raza against the Catholic Church policies and hierarchy in Los Angeles, California, on Christmas Day in 1969 had clear purposes. They wanted to expose the church's indifference as a public institution and they wanted resources. What was not clarified was how and who specifically they would confront. The demonstrators acted, were indicted and tried, and received unwarranted and unusually harsh prison sentences. Some thought that by playing the role of pious devotees, hands clasped in prayer and eyes rolled in supplication, the authorities they protested against would be lenient. They were not. Moreover the church did not respond to the protestors publically. More to the point, critical Catholics wondered about disrupting a Christmas Day mass as the main instrument of public pressure. Obviously, there was an array of options available. Moreover, there was a potential constituency critical of the church. Members of Cat61icos por La Raza split bitterly and the group disintegrated. Others continued pressures on the churches in less bold and theatrical manners. Church-affiliated organizations such as United Neighborhoods Organization (UNO), begun in 1975, and Communities Organized for Public Services (COPS), established in 1974, arose in California and Texas, respectively. 3 These important organizational developments illustrated parallel but distinct thrusts. In the late seventies and eighties, these organizations were community entities closest to being mass organizations. To some extent, they reproduced in other areas, such as in El Paso lnterreligious Sponsoring Organization (EPISO) and Valley

Church Choirs

Interfaith. Given the ineffectiveness of democratic electoral participation in the United States and the tendency for a self-serving leadership to control organizations, organizing the local residents represented a radical occurrence and always a vulnerable one. Christian church activists, whether Catholic or Protestant, favored certain approaches or tactics when they did engage in public advocacy. These efforts have been explicitly reformist and incremental in their position and Alinskyean in their methods. They have consistently and ostensibly eschewed ideology and partisanship per se. Since the forties, the basic precepts of an approach to the organizing of low-income persons, influenced by the training methods of Saul Alinsky and associated with the Industrial Areas Foundation, have been known and practiced in some Mexican American community organizing. In truth, the basic methods ascribed to Alinsky are dos and don'ts common to a particular kind of local organizing. They require: (r) a full-time organizer, trained but dependent on local support; (2) identification of a set of issues by informal polling, and the selection of the one with the most agitational potential and the lowest risks; (3 ) tactical fluidity, several optional tactics, and readiness to change them; (4) the building of a local committee and eventually a limited multiorganizational coalition; and (5) nonpartisan, nonideological, even nonethnic discourse and, if need be, aggressive action to keep this so. Churches, the Industrial Areas Foundation, and Alinsky maintained a partnership for years, dating back at least to the Community Service Organization (CSO) in the forties and continuing through the r97os. In the eighties, these COPS-UNO chapters grew extensively and secured measurable gains in local as well as statewide reforms. They definitely enhanced the empowerment of local residents and balanced the influence of other forces. They also enriched the influence of the church. In effect, as reformist centrists, they had the potential of moving to the right or to the left. Similar organizations were established in several areas in the Southwest. Churches, both directly and indirectly, in some cases offered other options for community cohesion and articulation.

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CHAPTER 22

New Options

rom the late sixties through the seventies, Marxist structurally oriented economic critiques of the Mexican American reality gained ascendancy among activists as the tendencies of utopian indigenismo, romanticized culturalism, and Alinskyean activism seemingly spread. Among these perspectives, particularly striking as a contrast to Marxist critique and as social critique, appeared a rudimentary indigenismo. From several sources in the late sixties, a growing number of Mexicano youth developed a deepening awareness and respect for the historical Native American societies as well as for their continuing contemporary cultural heritages.1 In effect, more than simply factually enriching historical or ethnographic contexts, the initial indigenismo informed articulators influenced by spiritual and ideological leanings of some of CCM's artists and associated politicos. Mexican youth devotion to ative American lore was not simply a passing fad stimulated by a book or film, as continuities of this devotion over years would demonstrate. The focus on the Native American past and present heritage reflected desires on the part of individuals and groups to better understand the historical and contemporary world in preparation for changing it. Some teatro and danza groups and associated individuals expressed this tendency in particular. The trend matured and flowered much later, after the early seventies . The work of Maestro Andres Segura during 1977 in Austin, Texas, which included Ines Hernandez and other pro-indigenistas, punctuated this CCM ideological development. However, more publicly visible than native heritage leanings, some critiques of society condensed into a modestly growing Marxist current within the Mexican community, one that numbered the major various :M arxist tendencies. 2 The extent and commitment within this rrend

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varied by individual and organization. For some, Marxism remained an intellectual trend to be familiar with, a philosophical critique of the society and particularly of its "hegemonic culture." For others, it became the conceptual framework for examining the :rv1exican experience critically in a more specific and extensive manner. For still others, Marxism represented an ideology combining analysis with a guide to political action and organizational structure. Among the cadre of the activist left existed members of the generations of the sixties and seventies as well as Marxists from the forties and fifties. The ideological commonality of the left notwithstanding, the social makeup of activists varied. A good part of this U.S. Mexican left had no specific organizational allegiance, but some of it did, and among these a distinction was drawn between those groups stemming from the community and those organizationally located outside it. Organized groups presented their views and visions in debates centered on "the national question" related to Mexican Americans, whose central focus remained the allegedly arguable point of whether Mexicans as a group have the right to self-determination. 3 During the seventies, a saliently militant organization emerged in the Mexican community that raised the question of group cohesion and group rights to new levels. Centro de Accio n Social Aut6nomaHermandad General de Trabajadores (CASA-HGT) arguably traced its roots to 1950s' pro-immigrant efforts, in particular La Hermandad Mexicana Nacional (HMN) based in San Diego, California. 4 Led at the beginning by Bert Corona, Chole Alatorre, Estella Garcia, Juan Mariscal, and others, the group emphasized immigrant services and rights. Over time this group incorporated organizational influences from left activists in Mexico and Puerto Rico and also activists from the youth movements of the 1960s. In CASA's immigrant services phase, the membership reached four thousand women and men, nearly all workers or from workers' families. In comparison to youth or professional groupings then active, CASA's broad base was an important feature of its membership character at the time. The formation of CASA changed in the early 1970s. Led by a more ideologically leadership-based group in Los Angeles, west of downtown, which included senior and younger activists, CASA eventually developed several chapters in other parts of the state and country. A printed, clear, and specific Reglamento offered guidance to members. Though many materia ls were analyzed, study groups favored Lenin. As CASA evolved, particularly in Los Angeles, linked groups

Chapter 22

were first Casa de Carnalismo (1969) and later Comite to Free Los Tres (197 3) and Comite Estudiantil del Pueblo (1974). Over time, the reformed CASA base eventually included young workers, some professionals, some students, and certainly women, mostly of Mexican origin although CASA included others- Jews, Anglos, Blacks, and various Latin Americans, among others. To be sure, some nuances differentiated CASA in Los Angeles from the other chapters, for example, the San Jose, Chicago, and San Antonio units, whose internal dynamics differed from those of Los Angeles central. Moreover, within the overall membership there existed some operational differences as to the goals, tactics, and priorities to be emphasized. In any case, CASA leaders and members projected themselves as being different and more effective than other groups and recruited members on these premises . They also publicized their activities more so than other left formations. Outsiders claimed CASA members cultivated a certain way of presenting and articulating issues and themselves. Stressing class and nationality dynamics for a time, the CASA organization indicated a more pronounced but nevertheless developing national and class consciousness among activists within the Mexican people in the United States. CASA reflected upon the possibility of radical social change in the United States. One possibility was that it could be linked to an international liberation movement related to worker-based organizing including workers in the United States. Consequentially and contextually, CASA's critique and vision was global and hemispheric, while consciously its organizing projects were local and specific. Their vision emphatically focused on a possible socialist world and not a nation-state. Among other concepts, CASA proceeded from the operational idea that Mexican workers, regardless of which side of the border they were born on, experienced the same exploitation under capitalism and that they responded with opposition to this exploitation. In community political mobilization, they stressed working-class interests and worker unity based on shared exploitation and class culture focused on selected progressive issues. They believed in advocating for effective international solidarity and in working with organized and spontaneous community mobilizations. CASA leaders sought nonorganized workers, militant unions, rank-and-file membership, and also politically conscious but nonorganizationally affiliated individuals. Their effective labor organizing and their ties with other Latino organizations, such as those of Marxist sympathies, that is, the Puerto Rican Socialist Party, in civil rights work were important. CASA continually devoted special attention

New Options

to transborder labor issues, unionizing drives, economic changes, and political developments and established precedent-setting relations with progressive groups in Mexico. Consultations occurred with activists in Puerto Rico and elsewhere. CASA leaders premised their political efforts on their disciplined membership and internal education as well as their direct and integral ties to the local community in which they resided and in which they worked. In the early and midseventies, CASA's sensitivity in political deployment to tactics and propaganda and to Mexican workers' culture and their relationship with Mexico made them post-I96os innovators in mass organizing in comparison to other groups in California. They also devoted attention to being financially self-supporting as an organization. Within a few years, CASA achieved a significant record of moderate successes. They pushed forward ideological and organizational development by providing mi litant leadership in a wide set of activities nationally and in Los Angeles. Their work underscored the Mexican community as one of the most important sectors in mobilizing workers nationally. The newspaper Sin Fronteras was clearly the best militant print organ of the CCM of the early and midseventies. CASA identified two key issues: strengthening national consciousness and organizing on behalf of workers, including the rights of undocumented workers. These key points furthered the militant direction that CASA aspired to realize through organizing the Mexican worker and through fomenting selected political activity. Eventually, as CASA-related worker organizing proceeded, a whole range of organizational questions remained unclear. This burden of unresolved questions was perhaps not so imminent a charge because of the efficiency and effectiveness of several of its activities. Actually, the major problems of internal coherence and accountable leadership went beyond debates and actions of organizational "on line" matters. This involved confronting theoretical, strategic, and tactical issues. Some argued that ethical concerns were as important as matters of deployment for a group representing a national minority within the United States and one seeking to organize immigrants from an increasingly diverse, complex, and changing Mexico. The theory was that CASA, given the organization it envisioned being, was too dependent on dated theoretica l and tactical materials inspired by I 9JOS and I96os experiences, both in regard to the U.S. world mobilizations and Mexico, at a time when left organizations were undergoing theoretical and organizational changes. CASA members debated the woman question in an ideologically

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informed and coherent manner, as they debated other questions such as worker rights. However, CASA did not deal with the woman question adequately and fully. This was, in part, because of how it was constituted operationally: it was hierarchically structured, consensus discreet, and project determined. Clearly women were important and visible. Cofounded at the beginning by the redoubtable organizer Chole Alatorre, who left after the reorganization, there were two women who were visibly respected within the organization during its lifetime: Isabel Hernandez Rodriguez, the female head of the Rodriguez family, and her daughter, Isabel Rodriguez, an attorney. Certainly, several women members, as in other groupings, worked indefatigably for the group, particularly in worker organizing and publishing responsibilities. Two examples of women organizers were Magdalena Mora and Adelaida R. Del Castillo. There was a paradox: women were vital and salient, yet some members repeatedly questioned gender relations within the organization. Unlike the complaints in black and white groups about how women were treated as sexual objects in CASA, the expectations and practices were of courteous manners between women and men. Since there were visible divisions in the leadership and membership, including women members, these affected work and discussion on this important question. The woman question concentrated on equality, priorities, and leadership. Granted, women were integrated into all the activities and not slotted into only alleged women's work or subgroups-in CASA there were no such discrete niches. 5 Among the best signs of its possible potential, CASA's unionizing efforts, women were clearly involved. The newspaper Sin Fronteras featured women-oriented content. Demonstrably, the organization had many talented young members. Many former members, including notably women, developed commendable careers in unions, law, politics, education, and also business. Among the community, many women members gained leadership positions in the years to come. In sum, the group had a marked relatively progressive trend and also some retrogressive aspects, which some members sought to correct but with small success. The malaise of CASA has simplistically been charged to its alleged Mexico syndrome, that is, the alleged dominance within its internal discourse on matters related to Mexican left politics and the alleged organizational characteristics that supposedly would follow from that- authoritarianism, cultura lism, and chauvinism. A magnified focus on Mexico's left politics might deserve critical scrutiny but not for reasons of supposed political culturalism.

New Options

The decline of CASA could be examined through its m ixed origins and a series of splits dating from 1972, as well as the challengers it faced. The origins of CASA derive from late 1968 when it began as an organization devoted to modest services for undocumented persons and built on a "membership" determined by the payment of a small fee in return for a "card" outlining membership and incumbent obligations and rights. Services and membership, among other organizational virtues, were seen as essential to overcoming the desultory tendencies often seen in procommunity groups . Though CASA had accumulated modest resources and operated on the basis of explicit dos and don'ts, there was insufficient tactical structuring or leadership accountability. There was any number of internal conflicts, along with the invariable denunciations, particularly those concerning financial matters. Conscious of its own limits as well as the weaknesses of previous Chicano organizations, CASA was forcibly reorganized and its membership restructured between 1974 and 1975· One consequence was that byr976 the leadership was linked to specific internal constituencies and not easily moved . In the past, leadership turnover had occurred. Its previous leaders had been drawn from MAPA and from organizations active in the sixties in Los Angeles, such as Cat6licos por la Raza and the UFW and, when deemed necessary, these were displaced. In fact, throughout the organization's existence, reorganization occurred continually, and it was still happening as the organization ended. Apart from members from Carnalismo, in the process leading to reorganization, the incorporation of members with extensive experience in Mexico was particularly important, as was incorporating members from the cohort around Prensa Sembradora of San Jose, California, and cohorts from Illinois, Colorado, and Texas. These goals were not easily met. Within CASA, major unsolved issues of factional leadership focused on internal democratic practices and the structure and priorities of the organization and erupted on a matter allegedly of personal ethics.6 As observed by outsiders, ostensibly a well-structured organization, CASA was reorganized several times but remained led by a cohort of relatives who allegedly, according to some, in practice constituted a privileged faction. More to the point, there were some who had ties to Carnelismo activities who were questioning what they considered too much intellectualizing and organizational structuring. This faction was later challenged by two other factions, somewhat loose and overlapping: one centered on the newspaper and the other centered on labor relations. Both of these factions insisted on a strong focus that underscored

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orgamzmg immigrant workers. One faction sought to emphasize worker organizing-whether in independent groups or in support of active unions-with the hope of building a mass constituency, and the other faction emphasized organizational strengthening and ideological ascertainment to tactically and strategically empower the organization. Both meant questioning assumptions and developing new materials for a more future-oriented organization. The privileged faction emphasized membership loyalty, limited national growth beyond Los Angeles, and limited relations with other organizations. There were also members who did not overtly identify with any of these three groupings. Arguably, in its last stages the activist building block of CASA of the early seventies was still visible years later: organizing for worker's rights and community liberation. Internal struggles involved differences of opinion between the older factions including ideological, strategic, and organizational priorities. The leadership failed the group, which until the end remained disciplined and talented. The deconstruction of CASA did not initially accelerate due to some grand ideological questioning but involved charges of intimidation and bureaucratization. According to some, the crisis began over a matter of ethics, and ethics were important to many members. In one explanation, allegedly a member had violated the Reglamento by a dishonest act; however, a leader tried to dismiss any disciplinary action against this individual. There followed a series of recriminations and questions that went beyond the initial matter, for example behavior related to Carnalismo, which could have been disputed through argumentation or dealt with summarily. Indeed, the promise of ethical comportment had initially drawn many members to the organization because they felt other groups were inadequate in regard to deportment and discipline of members. The immediate symptomatic expression of the looming organization's debacle involved acrimonious relations between members of a central committee, inadequate in several ways, and alleged ly focused on questions of the personal ethics of a member of the privileged faction according to the critics. Some insisted that yes, in t his case, the personal was political, personal discords were organizational, and the ideological and the moral joined at the point of the individual member and brought to the fore questions of theory and strategy. Since ethical concerns as well as matters of theory and strategy were insisted upon as part of CASA's reason for being, that is, what made CASA different from other

New Options

groups, this difference also involved the expectation of principled and ethical behavior by its members. Some argued that adhering to a code of ethics was of major importance, while others said that private acts were not organizational matters. To be sure, in retrospect, after the deconstruction of the Crusade for Justice, CASA was the most disciplined and organized of the Chicana and Chicano movement groups, and ostensibly the standards for membership were high. It was pointed out that some leaders had been judgmental to others but were not so when it came to their own close followers. In the sum of allegations and possible real missteps, an important organization for civil and human rights ended. After a period of intense internal debates and major changes in leadership and in internal modes of participation, CASA members chose to disband as a national organization. As a rule, older members favored disbandment while young ones favored continuance. True, local groups continued to function for a while, and former members remained active in community issues and labor and immigrant organizing. Eventually, some would run for elected office. Indisputably, CASA contributed to radical mobilization and discourse in the seventies, and its legacy informed the work of other organizations in the eighties. Its influence remained visible in labor organizing, pro-immigrants' rights advocacy, and, to a lesser and declining extent, movement rhetoric and written graphic or audio/visual materials. Its labor-organizing precedent-setting work was not sufficiently acknowledged for addressing and, in some cases, tentatively solving the conundrum facing Mexicans desirous of unionization but shut out by hostile management and indifferent union leadership. CASA, a left group, to some extent did, in fact, organize workers, because it made this organizing also a priority in the relatively propitious circumstances of the I970S and also made ethics a priority. Another orga nization both influential and, at yet another level, also transitional was the August Twenty-Ninth Movement (ATM). 7 This group both energized activities and contributed foundationally to the formation of other broader groups. Its roots and efforts lay partially in the Chicano community, but also elsewhere; it drew its founding members from a variety of past ethnic and white mobilizations, including student groups and community organizations from past movement newspapers. Indeed, this organization emphasized multiethnic membership. Thus, it was not a Chicana and Chicano organization purposely, nor an Afr ican or Asian American one; it was diverse in its makeup.

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Though ostensibly multiethnic, to call attention to itself it emphasized the so-called Chicano question, that is, the proclamation of the right to self-determination while, in effect, paradoxically remaining antinationalist in its critiques of other groups. August Twenty-Nine became less a Chicano-dominant group as time went by and more a multiethnic one. The group stressed a Marxism interpreted partially through its leaders' own arguable interpretations of Mao Zedong's writings, principally those available in the red handbook, his writings on strategy, and his four most widely read essays, which were limited excerpts or examples from the very large Mao corpus. Like other U.S. left groups, this one stressed propaganda work and the distribution of materials, particularly to students. In some instances, it interjected itself into a number of situations rather than creating mobilization on the basis of an organizationally projected issue and then organizing support premised on its own initiative. In some cases, reportedly some August Twenty-Ninth members acted intrusively and their efforts became counterproductive to their own ends; for example, in their interventions in Chilili, New Mexico, or in some specific MEChA chapter matters, or in some labor disputes. They were eventually excluded from some MEChA assemblies. Other efforts were more effective, such as their support for the anti-Bakke pro-affirmative action campaign, their insistence on an uncompromising radical politics in several instances, and their pro-worker solidarity during the Farah strike. Importantly, August Twenty-Ninth can be seen as transitional to the more focused League of Revolutionary Struggle (LRS). Without much public notice in the Chicana and Chicano community, the August Twenty-Ninth group went through some sharp internal purges, coalesced with other groups-mostly Asian American collectives (i.e., study groups)-reformed itself, and contributed to the construction the League of Revolutionary Struggle, for the most part an Asian American formation. This more effectively organized and directed group ostensibly focused on student and labor organizing issues and cautiously supported a range of issues involving civil rights equities and selected electoral campaigns. LRS members sincerely believed they were resolving some of the internal social dissidences of the broad civil rights movements of the 1960s, which th.ey judged as too often spontaneous, chaotic, and personalistic. LRS leadership seemed to prefer covert rather than overt work, integration rather than direct mobilization, and both a public articulation and a closed organizational discourse. Clearly the organization had indefatigable members who continued their activism

New Options

over the years. Coincidently CASA and the transformed August Twentyinth group dissolved within a short time of each other as other community forces gained ascendency. In time the LRS also dissolved; its impact was not easily traced, though it had some very talented members such as Bill Gallegos, William Flores, and Fred Ho. Rather than sharply stated ideological organizing, and instead of a single highly structured organization with a disciplined membership, more prevalent among Chicana and Chicano militant civil-rights activists of the mid- and late seventies was the formation of multiethnic coalitions embracing a variety issues, including peace and environmental justice, human and animal rights, gay and lesbian advocacies, and so forth. Their actions were directed at government and businesses and often dovetailed into efforts by liberal Democrats. Throughout the sixties and seventies, militant civil-rights activity, rather than becoming encompassed gradually by a dominant membership organization, remained as it had begun, as an operative coa lition of groups and individuals temporarily united on a specific issue for a specific effort. Writers and artists did not have even that kind of preliminary militant cohesion, but as a group they had an impactful chorus of voices that \•,ras heard through many neighborhoods.

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CHAPTER 23

Renaissance

hicana and Chicano artists contributed in unique ways to the Chicana and Chicano movement and left a grand, enduring, and multifaceted heritage. Many emphasized speaking for themselves. They did indeed voice their own historicizing and aesthetics. As stated by the artists of the 1975 Chicanarte Exhibit at the Los Angeles Barnsdale Park: "The Chicano art movement has no single birth date, no central leader, certainly no dominant financial patron and no written manifesto. Yet it is with us: we see it, feel it, rejoice in it, and we can recount its history. Chicano art has flourished since this synthesized reality we call 'Chicano' became understood and affirmed by those who were living it-some would claim since 1848, others prefer the year 1 968, and there are those who would say this movement evolved during the prophetic t wilight of the fifth sun." l Chicanarte offered an inclusive embrace for artists and audiences . "The 'leaders' in Chicano art are many people; all workers, all creators, some organized in groups, some independent, many represented in this publication, some not. The only true patron of Chicano art has been its perennial audience, el Pueblo Chicano: its resource, its impetus, its final critic. Chicano art has embraced an enduri ng manifesto of cultural and social statement-realistic, traditional, revolutionary, and envisioned in the work of Chicanartistas as it is so evident in the Jives of our people and their barrios." 2 These artists defined "el movimiento Chicano-the collective emotional, cultura l and political struggles of La Raza in the United States. Art arises from the perspectives of those artists who have drawn their creative impulse from popular sentiment and experience, an entire people's identity then emerges within the context of its art." 3 As for their work, Chicanarte claimed a broad creative space: "The

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Renaissance

present role of the Chicano artist has been primarily concerned with the realities of his people and the employment of expressive media as a means to communicate a renewed consciousness toward those realities . .. The use of diverse media is usually limited to materials accessible to the intent and cost abilities of the artist. We see innovations in graphite, ink, pen markers, watercolors, spray paint, acrylics and oils, prints, as well as nail, ceramics, photography, bronze, limestone and fabric." 4 These artists also identified thematically that "the pervasive subject matter of Chicanarte seems to be a dramatic portrayal of the human image as it is apparent in Chicano life in all its facets." 5 Moreover, "The survey of works in Chicanarte also reveals the dominance of certain themes, patterns and symbolism. Social realities and causes are approached."6 Clearly, "Strong social statements, though more conceptual in form, are contributed." ' The vision of the Chicano artist in his revelation of meaning and identity has not been restricted to purely representational art. Cosmic, mythic, or archetypal intimations have certainly influenced . . .. Reverence to old age is also prevalent as is evidenced." 8 And finally, Chicanarte affirmed its roots socially and aesthetically: "But more the figure who most symbolizes resistance and defiance in Chicano life is the vato loco, and his forceful presence is felt in Chicana rte. It is the vato loco who developed placa art or wall graffiti, which has become a common indigenous trait of the barrio." 9 The artists of Chicanarte continued to work for years to come along the lines they set forth. Chicana and Chicano movement arts varied by genre and form and communicated social and political messages. The statements made by artists involved in Chicanarte exemplified the promises and limitations of Chicana and Chicano movement advocacies. The community and culturally premised arguments underscored self- and community affirmations, but did not address social equities comprehensively. In many cases, women's and sexuality issues were subsumed within culturally homogenous depictions and references. Modernism and liberalism offered a pathway for a more fully recognized subject that previously had been defined in simplistically male-centered terms and forms. As a result, the male was privileged and supreme. As in the political movement, Chicana artists called out the ideological contradictions of liberal and modernist thought in regard to women 's statuses. As in other arenas of the Chica na and Chicano movement artists communicated personal and public concerns that contested racial,

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class, gender, and sexuality oppression. Chicana artists broached Mexican and indigenous women's oppression and proposed new dimensions for community empowerment. These contestations provided abundant ground for developing rich and vibrant expressive texts that included visual, performance, and 1iterary arts. 10 Within CCM, as is common to revitalization movements, a resurgence of the arts followed in step with calls for social changes in the community and also in the movement for civil rights} 1 Chicana and Chicano art provides the most sensitive retrospective on the movement . Arts emerged as a part of community life. Mexican Americans created arts in various ways and they expressed a variety of views. CCM organizations and activities used the arts as a vehicle of expressive communication . Moreover, artists created organizations and activities that supported community education and development. Arguably, all of the arts in both traditional and innovative forms increased in productivity and in numbers of participants. Inspirations drawn from early Mexicobased indigenismo remained an important aesthetic input, but the arts of insurgent movements abroad were equally as influential on Chicana and Chicano art as was the influence of United States arts of the 1960s and 1970s. In the late 1960s, some college intellectuals seized on a constructed notion of rasquache and rasquachismo as the mode of Chicano art. They defined these in several ways as primarily class bound, intellectually naive, observationally redundant, inexpert by studio standards, and so on. In fact, their definitions verged on condescension and stereotype. Rasquache is less than playful because although neighborhood people create cultural forms to please themselves, inherent in the cultural expression of working people is a self-defining and adamant insistence on survival. The intention is intimacy and familialism conveyed with honesty and affection . When an artist or critic intersects this communication to judge or appropriate, the communication process is distorted. Chicana and Chicano art cannot be contained, much less defined by, the kitsch affectations of studio-trained artists or academic critics. The Chicano arts impetus outlasted the political one; signs of this still-vibrant genre are evident. An outpouring of strident poetry by Chicana and Chicano writers expressed political intent that perhaps exceeded other materials in quantity. Artists used theater and music because of their easier applicability to protest, and they used graphic arts because of their utility for propagandization . Organized dance and performance groups made vibrant expressive statements. Gradually, a

Renaissance

body of diverse reflective literature came into being. Due to their widespread accessibility, newspapers were useful vehicles for stimulating participation. Stable and better-financed publishing efforts contributed to the dissemination of information and analysis on a wide variety of topics. Throughout the seventies, the medium that reached the widest audiences was film. Energy and optimism characterized artistic expressions; while the quality and themes varied greatly, the best were indeed excellent. For the most part their message emphasized pride, condemned discrimination, demanded equities, and consistently resonated self-confidence. Throughout the sixties and seventies this message was easily assimilable by the dominant society and varied sectors in the community. Much of the art produced emphasized ethnic contributions and participation more than insurgency. Moreover, artists and organizers fashioned a range of icons and symbols that concretized and communicated basic messages and symbols- an emerging parallel activist language. These subsumed in some instances the legacy of Mexican arts and symbols but, more telling, included radical revisions of these and entirely new inventions. Some Chicana and Chicano artists made up an activist force during the CCM. Like other specialists they did double duty: they produced art, and they also participated in the mundane work of organizing activities and events. They worked hard. Some also saw themselves as different from other participants because of their artistic vocation. Many artists drew inspiration from several powerful symbols, especially iconic figures or representations such the Virgen de Guadalupe. Artists animated powerful contemporary images in contrast to historic symbols, such as the novel representations focused on Cesar Chavez and the UFW, underscored by the red-and-black eagle emblem that contained indigenous resonances. New generations of activists, like their predecessors, made use of media, particularly the newspaper, as a critical device for organizing in contradistinction to traditional Spanish-language media.12 Chicana and Chicano activists initiated newspapers at perhaps one hundred localities throughout the United States. Indeed, a Chicano network of local publications served as a communications radius, though often sporadically. Eventually, with much effort and with few resources, a Chicano Press Association formed in 1969 with over a dozen publications. Chicano newspapers relied on writers and artists to create galvanizing messages that connected Chicanos and kept them abreast of events. A

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number of Chicana and Chicano newspapers emerged in the late sixties, including La Raza, published in Los Angeles by Eleazar Risco; El Gallo, distributed in Denver by the Crusade; and Infi.erno, located in San Antonio and staffed by Raza Unida supporters. Elizabeth (Betita) Martinez, active in the African American civil rights movement, cofounded with Enriqueta Vasquez an important newspaper, another of the early Chicano newspapers, El Grito del Norte (Cry of the North), in Espanola, New l'v1exico, in r968. This Latter paper covered injustices suffered by Chicanos, such as abuses by police and the courts and other issues, including the land-grant struggles. The movement newspapers tried to speak in a grassroots, authentic people-oriented voice. They preferred a dissenting, nonconformist style, and their plainly stated purpose was to foment protest-driven populist organizing. Individuals used videos and cassettes to promote their messages and distributed them to communities. Others associated with publications or direct organizing activities hosted or initiated radio programs, adding a new dimension to communicating information and analysis. Graciela Gil Olivarez, one of the first female disc jockeys in Phoenix, Arizona, addressed issues of poverty and marginalization experienced by Mexican families. In Los Angeles, the first such program began at station KPFK in the spring of r968, "La Raza Nueva," initially hosted by Juan Gomez, Carlos Vasquez, Mocre Esparza, and, after a year, Raul Ruiz. Actually, the earliest CCM radio attempts involved Alianza in New Mexico, the UFW in Texas, and FLOC in the Midwest. One of the best-received Chicano newspapers, El Malcriado (The Brat), located in California and recalling an earlier publication, began publication in 1969 as the public voice of the United Farm Workers. In addition to covering the labor struggles of the farm workers, the newspaper also published poems, short stories, and corridos. Andy Zermenio, the staff cartoonist, created a character called Don Sotaco (the underdog). Like the peladitos (humorous figures) of the carpa theater, this character epitomized the streetwise rasquachismo. Don Sotaco underscored the exploitation of the farm worker in a humorous and biting manner. This and more became the task of this initial movement artistic endeavor through the mid and late sixties; later it went through changes and eventually ceased. In a more underscored way and with a higher profile, El Malcriado faced questions faced by other publications: Who should be the intended audience? Were the investments of monies and staff time in a publication a high priority when it is only one among others?

Renaissance

Increasing political activity quickened the needs for graphic political art. Models and influences range from the pre-I9ro woodcuts and satire to the quality graphics of the I93os-I94os and also popular calendar art. Clearly the artists of the I96os Cuban graphics collective, sponsored by OSPAAL (Organization for the Solidarity of the Peoples of Africa, Asia and Latin America), influenced Mexican American poster artists and collectives. By I970, the Cuban OSPAAL posters were exhibited and discussed at the Galleria de La Raza, a community-based art center in San Francisco. Particularly important in fomenting this Cuban art impact was the exhibition at the California Palace of the Legion of Honor by the San Francisco State University art student Juan Fuentes. Chicana and Chicano art went wherever and however in sites and forms . Chicano posters expressed an examination and criticism of North American politics and culture as well as the need to communicate to a wide audience through an inexpensive mass-media device. The work of artists like Benjamin (Benny) Luna of La Raza and Andy Zermenio of El Malcriado newspapers used caricature to indict the dominant Anglo-American society. Posters provided a provocative means for creating widespread critical consciousness. Among the earliest examples were those of the Farm Workers Union, such as Emanuel Martinez and Carlos Almaraz. Almaraz, with three other artists, went on to cofound a local art collective whose works took Chicano street art to Los Angeles mainstream aud iences. The large Almaraz mural Boycott Gallo offered the East Los Angeles community one of the early movement declarations, while the Crusade made use of and distributed the works of Emanuel Martinez in its propaganda materials. Talented graphic artists like Amado Peii.a Murillo, Carlos Cortez, Rupert Garcia, and Malaquias Montoya helped galvanize the youth of the Mexican American community through images and texts that depicted historical icons, nearly all male, and celebrated such events as political marches, demonstrations, ceremonies, and also some dances. Male-centered discourse, featured prominently in the artwork and discourse of the early years of the movement, eventually came under criticism from women artists. Soon Chicanas refashioned aesthetic discourses to create more democratically oriented notions of equal ity and clearly voiced female concerns and visions . Chicanos in the United States continued to generate new projects of the artistic or expressive cu lture. Eventually, different sectors appreciated the varied popular arts emerging from the Chicano community.

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Chapter 23

Chicana and Chicano artists invariably sought methods of educating their own people as well as others about their lifestyles, dreams, traditions, histories, and religious beliefs. Chicanas and Chicanos expressed these concerns clearly through their visual street arts. Political murals are only one example of the several ways in which Chicanos expressed themselves. These artworks sent a message of honor and pride about their culture and community, whi le simultaneously creating an alternative public discourse. Other more explicit forms also achieved this on the streets of many communities.

C HAPTER 24

Street Says

G

iven CCM's energized civic populism, as might be expected, neighborhood-based populist artistic expression flourished and received attention. Youth, in particular, sought to express their dreams and angers and to have their status recognized. Expressive artists used their neighborhoods, their bodies, and their cars, which they embellished in various forms, as subjects. Their declarations were not secretive or anonymous; they were personal but also public. The communications received careful aesthetic attention. Invariably the designs, languages, and valorizations in these statements became known to their immediate public . Interestingly, Chicano street arts influenced copyists outside the neighborhood, including unique body tattoos. Chicana and Chicano expressive culture in the form of automobiles, trucks, and bicycles grew popular among youth constituencies through the 1960s and 197os. 1 Vehicles served as urban canvases for expression and imagination. These vehicles were recognized as aesthetic manifestations by the people who rode them and saw them, and they offered mobile public commentaries. Extraordinary vehicles, "lowriders" or "ranflas," began to proliferate in the 1exican American barrios across the Southwest through the forties and fifties . The lowrider, whether an automobile, truck, motorcycle, or bicycle, rode low to the ground and had special improvements. Lowriders usually had multicolored paint jobs, hydraulic suspension systems, crushed velvet interiors, "clean" engines, stylish hubcaps, and many other features. Some were highly ornately decorated with artwork and symbolic representations, some cultural, political, gendered, or sexual. In taking a look at lowriders, the recurrent making of contemporary popular arts and its male-centeredness stands out. Some lowriders had special qualities, which meant that the designs, 237

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colors, and workmanship were ae thetic. The 'vvhole image that lowriders gave stood in contrast to the plastic quality of most cars on the road. There were people, Mexican and Chicano, who had become involved with lowriders at an early age. They viewed their work as an artistic expression shared by many in their communities. The continued popularity and growth of lowriders was evident in exhibits and eventually publications. Importantly, what started out as a trend in the Mexican barrios of the southwest in the 1940s became a means of expression for others around the world. Graffiti script and drawings represented a form of youth art that commented on contemporary society. Graffiti murals often took much time to create, were detailed in style, color, and form, and strove for accuracy. These attributes indicated that the graffiti mural artist had a message to put out. Given the working-class backgrounds of many of the graffiti "offenders," the chances of them being exposed to traditional fine arts were small. They invented this inexpensive "instant" art form as a means of public expression and recognition that animated many youth who felt outcast from society. Graffiti culture reflected an invented sense of belonging and self-esteem. The styles of lettering conveyed a complex community, underscoring individuals, groups, places, and ethics, and also idealized confrontations. Dating from the 1930s, Chicano graffiti underwent some parallel changes. Practitioners who chose brushwork, at one time frequent, often traded brushes for thick felt pens and these, in turn, were joined to aerosol cans often outlining angular regional fonts. The debate on street expressive culture exploded when state officials chose to problematize and later criminalize graffiti. It was not just writing on the wall that was subject to objections. The "offenders," generally working-class Chicano youths, very publicly and very strongly illustrated alienations and injustices that occurred in and were overlooked by much of mainstream society. A small part of the general public who preached that graffiti in any form is offensive felt so not because they feared it as vandalism or gang-related activity, but because they feared this boldness of voices from the "plebe" of the community. Seemingly prolific Chicano graffiti, among these distinctive forms of contemporary barrio expressions, consisted of symbols or symbolic words consciously chosen by artists to convey social, political, or emot ional messages. The expressionistic style used distinctive angu lar lettering ana logous to western calligraphy.

Street Says

Early graffiti designs, often abstract or stylized forms, communicated names, current loves, gang emblems, and occasionally religious images. Barrio gangs and individual members developed unique symbols or places to identify their territory, their presence, or their signature. Later barrio graffiti expressed sentiments of resistance when political organizing expanded on the streets. The introduction of spray-can aerosols affected graffiti technique and subject matter; certain styles and representations were particularly apt for spray-can art. Thus, artists projected their personal sentiments into the public landscape. For youth living in urban settings, where frequently they remained anonymous to the larger dominant society, their "markings" identified them as public agents. Youth artists influenced the artwork produced by Chicana and Chicano activists. Eventually some muralists used graffiti in their work or on the edges of their work. "Con safos," often seen as "C/S" on walls or murals next to a signature of a placa, ·was used to ward off or warn against defacement. This symbolic antidote employed by street members sought to prevent widespread defilement by asserting prior rights. C/S appeared on many and diverse statements . For some Mexicans, prisons became sites for arts and were so particularly in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Sensitive to injustice, activist artists among the incarcerated drew attention to themselves and their plight. 2 Because of historical conditions of discrimination, poor access to education, and poverty, a disproportionate number of Mexican Americans were incarcerated in U.S. prisons. For some, the hopelessness, loneliness, and gravity of their incarceration was transformed into art productions or group organizing. Some prisoners responded with a variety of expressive art forms. Prison arts included poetry, cards, tattoos, envelope drawings, and small illustrations. For Mexican Americans, as significant economic and political changes and conflicts occurred, cultural written expressions mirrored them. In these times artists responded to changes and inequities. What weighted heavily negative for many Mexican American artists was the animus directed at them simply for being Mexican. The pain and anger and also confusion generated remarkable social statements of the times. Pacho by Jose Antonio Villareal drew upon these inspirational energies. 3 In several ways Mexican American artists countered their negative depictions and conditions through moderate and radica l assertions. Mexican American artists felt the need to be free of pejorative social

2

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Chapter24

constraints and stereoryped representations. Some argued for successful people from their own culture to become examples for others in their community. Artists also demanded to be represented in places where the decisions about them were made. Concurrent with these concerns and voicings, for those who were immigrants or the children of immigrants, memories flickered of past hurts and past harmonies or initiatives, often revolving around days gone by in Mexico. Ernesto Galarza, an academic and civil-rights spokesperson, published Barrio Boy in 1971-a collection of his remembrances shared with his family and on occasion with others during the fifties and sixties. This brief book spoke to pride in family support and neighborly collectivity resources accessible to all Mexicans regardless of their economic level. Galarza also researched and wrote three major books on Mexican agricultural workers as well as an autobiography, and he coauthored children's materials. Moreover, he was an indefatigable national organizer for worker rights and civic equities. Undoubtedly, this activist scholar was an inspiration to many during the Chicana and Chicano movement. 4 What occurred artistically in succeeding years reflected influences from the larger society, from Mexican Americans, and also from abroad. Artistically the interaction entailed a dialectical process involving these and also world changes. The political future in the making did not depend only on the external majority society; the Mexican community once again made its history public. The community now organized on a scale never before achieved. For the politically active artist, organizational participation influenced their political consciousness. Recurrent bursts of artistic activity included many issues and efforts. Artistically diverse communica tions and interactions increased across the Mexico-United States border. The exuberance, the public calls, the visual arts, the music, and the dancing of the 1970 August Twenty-Ninth Moratorium insurgency made the event one of the defining public experiential statements of identity for many Mexican American youth. At that time certain trends involving multiple issues unfolded, which were later extended and enriched and even superseded. In sectorial terms, CCM arts activities combined rural and urban identifications with past and present aspirations. Populism characterized nearly all expressions. Many youth transmitted popu list fashions through personal cultural expressions or dress. Now, youth had a variety of fashions, but there was a particular dress identified by urban youth. For example, the zoot suit became emblematic of the pachuco during the 1940s and later of

Street Says

the pachuco alleged resistance. In the sixties, cholo dress represented a form of youth-group identification as well as a defiance of family and school authorities. This form continued for individuals long after their youth was over and thus expressed generational or old-school identification. Clearly, some elements of identifiable dress have continued over time, such as khaki pants with sharply ironed pleats; a heavy type of dark glasses; single-color, heavy over-sized wool shirts identified as Pendleton; knitted black or dark blue caps; blue, black or red farmworker bandanas; and so forth, with the emphasis being solidarity and acknowledgement. This was a fashion sometimes invoked in Chicano songs, performances, and films.

2:: -

Women Brown Berets, Los Angeles, Californ ia. Photo by Devra ',Xleber.

Education Is a Basic Right, Chicano Moratorium, Los Angeles, California, August 29, 1970. Phoro by Devra Weber.

/

) I / ,

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.......

- ~·

"O UR

S T 0 l E N"

Land-grant heirs examining documents, Denver Public Library.

BEE N BY L. RAMIREZ)

ew Mexico, I97I. Photo courtesy

Cesar Chavez and Corky Gonzales for Colorado Labor Council, Colorado, I968. Photo courtesy Denver Public Library.

Women meeting to plan demo at Big Buy, Los Angeles, Ca lifornia, September 1969. Phoro by Devra Weber.

From Denver to Chicago to New York: Brown Berets, Latin American Defense Organization, and Young Lord s, Denver, Colorado, 1969. Photo courtesy Denver Public Library.

Fellow Travelers at the Chicano Moratorium, Los Angeles, California, August 29, 1970. Photo by Devra Weber.

Young women meeting, Los Angeles, California, 1970. Photo by Devra Weber.

Allies: John Trudell, Corky Gonzales, and Olga Talamantes, Denver, Colorado, I97 I. Photo courtesy Denver Public Library.

Dolores Huerta speaks at Corazon de Aztla n, Chicana Symposium, UCLA, Los Angeles, California, ·ovember I969. Photo by Devra Weber.

Planning meeting: Corky Gonzales, Angela Davis, Ernesto Vigil, and friends, Denver, Colorado, I97I. Photo courtesy Denver Public Library.

Participants at Corazon de Aztlfo, Chicana Symposium, UCLA, Los Angeles, California, November I969. Photo by Devra Weber.

E3

Women's leadership panel at Corazon de Azt!.in, Chicana Symposium, UCLA, Los Angeles, November I969. Photo by Devra Weber.

Alianza meeting in northern New Mexico, I968. Photo courtesy Denver Public Library.

Women in a theater scene in Denver, Colorado. Exact date uncertain, but probably 1969 or 1971. Photo courtesy Denver Public Library.

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Native American representatives with Corky Gonzales, 1971. Photo courtesy Denver Public Library.

People's music and art: Danny Valdez, Denver, Colorado, 1968. Photo courtesy Denver Public Library.

Camaraderie, Denver, Colorado, 1968. Photo courtesy Denver Public Library.

Strike Teatro, UCLA, Los Angeles, California, May 1970. Photo by Devra Weber.

Chichimeca and Aztlanenses on stage for United Farm Workers' rally, Los Angeles, California, December 1970. Photo by Devra Weber.

52

Boxers in the ring and civil rights champ Stokely Carmichael, 197r. Photo courtesy Denver Public Library.

Viva La Raza , high school demonstrations, Roosevelt/Lincoln, Los Angeles, Ca lifornia, May 19 70. Photo by Devra WebeL

Women high-five at Chicano Moratorium, Los Angeles, California, August 29, 1970. Photo by Devra Weber.

Women on the march, Chicano Moratorium, Los Angeles, California, August 29, 1970. Photo by Devra Weber.

Families and neighbors preparing for the Chicano Moratorium, preliminary march, Los Angeles, California, February 1970. Photo by Devra Weber.

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A family participating in the Chicano Moratorium, Los Angeles, California, February i970. Photo by Devra Weber.

Group representing Venice, California, at the Chicano lv1oratorium, Los Angeles, August 29, r970. Photo by Devra Weber.

Students holding a Tierra y Justicia sign at the Chicano Moratorium, Los Angeles, California , August 29, r970. Photo by Devra Weber.

C HAPTER 25

Sounds

ovement groups and activist events often featured performers and songs associated with the history and politics of activism in public gatherings alongside simple dance music. 1 early all groups and areas had certain favorite players and songs. Among CCM activists, music listening reflected more diverse tastes than its public performances might suggest. The musical varieties put on by activists and the performances generated by movement values and themes represented a kaleidoscope or a panorama of the movement itself. Music preferences remained quite varied and musical performance preferences often seemingly quite apolitical. And, like the movement itself, local music preferences were strongly nuanced by traditions much older than the fabled musical scene of the I96os striking across the country. At the same time that regional preferences or associations existed, there were also cross-cutting national tastes. Personal and cosmopolitan aesthetics characterized varied music choices in Mexican American communities. In music, the traditional Mexican and Latino styles continued to be popular, but young singers and musicians developed more contemporary trends and mainstream sounds. Though the lyrical content might be in Spanish or deal with Mexican issues, the sounds remained in step with modes current in the larger society but with a definite Latino and even Mexican American flavor. On the music bridge from the 1940s to the 1960s, several musicians stood out, among them Amalia Mendoza, Chelo Silva, Beto Avila, Ed Cano, and others. Musicians performed a wide range of varied music; they were personally popular in the communities. Lalo Guerrero wrote scores of songs and recorded dozens. He also continually promoted himself through excellent public relations with community members. On his own, he represents a bridge from previous decades to the 1960s in the sense that he belongs to the generation of

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Andy Russell and Vicki Carr. Guerrero pleads and jokes, while much Chicano music asserts and demands, as witnessed in the "Ballad of Pancho Lopez" (1956), "No Way Jose" (1974), and "Las Ardillitas" (1960s). The "Pancho" piece is a crude parody for which the Disney Company received 50 percent of the considerable royalties. In contrast to these, Guerrero once composed the popular, beautiful "Canci6n Mexicana" (1937). Guerrero did not so much influence music associated with the CCM, but rather movement artists, such as Luis Valdez, revitalized Guerrero's 1940s pieces and highlighted his recognition through replays of catchy rhythms such as "Chuco Suave" (1949) and "Marijuana Boogey" (1949) in the play Zoot Suit (1978). Guerrero's l97os-198os corridos about Cesar Chavez, Ruben Salazar, and Fernando Valenzuela appealed more to older people than to younger activists, with the exception of "El Chicano" (1977), a neo-corrido about himself and, as such, original. Affable and courteous, with white- and blue-collar audiences, Guerrero pioneered Chicanas and Chicanos entering the modern entertainment portals of both Los Angeles and Mexico City. In California, from the 1950s through the 1960s, an emergent Chicano music synthesized elements of rock 'n' roll, jazz, rhythm and blues, salsa, and conjunto played by many of the groups in Los Angeles. 2 New musical directions followed those of the 1940s decade, including pachuco boogie and trio-sung Mexican ballads. In the mid-195os, Richie Valens (Ricardo Valenzuela), primarily influenced by "bop," adapted the Veracruz song "La Bamba" to a rock 'n' roll hit, achieving popularity with both some Anglo-Americans and manr Mexican American youth from the fifties through the sixties. Since neither English language nor Spanish-language print media gave attention to this young Chicano, word of mouth spread a unique awareness and notable pride. But more, Valenzuela became a referred symbol and icon for bop, Chicano music enthusiasts, and their latter-day descendantship-hop deejays-through the 1960s and early 1970s. Among Mexicans, preferences followed the classics of African American rhythm, the blues of the 1950s, and 1960s rock 'n' roll. Some of this music action at first reflected teenage music of the time, but eventually it became particularly associated with Mexican American and barrio youth of the sixties, and especially with lowriders. Rhythm and blues and rock 'n' roll golden oldies continued as a strong part of Mexican American cultural preferences in many areas alongside other musical preferences. Certainly so-called west coast jazz and Latin jazz had avid Chicano listeners through the Southwest and Midwest.

Sounds

Talented combos and their music, such as Eddie Cano's "Taste of Honey" (1956), for example, became the popular sound in clubs from Virginia's to the Rainbow Gardens, to the M Club, where Los Angeles Chicanos went to socialize and dance and once in a while to politicize in the early and mid-196os. The Chicano sound of Los Angeles was born from bands and songs such as Thee Midniters's "Whittier Blvd" (1965) and "Chicano Power" (1969), Cannibal and the Headhunters's "Land of a Thousand Dances" (1965), and others. These prepared California audiences for music groups such as El Chicano (1970), Malo (1972), and Tierra (1973). Eventually, Los Lobos, a versatile group a generation away from the early bands, combined many of these styles in the 1970s, but in particular they combined rock 'n' roll with conjunto and country western to create a new synthesis that became popular nationwide among broad audiences in the decades following. The Los Lobos album "Just Another Band from East L.A." was released in 1978 and represented a style that built on Chicano movement influences. Chicano music listeners gave special attention to Santana, Grateful Dead, and Jimi Hendrix. Poncho Sanchez emerged as the acknowledged pacesetter of jazz and Latin sounds for movement listeners. The Chicano music scene exemplified several Latino trends apart from the romantic and heroic songs common to dances or to meetings. Youth often preferred rhythm and blues, oldies, rock, or protest music. However, in parts of the Southwest and Midwest the main innovation trend reflected a blend with strong influence from Texas musicians. In the 1960s, Valerio Longoria, Paulino Bernal, and Oscar Hernandez expanded the conjunto form again by adding three-part vocals and a large chromatic accordion, which became popular. These were the sounds that local activists danced to at a variety of venues . For example, in 1964, Paulino Bernal promoted a group in Texas known as Los Relampagos de! Norte (The Northern Lightning Bolts), who became popular on both sides of the border. In the seventies, an even more popular group appeared in California: Los Tigres del Norte . They sang the details of immigrant hardships and hopes and the stresses and romances of life. For a few years their signature song remained "La Jaula de Oro," a song referred to often in speeches and writings. During the 1970s, Little Joe and the Latinaires, renamed Little Joe and La Familia, blended the Tex-Mex ranchero sound with jazz and rock, creating a new musical form called La Onda Chicana (The Chicano Wave). In 1972, he released an album titled Para la Gente (For The People), a highly successful record that for some listeners captured

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the spirit of the Chicano movement as Tejanos understood it. One of the songs, "Las Nubes" (The Clouds), became a standard for music celebratory events in Texas and, rather than only about the trials of romance, the song \>Vas a metaphor for the utopian aspirations of activists. In Texas in the 1970s, the conjunto and orquesta (orchestra} merged, creating a style called Tejano. Mexican American Texas singers such as Freddy Fender (Baldemar Huerta) combined conjunto with Anglo country western. Tejano-origin performers of Tejano music remained uniquely important through the I970S and beyond. lri New Mexico, traditional Hispano popular and dance music groups such as Reyes de Albuquerque remained popular through the next two decades. Certain California popular music preferences followed trends from Mexico, especially those favored by young immigrants. Wthin all this diversity, certai11 music resonated among activists as music of el movimiento. Not unexpectedly, music associated with Mexicans, often ballads composed after the years of struggle, 19101920, were recycled. Specific compositions played while the performers were unaware that certain canciones were partisan specific; that is, villista (a fol Lower of Francisco Villa) grandparents would not endorse carrancista (a follower of Venustia.no Carranza) songs, and zapatista (a follower of Emiliano Zapata) grandparents had musical tastes quite distinct from those of northerners, often melancholy rather than triumphant. There was also the anomaly of corridos of right-wing factions ("Benjamin Argumedo") or cristero (church-affiliated dissenters) groups ("Valentin de la sierra") passed along as songs of the radical or populist revolutionaries. In any case there was a certain flourishing of music for certain occasions. "Cancion Mexicana," the song, served to inspire audiences for a while, but it expressed sentiments of the lower middle class or members of an earlier generation. Chicarra and Chicano activists were not nostalgic about Mexico; they were angry about its many political and social failings. Across the CCM board, the song most readily rehearsed was also a song with quite paradoxical origi11s in Spain, "De Colores," associated with Chicana and Chicano urban activists who borrowed it from the cursillistas (Catholic-affiliated group). This song lacked an overt partisanship such as is evident in "Las Nubes" or "Brown Eyed Children." Farm workers had their partisans and immediately recognized music, such as, "El picket sign," "The Corrido de Delano," "Huelga en

Sounds

general," "Corrido de Cesar Chavez," "Hasta Sacramento," and so forth. The UFW associates marketed their songs to the public. Landrights activists called for the "Corrido de Tierra Amarilla," while transnationalists sang the transnational song " Del Bravo a la Patagonia," favored by CASA and other militant groups. The Reyes de Albuquerque group was a fountain of inspirational music in New Mexico, not duplicated elsewhere. Renewed preferences meant certain historic songs were being played not in academic forums but in social and political gatherings, songs such as the nostalgic "Aca de este Lado," the Villista "Febrero 23," the regional "Corrido de Gregorio Cortez," the assertive "Corrido de Joaquin Murrieta," and others. Many local teatros composed songs for local events. By the late r97os music tastes had changed, affected by Caribbean cumbia, Pacific Coast tamborazo, and international social punk influences as well as the tidal wave of music promoted by immigrants.

CHAPTER 26

Acting

hicana and Chicano theater had an important and continuing influence in Mexican communities through the movement years and reflected significant immediate antecedents. A few repertory companies had continued after the 1940s and through the 1950s. During this period, several actors and actresses engaged in some limited work in radio, film, television, or theater. Depictions and representations of Mexicans occurred here and there in these media. However, the immediate battery for theater promotion came from other than the professional arenas. In 1965, "Chicano" theater was charged or recharged in the organizing fields of the San Joaquin Valley. 1 The Teatro Campesino developed on the picket lines of the 1960s farm workers' strike by two brothers, Luis and Daniel Valdez, and their friend Augustine Lira. The direct immediate roots of the Teatro encompassed live musicals and recitations practiced among the farm workers . Important among these were the multifaceted traditions of the Mexican carpa. Radical theater also provided influences. Later, more deliberately, artists drew from Mesoamerican philosophies. Luis Valdez promulgated didactic vignettes in the form of actos (skits), such as in Las dos caras del patroncito (1965), Los Vendidos (1967), and Pensamiento Serpentino (1973). The Teatro invoked the often elicited ancestral myths or historical political memories. The Teatro both provoked and inspired audiences just as Chicano graphic art had . The influences of the earlier protest actors did not fade. This political theater and others became popular features at nightly rallies during farm workers' and community organizing. Teatro Campesino eventually provided inspirational energies to other Chicana and Chicano movement activities. Allegedly playing the role of the

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boss or the administrator helped workers or volunteers become better organizers, so it was claimed. The dramas developed their skills in self-expression and speech, improving their ability to make political contacts for the protest boycotts or marches. Several teatros emerged across the country. A particularly noteworthy one for its emphasis was the group associated with Felicitas Nuiiez, Teatro de las Chicanas (San Diego, California), which traveled to various sites with its pro-women's equities message. By 1970, Teatro Quetzalcoatl formed at the University of Washington in Seattle. Teatro assemblies were held in different parts of the United States and Mexico. Perhaps the peak year occurred in 1976 when over one hundred teatros operated and some five teatro festivals were held. TENAZ (Teatros acional de Aztlan) flourished for a few years, an attempt at strengthening theater efforts organizationally and artistically. Of all the arts, the theater remained relatively more aesthetically successful in popularly depicting actual varieties of Mexican life and publicly giving Mexican artists preeminent space and recognition. Several places emerged as centers for Mexican theater with companies encouraging playwrights and actors. The most successful productions combined new music or comedy with social intent, while others offered successful repertoire theater.

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Dance

olkloric, modern, and classical dance had extensive devotees in the Mexican American community. Folkloric dance was, of course, the most visible and received the most support and participation by both adults and youth, but it was more limited in its opportunities for innovation than other forms . Students advocated for performance arts, whose movement link seems farfetched. Classical dance was not readily accessible and modern dance did not have the recognition it deserved, but these creative dances were important to some and would be important in the future. Dancing brought people together even when one was at a distance. Danza Azteca and folkl6rico were performance rituals and could be enjoyed by everyone at movement meetings or events. These were populist as well as popular arts. For a variety of reasons, group dances surged. 1 Again, dance performance flourished in communities prior to the sixties. Consciously politically motivated, dance provided one means of cherishing culture . Folkloric dance, for the individual or group, represented a personal endeavor to develop specific acquired knowledge and transform it into an artistic interpretation. This form of Mexican popular art offered a perceived beauty through the pageantry of group dance. Both the public performance and the practice sessions leading to it were important. Maestros, teachers of dance, passed along knowledge and an admiration for folkl6rico to other Chicanas and Chicanos, particularly the young. Because of growing response from students and friends, maestros formed groups and brought together Mexicans to share in practices of expressive culture. The formation of a performing troupe exposed those less informed and thus less fortunate to the beauty of the traditional Mexican dances. Groups performed dances from numerous regions of Mexico and introduced these dances w ith talent and

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confidence to new generations. During the 1970s, three women-Marfa Benitez, Lili del Castillo, and Eva Encinias-established flamenco companies in New Mexico as part of a program of arts and cultural enrichment. Eva Encinias inaugurated the first flamenco studies program at a major center of higher education at the University of New Mexico. 2 Those committed to the folkl6rico dance tradition have strong artistic commitments. Dances projected symbols of everyday life and common emotions expressed in the footwork and choreography. The intricately crafted costumes contributed to the education of those who watched as well as those who performed. Dance allowed Chicanas and Chicanos to engage the Mexican cultural heritage of their fami lies. Many Mexican dancers practiced their form as a communication link to her or his people, La Raza. The dances, in a sense, presented an unfolding of a narrative and not merely coordinated footwork or colorful costumes. Thus, there is a connection to be reclaimed-a romantic cultural one. For many participants, dances emitted spiritual elements that tied the dancer and the dance to the audience. Maestros propagated teaching Mexican dance. Through the music, costumes, and dances, the students learned about their heritage. Dancers and audience members came to understand the cultural values and customs of the people through the practice. For example, many of the Aztec dances that were learned revealed historically premised spiritual beliefs and facets of contemporary social life. Allegedly in the dances from Jalisco one can observe courtship between the men and women, closeness to nature, and respect for all life; the sexuality is plain to see. To maestros and students, all of the dances taught about the cultural regions where the dances originated- dances with histories of their own and that reflect the beauties of cultural expression. Across the country, thousands participated in dance. The 1979 national Danzantes Unidos Festival formed to take Mexican dances' beauty to as many people as possible. Inspired by the elaborate festival system of the Totonacas Indians of Mexico, Danzantes Unidos sought to bring together Mexican community participation from many areas of California and to reflect on this popular beauty under one programmatic endeavor. In effect, the purpose was to unify the growing folkl6rico movement of the 1960s and 1970s and to allow danzantes to meet, study, and perform in a united celebration of Mexican culture. The realization of such a festival came together during 1979, when the first Danzantes Unidos was held on the campus of UCLA. Danzantes Unidos, a festival unprecedented in the history of

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Mexican American folkl6rico dancing, culminated from the hard work, organization, and unity displayed by all those involved, and it continued successfully through the 1980s. Several corporate sponsors provided support that paid for three days of workshops and performances dedicated to effective communication to public a udiences who were increasingly sensitized by arts education advocacies.

CHAPTER 28

Film

exican American cultural and artistic accomplishments flowered with vitality in several areas, but one artistic ~spirati?n loomed large- filmmaking. At a broad level, this vitality reflected the creative and performing arts that surged and emerged in the community. Performances encouraged photography and filming as corollary. Moreover, as a result of past advocacy, there were more university graduates with degrees, professionals, students, and faculty at colleges and universities than ever before. Film projects came to the fore as did the following of actors in films. But even more importantly, as cultural consciousness and social knowledge deepened and spread, film representation met a growing demand for creative depictions of Mexicans and Mexican American life. Filmed intellectual and creative activities initially intended by Mexican Americans for Mexican audiences enjoyed ever-wider appreciation.1Chicano studies library collections expanded with the growing number of research projects, journals, and books. Educational films and audios circulated to schools and community groups . Mexican American vibrancy in the arts exhibited great diversity in addressing beauty and promoting criticism. The aesthetics involved both what was traditional and what was new. Across communities, poets, novelists, singers, and artists spoke fervently about social conditions. Mexican Americans working in film, writing, and producing music achieved critical and commercial success. The significant ethnic theater movement provided experience that for many aspirants proved transferable to film projects . The Mexican community, historically rich in creative talent, continued to be highly productive in the arts and sought film space and resources. Both institutional and community cultural activity enjoyed qualitative and quantitative range and a spectrum of viewpoints.

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Several arts have been of notable importance in the twentieth century, and Mexican Americans have participated in these, including film arts. Generally artistic representations of Mexicanos or Mexican Americans reflected important intergenerational dynamics. The dominant society lens continued to view this ethnic community in the 1960s and 1970s as an aggregate, a collection of stereotypes, though to a lesser degree than in previous times. Moreover, this stereotyping correlated with the less than satisfactory quality of participation in majority media and the majority arts offered by Mexican American professionals, whether old or young. Professional persistence and success set the measure for the yardsticks of acceptability or frustration tolerance. In the 1970s, urban musicians, some who had notable commercial success like Tierra, Malo and El Chicano, did not maintain their popularity beyond a moment, though their popularity revived in the 1990s. Some were able to sustain their popularity, such as Los Lobos. Similarly, in theater, the commercial successes of Luis Valdez's "Zoot Suit" and "Badges" were not replicated, though overall theater productions increased numerically, as did their audiences to a degree. In the 1970s, Mexican American performance professionals who succeeded in their professions often confronted the problem of being offered the assignment of the token Latino or of portraying a negative stereotype. This pattern was visible whether in the uneven successes of Cheech Marin or with local Spanish-surname newscasters. Ultimately, some Mexican Americans faced a choice of acceding to the demands of producers for less than quality participation or insisting on some measure of independence as artists or professionals and facing reduced professional openings. Certainly not many Mexican American art professionals found a professional satisfactory middle ground between the opportunity to work and the need to do so with dignity. They faced not lack of talent but the limits of the producers and writers. The latter thought that audiences tolerated only stereotypes when the performance involved minority content or minority actors. The Chicana and Chicano arts professional whose work encompassed more than the stereotype and the token player faced the difficulty of trying to successfully appeal to a wide audience while still upholding some of the ethnic community's social and political values. Social commentary and public responsibility have been a part of Mexican American art but, in some cases, at the cost of commercial success. In too many instances, artists faced decisions on privileging

Film

social responsibility or professional employment or trying to reconcile the two. Artists and arts activities, severely undersupported, exhibited remarkable vitality and often underappreciated diversity. Writers, directors, actors, and a few producers were among the artists who in some limited ways exhibited the most organized cohesion. As was to be expected given the continual exploration for new markets, "Chicano" cinema was barely attempted, but the circle of practitioners remained committed to opening doors. In film, what became the then current "Chicano" thrust was antedated by Mexican actors and production staff dating from the early years of Hollywood. Activists such as Luis Valdez and Armando Valdez created pioneering film works in the 1960s. Jose Luis Ruiz (Cinco Vidas, 1972, and The Unwanted, 1975), Jesus Trevino (America Tropical, 1971, and Yo Soy Chicano, 1972), and Ricardo Soto (A La Brava: Prison and Beyond, 1973, and A Political Renaissance, 1973) were among some of the earliest Chicana and Chicano movement filmmakers. Public television outlets sought out some of these Chicano-made works. Moctezuma Esparza produced several films and made a modest profit. In the early 1970s, Chicano activity in film benefited from openings in film-training projects or modes of access to film programs on campus. Works made in the rnid-197os included Ricardo Sanchez's Entelequia (1975) and Efrain Gutierrez's Please, Don't Bury Me Alive (1976) . Springing from movement impetus, this sector encompassed a few directors, actors, technicians, and others from several places across the country. The earliest noted women filmmakers included Susan Racho (Garment Workers, 1975), Esperanza Vasquez (Agueda Martinez: Our People, Our Country, 1977), and Sylvia Morales (Chicana, 1979); their work was continually played and appreciated. Among the artists, this cinema sector was the most voca l, and it may have also been the most supported by outside resources, including resources from Mexican government agencies. The trajectory of Chicana and Chicano filmmaking mirrored aspects of the CCM. Early on, men assumed leadership roles and mentored other men. Representations of women in these early works remained simplistic and gendered. Filmmakers who questioned the representation of women and women's issues eventually broke into the filmmaking scene, usually through their own initiative and advocacy. Chicana and Chicano films and documentaries offered another layered criticism and exploration of the Chicana and Chicano experience in the United States.

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CHAPTER 29

Words

n the 1960s and 1970s, interest in literature and the uses of literature invigorated Mexican American arts, and some activists, in particular, reflected on and invigorated Chicana and Chicano poutical rhetoric. 1 Io 1967, the organizer Corky Gonzales captured the activist cultural mood in his epic poem "I Am Joaquin." Thousands of copies were distributed to activists and community members. The poem was narrated and represented in a film by the Teatro Campesino in 1969 and generated continual interest and commentary for years. Gonzalez's poetic imagination combined visionary and historical interpretation and effectively communicated activists' hurts and aspirations of those days from a male perspective, emphasizing male-centered discourse. Another activist, Jose Angel Gutierrez, published the poem "25 Miles" (1968}; it was often read and referred to in movement discussions and spoke to the long journey for progressive social change, which necessitated persistence and contestation. The sixties witnessed the artistic arrival of several notable writers. Some identified with the CCM, others did not. John Rechy, arguably the most talented and widely read writer of Mexican descent, sympathized publicly but was not identified starkly with the movement in his writings. Clearly his work delineated the context and the circumstances from which sixties' activities arose. Rechy's Mexican American protagonist, an alter ego, was a pre-movement Mexican American youth seeking personal self-determination through the strength of his own will. Rechy's work over time received extensive critical attention in some literary circles after the publication of City of Night (1963), and even earlier with "El Paso de! Norte" in the Evergreen Review (1958}. Arguably related to his border background, his creative work as well as his interviews and editorial prose garnered positive reviews. His talent as a

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writer was clearly recognized. Some misinformed outsiders claimed Rechy was neither known in nor accepted by the movement. Setting the contradiction aside, that was simply not the case. Chicana and Chicano activists who preferred reading American contemporary writers knew of him and had met him. Moreover, activist youth often invited Rechy to campuses, and he did meet with Chicana and Chicano students on several occasions. Importantly in 1967, the periodical El Grito: A Journal of Contem porary Mexican-American Thought, a major public forum, emerged as a major Chicano literary outlet in a somewhat untraditional placeBerkeley, California. The journal spread early key articles on a variety of eras and subjects common to Mexican Americans' public concerns. This publication also launched the careers of some of the early prominent figures in Chicana and Chicano artistic and academic literature as well as some graphic artists. In 1968, these activities concurred with establishing a main Chicano publishing house, Quinto Sol, a name recalling the Aztec paradigm of the fifth sun. This house, from the first, contributed by publishing an anthology as well as single-title publications by authors who had published initially in El Grito. Two anthologies were protean, Voices (1971) and El Espejo (1972). In the early seventies, several initial anthologies edited by Philip D. Ortego, Lufs Valdez, or Antonia Castaneda and others clearly articulated and demonstrated this literary vigor from the first. Several publication centers evolved: Aztlan (Los Angeles, 1970), Revista Chicano-Riqueiia (Indiana, 1973), De Co/ores (Albuquerque, 1976), Mango (San Jose, n.d.), La Palabra (Arizona, n.d.), and The Bilingual Review (New York, 1970). Within and outside of these venues, Chicana writers sought out opportunities to publish their works. Their writings opened up once male-dominant spaces . The happenings of the Flory Canto conferences not only demonstrated vigor but also talent and diversity. Many Chicana and Chicano writers gained prominence in the community. CCM advocates were poets who drew inspiration from social issues and from fami ly or community oratorical or rhetorical traditions. Poetic speakers communicated values, styles, and imagery quickly associated with CCM. Reviving a practice dating at least to the early nineteenth century, early Chicana and Chicano movement-premised poems were read aloud before groups of students and workers who interpreted or argued the works. Among these spoke and wrote Corky Gonzales, Jose Montoya, Alurista, Abelardo Delgado, Reyes Cardenas, Lufs Omar Salinas, and Ricardo Sanchez. Gonzalez, Alurista, and

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Montoya represented direct consistent activism by activists who were also artists. Jose Montoya emerged as an exemplary of this tradition from the late sixties, as can be noted in his influential El sol y las de abajo (1972) . Another of the influential representations of this tradition was the early poetry of Alurista, particularly the poem "Bronce Breath" (1969), whose wording and images influenced the audience and shaped the preamble for the 1969 Chicano Youth Conference Plan of Action. Many Chicana and Chicano poets practiced a combination of Spanish, English, and Cal6, reflecting the frustration, suffering, efforts to survive challenges, and problems of existential being that confronted Mexican Americans daily. To be sure, there were those whose poetry drew from the Latino and indigenous heritages represented by the rising availability of literature and scholarship. Some examples would include Octavio Paz and Miguel Leon Portillo. Contradictory as it seems given the clear jingoism in their writings, American poets like Walt Whitman and others like him, such as Jack Kerouac, who included overtly racist themes in their work, influenced Chicano writings because of their direct affirmative styles. Indeed, a strand of early movement poetry of the 1960s took over phrasing and rhythm from the Beats and street life of the 1950s as a way of expressing disconformity. Others drew on barrio language and imagery. This was noticeable in the work of northern California poets such as the seminal Luis Salinas (Crazy Gypsy, 1970), but also the tough lyrical writing of Jose Montoya (El Sol y las de Abaja, 1972). Luis Omar Salinas, a talented exponent of rhetoric and romantic nuances and a one-time jailhouse prisoner, combined rhetoric and nostalgia in particularly effective ways in Crazy Gypsy to recall and share his life experiences. Among the successful conveyors of nostalgic barrio memories and brutal jail apprenticeships, the poet and narrator Raul Salinas (Un trip Through the Mind Jail y Otras Excursiones, 1999) stood out. Several El Paso, Texas, poets gained early notice. In 1969, Abelardo Delgado published "Stupid America" in a collection of poetry titled Chicano: 25 Pieces of a Chicano Mind, which rhetorically indicted the public for the lack of recognition granted Mexican Americans. These poems emphasized social reforms and social grievances with a certain complaining tone that is belied by the declamatory stance. These poems were intended to be presented in neighborhood centers, not necessarily movement conferences or campus symposiums. These pieces and others like them were printed and reprinted in community and movement

Words

newspapers throughout the southwestern United States. There were also writers from prison or formerly in prison who conveyed and shared their prison experiences and transformed them into inspirational influences. And, in these, they shared inspirations with the beats sounded by African American writers. Ricardo Sanchez, one of the most dramatic declamadores (poetic orators) of the Chicano movement, firmly believed rhetoric was poetry. Paroled from prison in 1969, he chronicled his life on the border between El Paso and Juarez as a barrio youth and repeat offender. He portrayed himself as a Chicano everyman, writing hundreds of poems for public events, rallies, magazines, and anthologies. In his first anthology of poetry, Canto y grito mi liberaci6n (y lloro mis desmadrazgos) (I Sing and Shout for My Liberation and Cry for My Faults), published in 1971, he figuratively shouted his poetic messages off the printed pages. Movement and movement-identified skeptics had their moments and stages . Their literary affiliations and readings were quite extensive. Tino Villanueva produced remarkably sensitive heartening works, invariably stating his love of life and hope for the future in remarkable metaphors. Reyes Cardenas displayed clear straightforward language that combined image and reflection in a uniquely telling way, such as in "I never was a militant Chicano." Here he affirmed that he was in his own way a militant through his subversive insight. Sergio Elizondo etched in clear, disciplined writing a satirical judgment on life and times in Perras y Antiperros: Una Epica Chicana (1972). The influence of readings on Mesoamerican philosophy and thought was evident in the early years of the indigenista phase within the Chicano movement. This was easily exemplified in the early works of Alu rista (Floricanto en Aztlan, 1971) and later Felipe Herrera (Rebozos of Love, 19 74). Their poetry combined Indian spiritual motifs and beliefs with elements of language play. These poems revealed differences in perception that underscored diverse day-to-day barrio experiences even as icon figures turned into metaphors while, on other occasions, they each stressed language and idyllic descriptions. Alurista's first collection of poetry, Floricanto, set the beat for many beginning poets and concurrently this influence spread to the visual arts. Eventually, a more informed indigenismo of the early years was enriched by the continued elaborations of indigenismo into the late seventies. Mexican American writers represented the largest group of artists in the movement. The general Chicano public greatly esteemed the best-known writers whose creativity has continued to crisscross the

:;;;.'1exican Americans," Atlantic Monthly (June 1967): 47-52; Helen Rowan, "Another Civil Rights Headache," U.S. News and World Report, June 6, 1966; art icles in Carta Editorial (1967-1970); and Gomez-Quinones, Chicano Politics, chap. 2. 2. For a discussion of the term Chicano, see Tino Villanueva, "Prologo," part 1, "Sobre el termino 'Chicano,'" in Chicanos: Antologia hist6rica y literaria, ed . Tino Villanueva (Mexico, D.F.: Fonda de Cultura Economica, 1980), 7- 67. For an advocacy of terms, see Tom Pino and Daniel Valdez, "Ethnic Labels in :Vlajority-Minority Relations," journal of Mexican American Studies 1, no. r (Fall r970): r6- 30. For the denunciation of the Chicano movement by the established leadership, see Henry B. Gonzalez, "The Hate Issue," Congressional Record, House of Representatives (April 22, r969); Eligio de la Garza "Reverse Racism," Congressional Record, House of Representatives (Apri l 28, r969); Edward R. Roybal, "Cabinet Committee on Opportunities for Spanish-Speaking People," Congressional Record, House of Representatives (December 16, 1969); and Joseph P. Montoya, "The Silent People No Longer," Congressional Record, Senate ( ovember r7, r967). The statements of federal officials were recorded and were accessible; the statements of Mexican American organizational representatives were not, and among them were those by all major groups. On class interaction within the Chicana and Chicano movement, see commentaries in Acuna, Occupied America; and Rodolfo Acuna, Community Under Siege: A Chronicle of Chicanos East of the Los Angeles River, 1945-1975 (Los Angeles, CA: Chicano Studies Research Center, University of California, 1984). For an endorsement of some aspects of the movement by the established leadership, see Joseph Monroya, Congressional Record, Senate (October 29, 197r}. For one Chicano perspective on the Black Power movement, see l\ick C. Vaca, "The Negro Movement as an Anti-Revolution," El Grito 2, no. 2 (1969): 61-70. On the movement's evolution between the late 1960s and early 1970s, see Rosales, Chicano! For activities in California, see Carlos Munoz Jr., Youth, Identity, Power: The Chicano Movement (New York: Verso, 1989). 3. For Chicanismo, see, on the one hand, David F. Gomez, Somos Chicanos: Strangers in Our Own Land (Boston, MA: Beacon Press, 1973); and, on the other hand, see Villanueva, "Prologo," in Chicanos; see also the reflective extended book-length essay by Ignacio M. Garcia, Chicanismo: The Forging of a Militant Ethos among lviexican Americans (Tucson: University of Arizona Press, r997) . 4. Carlos Monsivais, "Kotas sabra la cultura mexicana en el siglo XX," in Historia General de Mexico, vol. 4. Edited by Daniel Cosfo Villegas, 303476. Mexico: El Colegio de Mexico, r976.

Chapter 7 I.

On late sixties Chicana women's activities, see Carta Editorial

Note to Pages 80-93 (1967- 1970); Encuentro Femenil r, no. r (Spring 1973); Encuentro Femenil l, no. 2 (1974); Las Hiias de Cuauhtemoc (unnumbered edition, c. 1970); Regeneraci6n rand 2 (1970-1971); Enriqueta Longeaux Vasquez, "The Women of La Raza," La Raza (July 1969); Sonia Lopez, "The Role of the Chicana Within the Student Movement," in Essays on la 1Vlujer, ed. Rosaura Sanchez and Rosa Martinez Cruz (Los Angeles: University of California, Chciano Studies Research Center, 1977), 16- 29; Cecilia Suarez, "Sex ual Stereotypes: Psychological and Cultural Survival," Regeneraci6n 2, no. 3 (1972): 17- 21; Patricia Hernandez, "Lives of Chicana Activists: The Chicano Student Movement (A Case Study)," in Mexican Women in the United States: Struggles Past and Present, ed. Magdalena Mora and Adelaida R. del Castillo (Los Angeles: Chicano Studies Research Center, University of California, 1980), 17-25; and Cotera, The Chicana Feminist. For a bibliography of pointed materials related to Chicanas as matters were in the mid-197os, see Patricia Herrera Duran and Roberro Cabello-Argandona, The Chicana: A Preliminary Bibliographic Study, Reference Series, no. 2 (Los Angeles: Chicano Studies Rese arch Center, University of California, 1973); and Roberto Cabello-Argandona, Juan GomezQuiiiones, and Patricia Herrera Duran, The Chicana: A Comprehensive Bibliographic Study iLos Angeles: Chicano Studies Research Center, University of California, 1975). For a pertinent collection of pro-women statements, see Garcia, ed., Chicana Feminist Thought. For narrative and assessment of Chicana power, see Maylei Blackwell, jChicana Power! For how rwo male writers were assimilating women's concerns, see Abelardo Delgado, "An Open Lecrer to Carolina or Relations Between Men and Women," in A Decade of Hispanic Literature: An Anniversary Anthology, ed. Nicholas Kanellos (Housron: Revista Chicano-Riquena, 1982), 279-84; and Ricardo Sanchez, "Coy unrate, Mujer," in Hechizo Spells (Los Angeles: Chicano Studies Research Center, University of California, 1976), republished in Villanueva, ed., Chicanos. These publications had a distribution higher than most statements of the rime. For a CC\'1 newspaper commentary on women, see issues of Sin Fronteras (Los Angeles, CA) . For employment figures, see Laura E. Arroyo, "Industri a l and Occupational Distribution of Chicana Workers," Aztlan 4, no. 2 (1975): 343-82; and Anna Nieto-Gomez, Chicanas and Labor (Los Angeles: University of California, Chicano Studies Reseach Center, 1980). 2. " Resolution from the Chicana Workshop," in Chicana Feminist Thought, ed. Garcia, 146-47. The document was published originally in La Verdad (June 1970), 9· 3. Richard Santillan, "The Politics of Cultural a tionalism: El Partido de la Raza Unida in Southern California, 1969- 1978" (PhD diss., Claremont Graduate School, 1978), 189. 4. Ibid.

Chapter 8 r. On labor, see Gomez-Q uinones , Mexican Ame rican Labor. For a sta tement on community and Cesar Chavez's ow n sentiments toward labor, see John R. J\'1oyer, "A Conversation with Cesar Ch avez," journal of Current

3E

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Note to Pages 98-105

Social [ssues 9 (November-December 1970): 3-9; and "The Digniry of the Farm Worker," in Aztlan, ed . Valdez and Steiner, 209. For articles in the contemporary national press, see Look magazine (April 1969), Christian Century (February 18, 1970), and Ramparts (Ju ly 1966). For the origins of the union, see Sam Kushner, Long Road to Delano (New York: International Publishers, 1975). The lirerarure on the UFW and Cesar Chavez is considerable and much of it is favorab le; for the 1970s, see Jacques E. Levy, Cesar Chavez : Autobiography of La Causa ( ew York: Norton, 1975); Dick Meister and Anne Loftis, A Long Time Coming: The Struggle to Unionize America's Farm Workers (New York: Macmillan, 1977); and Kushner, Long Road. "El Plan de Delano" (typescript, n.d., photostatic copy) is sometimes reprinted with the title "Farm Worker's Manifesto." For commentary and a printed version, see Valdez and Steiner, eds ., Aztlan, l97-2I8. For an early printing of the plan and excellent photos, see George Ballis, Basta! La historia de nuestra lucha (Delano, CA: Farm Workers Press, 1966). For a critical assessment of Cesar Chavez in politics, see Harry Bernstein, "Farm Union: Why Didn't It Burgeon?" Los Angeles Times, December 6, 1982. For a view from within the union, see Dolores Huerta, "Dolores Huerta Talks About Republican s, Cesar, Children, and Her Home Town," La Vaz del Pueblo (Novem ber-December 1972). 2. AFL-CIO News 16, no. 7 (November i.3, 1973). 3. Ibid. 4. Jbid.

Chapter 9 r. On diverse views on land identification amo ng J'vlexican Americans, see Chavez, The Lost Land; Rudolfo Anaya and Francisco Lomelf, eds., Aztltin: Essays on the Chicano Homeland (Albuquerq ue: University of New Mexico Press, 1989); and, in particular, the essay by Enriqueta Longeaux Vasquez, "La Santa Tierra," El Grito de/ Norte (December 1970); and Raul Salinas, "A Trip Through the Mind Jail," Entre Lineas r, reprinted in Ortego, ed., We Are Chicanos, 195-200. 2.. On the Alianza, see Reies Lopez Tijerina, They Ca lled Me "King Tiger": My Struggle for the Land and Our Rights (Houston: Arte Publico Press, 2000). The Spanish edition is longer and '.Vas published in 1978 by Fondo de Cultura Economica, !\1exico D.F. For CCM developments in New :Mexico, see David Maciel and Juan Jose Peiia, "La Reconquista: The Chicano Movement in New Mexico," in The Contested Homeland: A Chicano History of New Mexico, ed. Erlinda Gonzalez-Berry and David tviaciel, 269-301 (A lbuquerq ue: University of ).l"ew Mexico Press, 2000). Early publications on the Alianza are Peter ~abokov, Tijerina and the Courthouse Raid (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1969); and Patricia Bell Blawis, Tijerina and the Land Grants: Mexican Americans in Struggle for Their Heritage ( ew York: International Publishers, 1971).

Note to Pages 109-115 38 Chapter 10 I. On Mexican Americans, the law, and the courts, see Anaya Va lencia et al., eds., Mexican Americans and the Law; see also Edward J. Escobar, Race, Police, and the Making of a Political Identity: Mexican Americans and the Los Angeles Police Department, r9 00-r945 (Berkeley: Universi ty of California Press, 1999); Roberto Rodrfguez, justice: A Question of Race (Tempe, AZ: Bilingual Press, 1997); and B. V. Olgu[n, La Pinta: Chicana/a Prisoner Literature, Culture, and Politics (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2010). 2. On the early Southwest Council of La Raza, see Y. Arturo Cabrera, Emerging Faces: The Mexican -Americans (Dubuque, IA: William C. Brown, 1971), 34-3 6. For views of the community and the needs that served as its premise, see Ernesto Ga larza, Herman Gallegos, and Julian Samora, MexicanAmericans in the Southwest (San ta Barbara: McNa lly and Loftin, 1969); and Henry Santiesteban, "Southwest Council of La Raza Balance Sheet," Agenda l (Summer 1973): 16-17. For news reports on the funding of the Southwest Council of La Raza, see Christian Science Monitor, May 3, 1968, and July 31, 1968; and the New York Times, June 17, 1968, 24. For later developments, see Christine Sierra, " The Political Transformation of a Minority Organization: The Council of La Raza, 1965- 1980," (PhD diss., Stanford University, 1982). 3. On the :V1exican American Legal Defense and Education Fund, see Annette Oliveira, MALDEF, Diez Anos (San Francisco, CA: MALDEF, 1978); and MALDEF, "Bylaws and Incorporation Statement" (photostatic copy, 1967); Karen O'Conner and Leo Epstein, "A Legal Voice for the Chicano Community: The Activities of the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund, 1968-1982," Social Science Quarterly 65, no .. 2 (1984): 245- 56; and :tv1aurilio Vigil, "The Ethnic Organization as an Instrument of Political and Social Change: MALDEF, a Case Study," journal of Ethnic Studies 18 (Spring 1990): 15-3i. On pinto activism, see Raul Salinas, Raul Salinas and the jail Machine: My Weapon ls My Pen, ed . Louis Mendoza (Austin: Universiry of Texas Press, 2006); Special Issue " Los Pintos," De Co/ores 3, no. 2 (1976); and B. V. Olguin, La Pinta. 4. On confrontational tactics, see the recollections related in Ernesto B. Vigil, The Crusade for Justice: Chicano Militancy and the Government's War on Dissent (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1999); Jose Angel Gutierrez, The Making of a Chicano Militant: Lessons from Cristal (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1998); and David Sanchez, Expedition Through Aztlan (La Puente, CA: Perspectivas Publications, 1978). An informed analysis of protest tactics and their viability at the time was Michael Lipsky, "Protest as a Political Resource," American Political Science Review 62 (December 1968): 1144-5 8. Surely repudiated and also read by many activists were the works of Saul D. Alinsky, Reveille for Radicals (New York: Vintage, 1969) and Rules for Radicals: A Pragmatic Primer for Realistic Radicals ( ew York: Vintage, 1971).

Chapter 11 I.

On the Crusade for Justice and Rodolfo Gonzalez, see issues of EI

~4

Note to Pages 115-122

Gallo: La Vaz de laJusticia and also La Raza (July IO, 1968); Rodolfo "Corky" Gonzales, "What Political Road for rhe Chicano Militant," The Militant, March 30, 1970; Antonio Esquibel, ed., Message to Aztlan: Selected Writings of Rodolfo "Corky" Gonzales (Houston: Arte Publico Press, :z.001); El Gallo: La Vaz de la Justicia, January 1968 to March-April 1980; and Vigil, Crusade for Justice; see also Christine Marin, A Spokesman of the Mexican American Movement: Rodolfo "Gorky" Gonzales and the Fight for Chicano Liberation, r966- 1972 (San Francisco, CA: Rand E Research Associates, 1977). For the Poor People's March and the Plan de! Barrio, see La Raza, 2. July IO, 1968, and La Raza Yearbook, September 1968; for first-hand narratives, see Vigil, Crusade for Justice; see also Tijerina, They Called Me "King Tiger," 103-16. For a contrasting view, see the memoirs of Ralph Abernathy in And the Walls Came Tumbling Down: An Autobiography (New York: Harper and Row, 1989). 3. Rodolfo "Corky" Gonzales, "I am Joaquin," and "A Boy, Juarez U.S.A.," in Message to Aztlan, ed. Esquibel, 16 and :z.05 respectively. 4. On violence and response, see Armando Morales, Ando Sangrando (I Am Bleeding): A Study of Mexican American Police Conflict (La Puente, CA: Perspectiva Pub lications, 1972); and the novels of Oscar Zera Acosta, The Autobiography of a Brown Buffalo (San Francisco: Straight Arrow Books, 1972) and Revolt of the Cockroach People (San Francisco: Straight Arrow Books, 1973); see also Julian Samora, Joe Bernal, and Albert Pefia, Gunpowder Justice: A Reassessment of the Texas Rangers (Notre Dame, I ·:University of Notre Dame Press, 1987); Escobar, Race, Police, and Political Identity; and Rodriguez, Justice.

Chapter 12 I. On youth activities and community defense, see issues of La Causa (Los Angeles) from 1969 to 1972. On Brown Berets, see Sanchez, Expedition Through Aztlan; and Black Berets, "Black Beret Organization," in La Causa Politica: A Chicano Politics Reader, ed. F. Chris Garcia (. orre Dame, l University of. otre Dame Press, 1975), 405-8, which reprints a program statement, also found in Gilberto Lopez y Rivas, The Chicanos: Life and Struggles of the 1Vfexican Minority in the United States, trans . and ed. Elizabeth Martinez (New York: Monthly Review Press, r973), and Dionne Espinoza, "' Revolutionary Sisters': Women's Solidarity and Collecti ve Identification among Chicana Brown Berets in East Los Angeles," Aztlan 26, no. I (Spring

2001): I7-58. 2. On the momentum for community defense efforts, see issues of La Verdad (San Diego) and the Crusade newspaper El Gallo: La Voz de La Justicia (Denver); Acuna, Occupied America; and Sanchez, Expedition Through Aztlan. 3. On the student movement, see Juan Gomez-Quinones, Mexican Students par La Raza: The Chicano Student Movement in Southern California, r967r977 (Santa Barbara, CA: La Causa Publications, 1978); Lopez, "The Role of the Chicana," in Essa)'s on La Mujer, ed. Sanchez et al., 16-29; Carlos Munoz

Note to Pages 125-164

and Mario Barrera, "La Raza Unida Party and the Chicano Student Movemenr in California," Social Science journal 19 (April 198i.): lOI- i.o; Munoz, Youth, Identity, Power; and Armando Navarro, Mexican American Youth Organization: Avant-Garde of the Chicano Movement in Texas (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1995). For 1970s mobilization, see Carlos M. Haro, ed ., The Bakke Decision: The Question of Chicano Access to Higher Education (Los Angeles: Chicano Studies Research Center, University of California, 1977). Also relevant to the Chicana and Chicano student movement are a number of interviews in the possession of Juan Gomez-Quinones, including recorded and transcripted discussion with Rodolfo Acuiia, Jorge Aquiniga, Alurista, Lufs Aragon, Luis Arroyo, Carlos Cortes, Castulo de la Rocha, Adelaida del Castillo, Tobias Duran, Moctezuma Esparza, Justo Fernandez, Jorge Garcia, Leo Gomez, Jorge Gonzalez, Jose Limon, Fred Lopez, Rudy Lozano, Reynaldo Macias, Chaco Mesa, Tacho Mindiola, .V1agda lena Mora, Nancy Montano, Yolanda Nava, Victor elson-Cisneros, Anna Nieto-Gomez, Rene Nu iiez, Frank Quevedo, Susan Racho, Amalia Rodriguez, Armando Va ldez, Carlos Vasquez, and Christina Vega.

Chapter 13 r. On activists, needed school reforms, and school protests there are a variety of materials as well as interviews wi th participants in Texas, California, and elsewhere-for example, Ray Santana and Mario Esparza, "East Los Angeles Blowouts," in Parameters of Institutional Change: Chicano Experiences in Education, ed. Armando Valdez (Hayward, CA: Southwest Network, 1974), l-9; Mario T. Garcfa and Sal Castro, Blow Out!: Sal Castro and the Chicano Struggle for Educational justice (Durham: University of North Carolina, 2orr); and the dissertation by participant Henry J. Gutierrez, "The Chicano Education Rights Movement and School Segregation, Los Angeles, 1962-1970" (PhD diss., UC frvine, 1990). Both Gutierrez, Making of a Chicano Militant, and Vigil, Crusade for justice, cover student protests. See also Dolores Delgado Berna I, "Chicana School Resistance and Grassroots Leadership: Providing an Alternative Framework for the 1968 East Los Angeles Blowouts" (PhD diss ., University of California, Los Angeles, 1999); and close observer Guadalupe San !figuel, "Let All of Them Take Heed ": Mexican Americans and the Campaign for Educational Equality in Texas, 1910-1981 (Austin: Un iversity of Texas Press, 1987). 2. See Black Beret 12. Point Program & Platform, reprinted as "Black Beret Organization," in La Causa Politica: A Chicano Politics Reader, edited by F. Chris Garcfa. (Norte Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1974), 405-8.

Chapter 15 1. A basic statement on the Chicana and Chicano in higher education is Chicano Coordinating Council on Higher Education, El Plan de Santa Barbara

3

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E36

Note to Pages 168-179 (Oakland, CA: La Causa Publications, 1969); Armando Valdez and Juan Gomez assumed the responsibility for the final manuscript, line editing, typesetting, and printing. For a reflection on this a few years later, see Mary Pardo, "A Selective Evaluation of El Plan de Santa Barbara," La Gente (Ma rch/April 1984): 14- 15. On Mexican Americans and educational achievement, see Ronald W. Lopez and Darryl D. Enos, Chicanos and Public Higher Education in California (Sacramento: California Legislature, Joint Committee on the Master Plan for Higher Education, December 1972); U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, Ethnic Isolation of lvlexican Americans in the Public Schools of the Southwest, Report 1 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, April 1971); U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, The Unfinished Education: Outcomes for Minorities in the Five Southwestern States: M exican American, Report 2 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, October 1971 ); U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, The Excluded Student- Educational Practices Affecting Mexican Americans in the Southwest, Report 3 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, May 1972); U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, Mexican American Education in Texas: A Function of Wealth, Report 4 (Washington, D.C. : U.S. Government Printing Office, August 1972); and U.S. Commission on Civil Rjghts, Teachers and Students- Differences in Teacher Interaction with Mexican American and Anglo Students, Report 5 (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Government Printing Office, March 1973).

Chapter 16 1. On the evolution of Chicana and Chicano Studies as seen in the midseventies, see Valdez, ed., Parameters of Institutional Change; Tobias Gonzales and Sandra Gonzales, Perspectives on Chicano Education (Palo Alto, CA: Chicano Fellows, Stanford University, 1975); and the recent works of Rodolfo Acuna. 2. Chicano Coordinating Council on Higher Education, El Plan de Santa Barbara, 44. 3· Ibid., IO. 4. On alternative education efforts presented by activists, see Valdez, ed., Parameters of Institutional Change; H. Homero Galicia, "Chicanos and Schools: A Perspective for Chicano Alternative Educational Situations," in Chicano Alternative Education {Study commissioned by Southwest etwork of the Study Commission on Undergraduate Education and the Education of Teachers) (Hayward, CA: Southwest Network, 1974), 1- 16; and Clementina Almaguer, Casa de la Raza: Separatism or Segregation (Hayward, CA: Southwest Network, 1974).

Chapter 17 1. For one perspective on ideological trends by a veteran activist, see Roberto Rodriguez, "The Origins and History of the Chicano Movement" (East Lansing: Michigan State University, Julian Samora Institute, 1996); and see Roberto Rodriguez, Assault with a Deadly Weapon (Los Angeles, CA:

Note to Pages 183-191 Libreria Lati no America no, I98 5) for his view of life in an immoral society; see also Garcia, Chicanisrno, which delineates Garcia's presentation of what LRUP of South Texas advocates desired. For Chicana feminists, see Garcia, ed., Chicana Feminist Thought.

Chapter 18 I. For coverage on the I969 Denver conference, a seminal event of the CCM, see: EI Gallo, La Raza, and La Verdad (March- July 1969); and EI Grito del Norte 2, no. 9 (July 1969). See also El Plan de Aztlan. The committee's handwritten original, dated March 1969, is in the possession of Juan Gomez-Quinones, who served on the drafting committee with four other members, among them Luis Valdez and Jorge Gonzalez. For the printed plan and program, see La Verdad (San Diego) I (June 1969). This issue also contains the poem by Alurista, "Bronce Breath," which was a basic point of departure and a synthesis of early interpretive comments by Rudolfo "Corky " Gonzales. Regrettably and erroneously, in some anthology reprints of the plan, at the end there appears the meaningless phrase, "To hell with the nothing race," which may have been inserted by someone who did not understand Spanish. Two lernas (mottos) were circulated for the bottom on the printed plan: one, "Por La Raza, Para La Raza," which harkens back to the l9II congreso; and the other, "Dentro de la Raza Todo, Fuera de la Raza ada," which harkens to a lema of the Cuban Revolution: "Dentro de la Revoluci6n Todo, Fuera de la Revoluci6n Nada." The actual motto on the circu lar is "Para la Raza Todo, Fuera de le Raza ada" (Within the Raza Everything, Outside of the Raza Nothing). The historical and contemporary content of these phrasings is very distinct from "To hell with the nothing race," allegedly inserted by a nonMexican in a version circulated by the "radical caucus," which was composed of some attendees from the Northern California Bay area. La \lerdad also printed a version of the women's caucus report. For recollections by women activists, see Enriqueta Vasquez and Dionne Espinoza, eds., Enriqueta Vasquez and the Chicano Mo vement: Writings from El Grito def Norte, ed . Lorena Oropeza and Dionne Espinoza (Houston: Arte Publico Press, 2006). 2 . .:V1imeographed document, in authors' possession. 3. 1v1imeographed document, in authors' possession. 4. Alurista, "Must be the Season of the Witch," in The Latino Reader: An American Literary Tradition from 1542 to the Present, ed. Harold Augenbraum and Margarite Fernandez Olmos (Boston: Houghton Mifflin,

1997), 288.

5. Life, April 24, 1970 (photo insert). 6. See Jose Angel Gutierrez, "Chicanos and Mexicanos Under Surveillance, 1940- 1980," Renato Rosaldo Lecture Series Monograph, vol. 2, series 1984-1985, ed. Ignacio Garcia (Tucson: University of Arizona, Mexican American Studies & Research Center, Spring 1986); see also Ward Churchill and James Vander Wall, Agents of Repression: The FBI 's Secret Wars Against the Black Panther Party and the American Indian Movement (Boston, MA: South End Press, 1988).

3:

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Note to Pages 192-205 7. Jose Angel Gutierrez, A Gringo Manual on How to Handle Mexicans, i.nd. ed. (Houston, TX: Arte Publico Press, 2001). 8. Amfaico Paredes, "\'(!ith His Pistol in His Hand ": A Border Ballad and Its Hero (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1958). 9. Octavio Romano-V, "The Historical and [nrellectual Presence of Mexican Americans (1969)," in El Grito 2 (wi nter 1969): 32- 46; a nd Octavio Romano-V, "The Anthropology and Sociology of the Mexican America ns: The Distortion of Mexican American Hjstory," El Grito 2 (fall 1968): 13-26. 10. Acuna, Occupied America; Mario Barrera, Race and Class in the Southwest: A Theory of Racial Inequality (Notre Dame, IN : University of Notre Dame Press, 1979); and Mario Barrera, Ca rlos Munoz, and Charles Ornelas, "The Barrio as an Internal Colony," in People and Politics in Urban Society, ed. Harlan Hahn, 465-99 (Beverly Hills, CA: Sage Publications, 1972).

Chapter 19 I. For eyewitness accounts, photographs, and statements o n the Chicano !vloratorium, see La Raza l (October 1970} : 32; .Morales, Ando Sangrando, 91- 122; "Inaction, Growing Militancy Viewed as Causes of Riots ," Los Angeles Times, August 31, 1970; and William J. Drummond, "How East LA Protest Turned into Major Riot," Los Angeles Times, September 16, 1970. For a critique of both police agency actions and l'vlexican American leadership responses, see Antonio Camejo, "Lessons of the Los Angeles Chicano Protest," The Militant 3, no. 38 (October 16, 1970). See also Escobar, Race, Police, and Political Identity. 2. On specifics includ ing the death of Ruben Salazar, see H ank Lopez, "Overkill at the Silver Dollar," The Nation, October 19, 1970; a nd Jose Angel de la Vera, "1970 Chicano Moratorium and the Death of Ruben Salazar," in An Awakened Minority: The Mexican-Americans, ed. Manuel Servin (Beverly H ills: Glencoe Press, 1974). For writings by Ruben Sa laza r, see Stranger in One's Land (Washington, D.C.: U.S. Commi ssion on Civil Rights, U.S . Governmem Printing Office, May 1970); and see the biography and collection of Salazar's writings by Mario T. Garcia, ed., Ruben Salazar: Border Correspondent, Selected \'i!ritings, 1955- 1970 (Berkeley: Un iversity of California Press, 199 5). 3. On patterns of politics, see Juan Gomez-Quinones, Chicano Politics; see also the dissertation of Alfredo Cuellar, "A Theory of Politics: The Idea of Chica no Revisionism" (Claremont College Graduate School, 1976); a nd the assessme nt of a veteran activist, Henry Santiestevan, "A Perspective on 1-1exican American Organizations," in Mexican-Americans Tomorrow: Educational and Economic Perspectives, ed. Gus . Tyler (Albu querque: University of New· Mexico Press, 1975), 164-202.

Chapter 20 I. On the origins of La Raza Unid a a nd its leadership, see Gutierrez, Making of a Chicano M ilitant; and for materials of the time, see "The Del Rio

Note to Pages 206-209 Mexican American Manifesto to the Nation (March 30, 1969)" (photostatic copy, n.d., n.p.). A copy of this latter document can be found in the authors' possession and in the Albar Peiia Papers located at the University of Texas, San Antonio, as cited in Brian D. Behnken, Fighting Their Own Battles: Mexican Americans, African Americans, and the Struggle for Civil Rights in Texas (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2011). See also Gutierrez, Gringo Manual; Jose Angel Gutierrez, "Mexicanos Need to Control Their Own Destinies," in La Raza Unida Party in Texas : Speeches by Mario Compean and Jose Angel Gutierrez, ed. Mario Compean and Jose Angel Gutierrez, 10-15. ( ew York: Pathfinder Press, 1970); Jose Angel Gutierrez, El Politico: The Mexican American Elected Official (El Paso, TX : Mitla Publications, 1972); Jose Angel Gutierrez, "Aztlan; Chicano Revolt in the Winter Garden," La Raza 1, no. 4 (1971): 34-37; and Cotera, The Chicana Feminist. See also George Rivera, "Social Change in the Barrio: The Chicano Movement in South Texas," Aztltin 3 (Fall 1972): 20 5-14. A thoughtful and informed coverage of the party is available from LRUP activist and academic Ignacio M. Garcia in United We Win: The Rise and Fall of La Raza Unida Party (Tucson: Mexican American Studies and Research Center, University of Arizona, 1989); and also in Armando Navarro, La Raza Unida Party: A Chicano Challenge to the U.S. Two-Party Dictatorship (Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press, 2000). 2. On Crystal City, see activists Gutierrez, Making of a Chicano Militant; and Armando Gutierrez and Herbert Hirsch, "Political Maturation and Political Awareness: The Case of the Crystal City Chicano," Aztltin 5 (1974) : 295- 312. For commentary, see John Staples Shockley, Chicano Revolt in a Texas Town (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1974), and Armando avarro, The Crystal City Experiment: A Chicano Struggle for Community Control (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1998). 3. On the interpretations of the concepts of La Raza Unida and party forming and on some of the thinking and tactics of La Raza Unida activists for South Texas, see Armando . avarro, "El Partido de la Raza Unida in Crystal Cit)': A Peaceful Revolution" (PhD diss., University of California, Riverside, 1974); for California, see Santillan, "Politics of Cultural ationalism"; and for Colorado, see Vigil, Crusade for Justice. 4. On the 1972 El Paso Conference, see The Militant, September 22, 1972; Richard Santillan, La Raza Unida (Los Angeles: Tlaquito Publications, 1973): 148-50; and John L. Espinoza, "Raza Unida Conference: Unidos Quedaremos," La Luz (October 1972): 10-12.. The major statement can be found in " Draft of Constitution of La Raza Unida Party Adopted as Governing Instrument for La Raza Unida Party in the El Paso Convention" (September 1972). A copy of this document can be found in the authors' possession. Written close to the time of the events, Samillan's work graphically conveys not only a narrative of events, but also the thoughts, feeling, attitudes, and words of LRUP activists. See, of course, Gutierrez, Making of a Chicano Militant; and Vigil, Crusade for justice. 5. On the LRUP in Colorado see Vigil, Crusade for justice; and for l\ew Mexico, see the coauthored essay by Pena and .\faciel, "La Reconquista," in

38 ~

90

Note to Pages 211-215

The Contested Homeland, ed. Gonzalez-Berry and Maciel, 269-30I. 6. On La Raza Unida in California and its various expressions there are several sources. For origins in Southern California, see the views of two activists: Alberro Juarez, "The Emergence of El Partido de la Raza Unida, California's New Chicano Party," Aztlan 3, no. 2 (Fall 1972): 177-204; Santillan, La Raza Unida; and Santillan, "The Politics of Cultural Nationalism." For developments in Northern California, see Munoz, Youth, Identity, Power; and Mario Barrera, Beyond Aztlan: Ethnic Autonomy in Comparative Perspective ( ew York: Praeger, 1988). On these electoral politics contestations in Los Angeles, see Los Angeles Times, Kovember 18, 1971; for a view favorable to LRUP, see Santillan, La Raza Unida, 84- 85. The Republican Brophy benefited from a widely reported incident immediately prior to the election in which he claimed that his home had been fired into. For state•vide LRUP efforts, see Los Angeles Times, August 30, 1973, and August 16, 1974· The reference to the Democrat is in the August 30, 1973, issue. For some early antecedents, see Los Angeles Times, November 22, 1972. On past East Los Angeles incorporation efforts, see Reynaldo f. Macias, Guillermo Vicente Flores, Donaldo Figueroa, and Luis Aragon, A Study of Unincorporated East Los Angeles (Los Angeles: Chicano Studies Research Center, University of California, 1973); Los Angeles Times, August 16, 30, and c ovember 16, 1974; Jaime Raigoza, "The East Los Angeles Cityhood M:easure," Campo Libre I, no. l (Winter 1981): 1-23; and Frank del Olmo, "Defeat of East LA Plan Laid to Fear of High Property Tax," Los Angeles Times, ovember 7, 1974· LRUP California activists crisscrossed activities with a major Californiabased group, the UFW. On Raza Unida goals and activities in contrast to those of the UFW and its leadership, see Castro, Chicano Power, 94-100. On the major issue of reapportionment, see Richard Santillan, California Reapportionment and the Chicano Community: An historical overview, 19601980 (Claremont, CA: Rose Institute, Claremont Men's College, 1981); Los Angeles Times, January 16, 1973, February 21, 1973, and September 3, 1973.

Chapter 21 l. On church-related activities, see Gomez, So mos Chicanos; Antonio M. Stevens Arroyo, ed., Prophets Denied Honor: An Anthology on the Hispano Church of the United States (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Press, 1980); Richard Edward Martinez, PADRES: The National Chicano Priest Movement (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2005); Laura 11edina, "Las Hermanas: Chicana/ Latina Religious Political Activism, 1971- 1996" (PhD diss., Claremont Graduate University, 1998); Leo 0. Nieto, "The Chicano Movement and the Churches in the United States," Perkins Journal (Fall 1975): 32-41; and Jay P. Dolan and Allan Figueroa Deck, eds., Hispanic Catholic Culture in the U.S .: Issues and Concerns (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1975). On "Cat6licos Por la Raza," see issues of the newspapers Cat6/icos Por la Raza

Note to Pages 216-221 (January 1970) and La Raza, (1970). Retrospectively, see Ada Maria lsasi-Dfaz and Fernando F. Segovia, Hispanic/Latino Theology: Challenge and Promise {Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 1996). 2. On Communities Organized for Public Service (COPS) and the United Neighborhoods Organization (UNO), see Fcank de! Olmo, "UNO, at ro, Enjoys Key Role in Region's Decision Making," Los Angeles Times, July 16, 1987; see also Richard Ed ward ~fartinez, PADRES, rr5- 17. 3. On COPS/UNO see participant Louis Negrete and direct observer Acuna's Occupied America; and de! Olmo, "U O, at ro"; see also Martinez, PADRES, n5-17.

Chapter 22 r. For several tendencies, see Gomez-Quinones, Chicano Politics, chap. 3; Acun a, Occupied America, chaps. 13 and 14; and Garcia, Chicanismo. 2. The avai la ble public sources on these organizations and their activities are the newsletters or newspapers of the organizations. See references to these in Elbaum, Revolution in the Air. For the ideological and print context of these, see Abe Peck, Uncovering the Sixties: The Life and Times of the Underground Press {New York: Pantheon Press, 1985). 3. The available public sources on these organizations and their activities are the newsletters or newspapers of the organizations; one review of these focused on "the national question" is Anton io Rios-Bustamante, Mexicans in the United States and the National Question : Current Polemics and Organizational Positions (Santa Barbara, CA: La Causa, 1978); see also Zaragosa Vargas, "Chicanos and the Shaping of the Left," Science and Society 65 (Spring 2001): 131-36. Some 1960s roots can be identified through Theodori Massimo, ed., The New Left: A Documentary History ( ew York: Bobbs ;\ferrill, 1969). 4. The most readily available public source on CASA is the newspaper Sin Fronteras (1974-19 78) . There are a lso special collections files at Stanford University Library pertinent to CASA. There are also documents available on its internal organization, for example, the Reglamento and Who We Are, and on its labor activities there is a lengthy report on two dozen labor organizing efforts. Various typescript assessments exist on the reasons leading to the closure of the organization. One distributed early study on CASA is David G. Gutierrez, "CASA in the Chicano ~ovement: Ideology and Organizational Politics in the Chicano Community, 1968- 1978," Working Paper Series, no. 5 (Stanford, CA: Department of History Stanford University, 1984); this has some questionable points, though also some informative analysis . For informed but brief sharply critical commentary, see Arturo Santa Marfa Gomez, La izquierda norteamericana y los trabaiadores indocumentados (Sinaloa, Mexico: Ediciones de Cultura Popular, Universidad Autonoma de Sinaloa, 1988). See also Ernesto Chavez, "iMi Raza Primera!" (My People First!}: Nationalism, Identity, and Insurgency in the Chicano Movement in Los Angeles I966-L978 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2002); .'vlarisela R. Chavez, "Despierten Herm a nas y

3~

,.2

Note to Pages 224-232 Hermanos! Women, the Chicano Movement, and Chicana Feminisms in California, 1966-198 1" (PhD diss., Stanford University, 2004); and Laura Pulido, Black, Brown, Yellow, and Left: Radical Activism in Los Angeles (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2006). 5. Chavez, " Despierten Hermanas y Hermanos! "; Chavez, "iMi Ra za Primera!"; and Adelaida del Castillo, " Mexican Women in Organization," in Mexican Women in the United States, ed. Mora and Del Casti llo, 7-16. See also comparative comments by Laura Pulido in Black, Brown, Yellow, and

Left. 6. On the August Twenty-Ninth Movement, see their published statement titled Fan the Flames: A Revolutionary Position on the Chicano National Question (Los Angeles: August Twenty-Ninth Movement, 1976); issues of their newspaper Revolutionary Cause (1976- 1977); and their journal, The Red

Banner: Theoretical Journal of the August Twenty-Ninth Movement, ML l (Winter 1976- 1977); see also comments in Pu lido, Black, Brown, Yellow, and L eft. 7. On the League of Revolutionary Struggle, see Forward 1-7 (19791987) and read its critique of some basic Marxist-Leninist tenets in its statement on its dissolution; see also passages in Wicked Theory, Naked Practice: A Fred Ho Reader, ed. Diane C. Fujino (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2009).

Chapter 23 I. Chicanarte (Los Angeles: Comite Chicanarre, Ch icano Studies Research Center, University of California, 1976), 1. 2. Ibid. 3. Ibid., 3. 4· Ibid. 5· Ibid. 6. Ibid., 4. lbid. 7. 8. Ibid., 5. 9 . Ibid. 10. Laura E. Perez, Chi cana Art: The Politics of Spiritual and Aesthetic Altarities (Durham, NC : Duke University Press, 2007). II. On art materials and critiques of cultural expression, see the extensive bibliography in Shifra M . Goldman and Tomas Ybarra-Frausto, Arte Chicano: A Comprehensive Annotated Bibliography of Chicano Art, 1965 - 1981 (Berkeley, CA: C hicano Studies Library, 198 5). On CCM posters, see Shifra M . Goldman, "A Public Voice: Fifteen Years of Chicano Posters," Art journal 44 (1984): 50-57; see also Richard Griswold del Castillo et al., eds., Chicano Art: Resistance and Affirmation, 1965- 1985 (Los Angeles: Wight Art Gallery, University of California, 1991); Perez, Chicana Art; and Alicia Gaspar de Alba,

Chicano Art Inside/Outside the .Master's House: Cultural Politics and the CA RA Exhibition (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1998).

Note to Pages 233-257 1 2. On publications as known then, see materials listed in Guillermo Rojas, "Toward a Chicano/Raza Bibliography: Drama, Prose, Poetry," El Grito 7, no. 2 (I973) : I- 85; see a lso Cabello-Argandona et al., The Chicana: A Comprehensive Bibliography; and Directorio Chicano: A Resource Listing of Chicano Print Media (Hayward, CA: Southwest Network, I975l· For retrospective views and prospective activities, see Ernesto Bustillo, Chicano Journalism, Its Histor)' and Its Use as a Weapon for Liberation: Articles and Speeches on the Press, Propaganda and Consciousness (San Diego, CA: Raza Press, 2009)

Chapter 24 1. On early statements on street and neighborhood arts, see l\1ildred l\tlonteverde " Contemporary Ch icano Art," Aztlan 2, no. 2 (Fa ll 1971): 51-61; David Kahn "Chicano Street Murals: Peoples Art in the East Los Angeles Barrio," A z t/tin 6 (Spring 1975): II7-21; Victor Alejandro Sorell, "Articulate Signs of Resistance and Affirmation in Chicano Public Art," in Chicano Art, ed . Del Castillo et al., 41- 154; issues of Lowrider magazine; and Jerry Romotsky and Sally R. Romotsky, Los Angeles Barrio Calligraphy (Los Angeles, CA: Dawson's Book Shop, 1976). 2. On pinto arts see Sorell, "A rticu late Signs," 4I-154; and Allan Govenar, "T he Variable Context of Chicano Tattooing," in Marks of Civilization: Artistic Transformations of the Human Body, ed. Arnold Rubin (Los Angeles, CA: Museum of Cultural History, 1988), 209-I8. On art messages, see Gaspar de Alva, Chicano Art; and Victor Alejandro Sorell, Illuminated Handkerchiefs, Tattooed Bodies, and Prison Scribes: Meditations on the Aesthetic, Religious and Social Sensibilities of Chicano Pintos (Notre Dame, IN: Snite Yiuseum of Art, University of Notre Dame, 2005). 3. Jose Antonio Villareal, Pacho (Garden City, Y: Double Day, 1970). 4. Ernesto Galarza, Barrio Boy (No tre Dame, IN : University of Notre Dame Press, I97I); Ernesto Galarza, Farm Workers and Agri-Business in California, 1947-1960 ( otre Dame, I : University of Notre Dame Press, 1977); Ernesto Galarza, Spiders in the House and Workers in the Field (Santa Barbara, CA: Mc ally and Loftin, I970);and Ernesto Galarza, Merchants of Labor: The Mexican Bracero Story (Santa Barbara, CA: McNally and Loftin , 1964).

Chapter 25 1. On sounds and activism, see Steve Loza, Barrio Rh ythm: lvfexican American iVfusic in Los Angeles (C hicago: University of [[[inois Press, 1993). Ruben Gue~·ara compiled a two-volume recording titled Los Ange/inos East Side Renaissance, which chronicled the East Los Angeles rock music scene. Borh the UFW and the Crusade for Justice distributed albums, as did El Teatro Campesino.

39>' :

34

Note to Pages 258-267 2. On pre- and post-Chicano era sounds, see the work by musicians and writers David Reyes and Tom Waldman, Land of a Thousand Dances: Chicano Rock 'n' Roll in Southern California (Albuquerque: University of New Mexico Press, 1998) . For a reminder of the interest of Latinos in jazz, see Ronald D. Arroyo, "La Raza Influence in Jazz," El Grito 5 (Summer 1975): 80-84; and read the informative Rau l Fernandez, Latin jazz: The Perfect Combination I La Combinacion Perfecta (San Francisco, CA: Chronicle Books, 2002).

Chapter 26 r. For theater presentations, see Luis Valdez and Teatro Campesino, Actos (San Juan Bautista, CA: Cucaracha Productions, 1971); Jorge Huerta, ed., Necessary Theater: Six Plays About the Chicano Experience (Houston, TX: Arte Publico Press, 1989); and Roberto Garza, ed., Contemporary Chicano Theater (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1976). On Chicano theater reflections in its day, see David Copelin, "Chicano Theater: El Festival de los Teatros Chicano," The Drama Review 17 (1973): 73-89; Yolanda Broyles Gonzalez, El Teatro Campesino : Theater in the Chicano Movement (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1994); and, for a somewhat contrasting view by playwright Carlos Morron, "La Serpienre Sheds Its Skin: The Teatro Carnpesino," The Drama Review 18 (1974): 71-76. For a historical view of Latino theater, see icolas Kanellos, A History of Hispanic Theater in the United States: Origins to 1940 (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1990); and Roy Eric Xavier, "Politics and Chicano Culture: Luis Valdez and El Teatro Carnpesino," in Chicano Politics and Society in the Late Twentieth Century, ed. David Montejano (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1999), 175-200.

Chater 27 1. On dance see Benjamin C. Hernandez, "The Legacy and Effects of Mexican Dance in Los Angeles, 1970-1999" (Master's thesis, University of California, Los Angeles, 1999); and Gayle E. Armstrong, "Danza Azteca: Contemporary Manifestation of Danza de los Concheros in the United States" (Master's thesis, Unviersity of California, Los Angeles, r98 5). 2. See Mary Caroline !vlontaiio, Tradiciones Nuevomexicanas: Hispano Arts and Culture of New Mexico (Albuquerque, NM: College of Fine Arts,

2001), 212.

Chapter 28 1. On early film-related activism, see Jesus Trevino, Eyewitness: A Filmmaker's Memoir of the Chicano Movement (Houston, TX: Arte Publico Press, 2001); see also David Maciel, El bandolero, el pocho y la raza: lmcigenes cinematogrcificas de/ chicano (Mexico, D.F.: Siglo XXI & CONACULTA,

Note to Pages

270-284

2000); and Gerald D. Keller, Cine Chicano (Mexico D.F.: Cineteca Nacional, r988). For an assessment on film, see David Maciel and Susan Racho, " Yo Soy Chicano: The Turbulent and Heroic Life of Chicanas/as in Cinema and Television," in Chicano Renaissance: Contemporary Cultural Trends , ed. David Maciel, Isidro D. Ortiz, and Marfa Herrera-Sobek (Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 2000), 91-130; some of the essays by film activists in Chon oriega, ed., Chicanos and Film: Essays on Chicano Representation and Resistance ( ew York: Garland Publishers , 1992); and Chon oriega, Shot in America: Television, the State, and the Rise of Chicano Cinema (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2000).

Chapter 29 r. On literature, see Alurista, F.A. Cervantes, Juan Gomez-Quinones, Mary Ann Pacheco, and Gustavo Segade, Festival de Flor y Canto: An Anthology of Chicano literature (Los Angeles: El Centro Chicano, University of Southern California, 1976); and Carlota Cardenas de Dwyer, "Chicano Nationalism and Chicano Literature," Me/us 8 (1981): 40- 47; see also Octav io Romano-V, El Espejo I The Mirror: Selected Mexican American Literature (Berkeley, CA: Quinto Sol, 1969); Villanueva, ed., Chicanos; Lufs Leal, Fernando de Necochea, Francisco Lomelf, Roberto G. Trujillo, A Decade of Chicano Literature (r970 - r979}: Critical Essays and Bibliography (Santa Barbara, CA: Editorial La Causa, 198i.); and icolas Kanellos, ed., A Decade of Hispanic Literature: An Anniversary Anthology (Houston, TX: Revista Chicano Riquena, 1982). For retrospective analysis of the most visible poetry writings, see Rafael Perez-Torres, Movements in Chicano Poetry: Against Myths, Against Margins (Ca mbridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995).

Chapter 30 r. On visual arts, see special issue of Chisme Arte 1, no . 4 (1979); Del Castillo et al., eds, Chicano Art; Goldman and Ybarra-Frausto, Arte Chicano; Gaspar de Alba, Chicano Art; and Victor Alejandro Sorell, "A Triumph for Chicana/a Visual Art and its Historiography," Art journal 63 (2004 ): 100-103.

Chapter 31 r. On CCM international dimensions and ac tions, see Rendon, Chicano Manifesto; recollections of Roberto Rubalcava, "Venceremos: lv1exican American Statement on Travel to C uba," in Aztlan, ed. Valdez and Steiner, 214-18; Gutierrez, Making of a Chicano Militant; Antonio Gonzalez, "Chicano Politics and U.S. Policy in Central America, 1979- 1980," in Chicano Politics and Society, ed. Montejano, 154- 74; and Armando Rendon, " Latinos: Breaking

39' !

.,6

Note to Pages 287-304 the Cycle of Survival to Tackle Global Affairs," in Ethnicity and U.S. Foreign Policy, ed. Abdul Aziz Said ( ew York: Praeger, 1981), 183-200. 2. On :Vlexico-Chicano relations at this rime, see essays in tvlanuel Carda y Griego and Carlos Vasquez, eds., Mexican- U.S. Relations: Conflict and Convergence (Los Angeles: Chicano Studies Research Center, University of California, 1983); and Maria Rosa Garcia-Acevedo, "Rerurn to Azrlan: ~exico's Policies Toward Chicanos," in Chicanas/os at the Crossroads: Social, Economic, and Political Change, ed. David Maciel and Isidro D. Ortiz (Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1996), 130-41; see also commentary in Gutierrez, Making of a Chicano Militant; and Navarro, La Raza Unida Party. 3. On specific transborder relations, see Gutierrez, Making of a Chicano Militant; Jorge Bustamante, "El Movimiento Chicano y Su Relevancia Para Los ~'1exicanos," in Contemporary Mexico: Papers of th e IV International Congress of Mexican History, ed. James W. Wilkie, Michael C. Meyer, and Edna Monzon de Wilkie (Los Angeles: University of California Press and UCLA Latin American Center, 1976), 531-41; Santa Marfa Gomez, La izquierda; and Tacho Mindiola et al., eds., Chicano-Mexicano Relations (Houston, TX: Mexican American Studies, University of Houston, 1986). See also Garcia y Griego and Vasquez, Mexican-U.S. Relations.

Chapter 32 i. On solidarity in the face of U.S. immigration law practices, see RiosBusramante, ed., Mexican Immigrant Workers in the U.S. For a contrasting view, see Gutierrez, Walls and Mirrors. On continuation of pro-immigrant rights activities, see Lisa Garcia Bedolla, Fluid Borders: Latino Power, Identity, and Politics in Los Angeles (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2009); and also Zaragosa Vargas, Labor Rights are Civil Rights: Mexican American Workers in Twentieth-Century America (Princeton, J: Princeton University Press, 2005). On worker organizing prior to the 1960s, see Zamora, Claiming Rights and Righting Wrongs.

Chapt er 33 i. On legal cases on equality and civil rights issues, see Michael A. Olivas, ed., "Colored Men " and "Hombres Aquf": Hernandez v. Texas and the Emergence of Mexican-American Lawyering (Houston, TX: Arte Publico Press, 2006). See also Gomez, Manifest Destinies.

Chapter 34 i. On a positive view of brown-black relations, see essay by Irene Vasquez, "Tumbling the Walls Together" (unpublished manuscript, March 18, 20II, Microsoft Word file); for a negative view, see Nick C. Vaca, The Presumed

Note to Pages 305-321

Alliance: The Unspoken Conflict between Latinos and Blacks and What It Means for America (New York: Rayo, 2004) . Some tempered judgments on specific elements of the brown-black reality are found in Tatcho Mindiola Jr., Yolanda Flores iemann, and Nestor Rodriguez, Black-Brown Relations and Stereotypes (Austin: University of Texas Press, 2002). 2. Vasquez, "Tumbling the Walls." The subject of black and brown relations has drawn increasing attention and publications will increase. For some context, see Gerald Horne, Black and Brown: African Americans and the Mexican Revolution, 19ro-1920 ( ew York: New York University Press, 2005). As to ho"v some African American spokespersons view themselves in relation to the other groups, see Eddie S. Glaude, ls it Nation Time? Contemporary Essays on Black Power and Black Nationalism (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 2002). 3. Stokely Carmichael, Stokely Speaks : Black Power Back to PanAfricanism (New York: Random House, 1971), 104- 5.

Chapter 35 I. On elecroral exercises, see Juan Gomez-Quinones, Chicano Politics; Rodney E. Hero, Latinos and the U.S . Political System: Two-Tiered Pluralism (Philadelphia, PA : Temple University Press, 1992); Peter Skerry, Mexican Americans: The Ambivalent Minority (New York: Free Press, 1993); John A. Garcia, Latino Politics in America: Community, Culture, and Interests (Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield, 2003) . Also, for background, see F. Chris Garcia, ed., La Causa Politica.

Chapter 36 r. On the San Antonio 1977 conference, see several published commentaries including Richard A. Garcia, "The Chicano Movement and the MexicanAmerican Community, 1972- 1978: An Interpretive Essay," Socialist Review 40-41 (July-October, 1978) : n7- 36. l . On the Bakke case, see Haro, ed., The Bakke Decision; see also Acuna, Occupied America, chap. 14.

397

Bibliography

Periodicals

Abrazo (Chicago, IL) Bronze (San Jose/Oakland, CA) Caracol (Houston, TX) Carta Editorial (Los Angeles, CA) Con Safos (Los Angeles, CA) De Co/ores: Journal of Emerging Raza Philosophies (Albuquerque, El Gallo: La Vaz de la Justida (Denver, CO) El Grito: A Journal of Contemporary Mexican-American Thought (Berkeley, CA) El Grito de f Norte (Espanola, NM) El Ma lcriado (Delano, CA) El Pocho Che (Bay Area, CA) Encuentro Femenil (Los Angeles, CA) FEM (\1exico) Forward (Oakland, CA) Hembra (Austin, TX) Hiias de Cuauhtemoc (Long Beach, CA) Imagenes de la Chicana (TX) La Causa (Los Angeles, CA) La Gente de Aztlan (Los Angeles, CA) La Luz (Denver, CO) La Raza (Los Angeles, CA) La Verdad (Sa n Diego, CA) La Voz def Pueblo (Berkeley, CA) La Voz Fronteriza (San Diego, CA) The Militant ( ew York, NY) Regeneracion (Los Angeles, CA} Revolutionary Cause (Los Angeles, CA) Sin Fronteras (Los Angeles, CA) Tejidos (Austin, TX) Venceremos (A lbuquerque, ~vi) 399

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Index

Page numbers in italic text ind icate photographs. Alianza Por Unidad Obrera y Estudiantil, 155 Alicia, Juana, 283 The Alien and the Asiatic in American Law (Konvitz), 30 alienation, 54; from education, xiixiii; student, I2) Alinsky, Saul, 2I9 Almaraz, Carlos, 235, 279 Almazan, Roberto, 128 Alta Med, 325, 328 alternative schools, 166, I79-82 Alurista, 271, 272, 273, 274 Alvarado, Alberto, I61 Alvarez, Delia, I90- 9I Alvarez, lno, 207 Alvarez, Luis Echeverria, 287 Alvarez v. Lemon Grove School District (1931), 302 Amalgamated Clothi ng Workers of America {ACWA), 95, JOI American G.I. Forum (AGIF), III Amezcua, Consuelo Gonza lez, 278 amparo, 315 Anaya, Rudolfo, 7, 277 Angel, Francisco, 146, I47 Anguiano, Lupe, 87, 165 anticlericalism, 67 anti-intellectual bias, 60 antiun ion laws, 38 Anzaldua, Gloria, 274 Aragon,John, I 46,I47

Abiquiu Corporation, 106 abuelitas, 275 La Academia de la Nueva Raza, I8o acculturation, 24 Acosta, Oscar Zeta, n2, 276 Acuii.a, Rodolfo, I93 ACWA. See Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America Adame, Leonard, 275 adelitas, 275 AFL-CIO, 96- 99, 298 African Americans, 20-2I; Brown Beret relations with, I22; civil rights and, n; cooperation with, 304-Io; foundationa l heritage with, 22-23; slavery reaffirmed for, 28 Agenda, III AGIF. See American G. I. Forum Aguiniga, Jorge, IJI Ala mo, 26 Alaniz, Ruben, 96 Alarcon, orma, 275 Alatorre, Soledad "Chole," 78, 87, 221, 224 Alejandrez, Daniel "Nane," 327 Alejandrez, Mary Lou, 327 Ali anza Federal de Mercedes, 56, 69, 105- 6, 127; agenda of, ro6-7; alli ances, Io7; argument references of, ro7; membership, Io7; New Mexico meeting, 248

44 3

Index Aragon, Lu is, 161 Arango, Carlos, 327 Archu leta, Jerry, 97 Arellanes, Gloria, 120, 328 Arias, Ronald, 276 Arise Chicanos and Other Poems (de Hoyos), 274 Arredondo, Jesse, 96 Arreguin , Alfredo, 278 Arroyo, Luis, 142-43 art, 7- 8, 334; advocacy, 278; graffiti, 238-39; in El Grito, 278; mura ls, 280- 83; prisoners, n3- 14, 239; street, 237-41; vehicle, 237-38; by women, 279. See also Chicanarte Exhibit; specific artists artists: community and, 59; culture and, 58-60; responsibilities of, 59. See also specific artists assaults, 119; on youth, 120 August Twenty-Ninth Movement (ATM), 227-29, 240; Ma rxism and,228 The Autobiography of Brown Buffalo (Acos t a), 276 Avalos, David, 2.82 Avila, Beto, 257 Avila, Chelo, 2.07 Ayala, Luz, 327 ayuda mutua, 66 Aztlan (publication), 271 Aztlanenses, 251 Baca, Herman, 120 Baca, Jimmy, 275 Baca, Judith, 280 Badges, 268 bad-jacketing, 202-3 Baker, El la, 306 Bakke anti- affirmative backlash, 87, 156-57, 321-23 Baldenegro, Salvador, 212 "Ballad of Pancho Lopez," 258 Baller, Morris J., 112 Banuelos, Ramona, 78 Baraka, Amiri (LeRoi Jones), 310 Barraza, Maclovio, 96, 97, 325 Barrera, Mario, 193 Barrientos, Gonzalo, 160

"The Barrio as an Internal Colony" (Barrera, Muiioz, and Ornelas), 193 Barrio Boy (Ga larza), 240 Barrio Communications, 310 Barrios Unidos of Santa Cruz, 325, 327 bato loco, 140, 150 Bazan, Luz, 85 Beals, R., 194 Beauvoir, Simone de, 77 Becas Para Aztlfo, 293 Benitez, Marfa, z.65 Benson, Evelyn Velarde, 78 Bernal, Antonio, 307 Berna l, Paulino, 259 The Bilingual Review, 271 Bilingual Seminar, z.89 bilingual skills, 41- 42 Birdwell, Yolanda, 207 birth control, 187, 188 Black Berets, 120 Black Panther Parry (BPP), 197, 208; decline of, 309; endorsements from, 308- 9 black-white paradigm, 305-6 Bless Me, Ultirna (Anaya), 177 Bobby Garcia Memorial Clinic, 120 Bocalero, Karen, 183 Bojorquez, David, 137 bondi ng, 16 border, xi; construction of, 51- 52; culture and, 51-52; identity and, 51-52; people, 24-25 Border Patrol, n9 Borrego, Stella, 83 Botello, David, 279 Boycott Gallo (A lmaraz), 235 boycotts, 96 BPP. See Black Panther Party breakdown/reconstitution theory, 9- 10 "Bronce Breath" (Alurista), 272 Bronze Nation of Aztlan, 192 Brown, Elaine, 213 Brown, Helen Gurley, 77 Brown, H. Rap, 122, 306 Brown Berets, 120-21, 129-30, 244, 305; African American relations

Index

with, 122; priorities of, 121-22; ten-point program, 121; women, 242

"Brown Eyed Children," 260 Brown is Beautiful, 45 Brown v. Board of Education (195 4), 164, 303

business development, 41 Bustillos, Ernesro, 122 Calderon, Dorothy, 78 California Convention debates 1848, 29-30

Ca macho, Humberto, 94 Campbell, Lorenzo Martin, 148 Camp Hess Kramer, 128 Cana les, Alma, 207 "Canci6n Mexicana," 258, 260 Candelaria, Salvador, 120 Cannibal and the Headhunters, 259 Cano, Ed, 257, 259 Canto )' grito mi liberaci6n (y lloro mis desmadrazgos) (Sanchez), 273 CAP. See Congress of African People capitalism, 55 Caras viejas y vino nuevo (Morales), 276-77

Cardenas, Gilberto, 130 Cardenas, Reyes, 271, 273, 275 Carmichael, Stokely, 81, 122, 308; boxers with, 252 carnalismo, 186, 189 carpa, 234 Carpenters and Joiners Union, 93 Carr, Vicki, 258 carrancista, 260 Carranza, Venustiano, 260 Carrasco, P., 194 Carrillo, Graciela, 283 Carta de Derechos para los Trabajadores Indocumentados, 299

Carter, Thomas, 165 Casa Aztlan of Chicago, 325, 327 Casa de Carnalismo, 222 CASA-HGT. See Centro de Acci6n Social Aut6noma-Hermandad General de Trabajadores Casanova, Pablo Gonzalez, 193

Casas, 1111elesio, 278, 279 CASO. See Chicano Associated Student Organization Castaneda, Antonia, 271 Castaneda, Carlos, 339 Castellanos, Leonard , 279 Castillo, Ana, 275 Castillo, Raul, 305 Castillo, Sylvia, 91 Castro, Raul, 294 Castro, Sal, 166 Castro, Vickie, 82, 128 Castro v. State of California (1970), 312

Catholic Church, 215-16; protests against, 218 "Catholic Social Teaching and the United States Economy," 217 Cat6licos por el Pueblo, 218 Cat6licos por la Raza, 218 CCCHE. See Chicano Coordinating Commission on Higher Education CCM. See Chicana and Chicano Movement Centro de Acci6n Social Aut6nomaHermandad General de Trabajadores (CASA-HGT), 155, 221, 297-99; decline of, 225-27; guidance from, 221-22; membership, 221, 222, 225; origins of, 225; success of, 223; vision of, 222-23; women and, 223-24 Centro de la Raza, 325, 326 CEP. See Comite Estudiantil del Pueblo Cervantes, Lorna Dee, 274, 275 CETA. See Comprehensive Employment and Training Act CFM . See Comisi6n Femeni l Mexicana Nacional Chacon, Juan, 9 5 Chapa, Evey, 88, 207 Chavarria, Jesus, 169 Chavez, Cesar, 98-101, 192, 243, 289, 312; family of, 100; fast of, 103

Chavez, Denise, 275 Chavez, Dennis, 284 Chavez, Fernando, 148

44

~

Index Chavez, Richard, IOI Chavez, Teresa, 274 CHE. See Committee for Hispanic Emancipation Chicana and Chicano Movement (CCM): activity range of, xix-xx; concessions forced by, xx; construction of, 63; criticisms of, xxi; dynamics of, 3-5 ; evolution of, xxv; interactive media relationship with, 68-69; judging, 330; necessity of, 330; questions raised by, xxvii- xxxii; references for, 69-75; trends, 74- 75; women and, xxi Chicana Corazon de Aztlan Symposium, 82 Chicana Forum, 90-9I Chicana Regional Conference at California State University, May I97I, 82

Chicanarte Exhibit, 230-3I Chicana Social Services Action Center, 90 Chicana Studies courses, 86 Chicana Welfare Rights Organization, 82; immigration and, 299 Chicanismo, 69, 70- 7I; gender and, 7I; as lifestyle, 7I Chicano: 25 Pieces of a Chicano Mind, 272 Chicano Associated Student Organization (CASO), I46 Chicano Coordinating Commission on Higher Education (CCCHE), 86, 143-44

Chicano Histor}', 282 Chicano Liberation Conference, I99 "Chicano Power," 2.59 Chicano Press Association, I53 Chicano Rights Organization, I20 Chicanos en la literature y en al arte: El Grito (Trambley), 274 Chicanos por La Causa {CPLC), 325-26

Chicano Studies, 144-47; community and, 170- 7I, 174; confl icts in, 172- 73, I76; contributions of, I75; criticism of, 176; epistemological validity for, l7I- 72; feminist

critics of, 172; goal for, I69; questioning, 176-78; reactions to, 17172; responsibility for, 175-76; validity of, 176-78 Chicano Studies Research Center, 86 Chica no Youth Conference, I35; Plan of Action, 272 Chicano Youth Liberation Conference, q8, 19I Chichirneca, 2JI cholo, 241 Christianity, 66- 67. See also Catholic Church; churches; Protestant churches "Chuco Suave," 258 churches: activities of, 215; organizations affiliated with, 218- 19; tactics favored by, 219; women and, 2I6. See also speci~c churches Cisneros, Sandra, 274 Cisneros, Victor ·elson, 16I City of Night {Rechy), 270 civic interest, 128 civicisrn , 72. civic self-determination, r civil rights, xiii-xiv; African Americans and, 21; contributions to, xxii; Native American exemptions, 30; Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo recognizing, 29, 30-31; women, 31 Civil War (U.S.), xi class: culture and, 52-55; identity and, 52-55; li beralism and bias of, 2; personal dynamics and, 3; politics, 54; western liberalism and bias of, 2. Clinica del Barrio, 328 Colegio Cesar Chavez, 180 Colegio Jacinto Trevino, I79 collective identity, 317; expression of, I4

collectiv ity, I86 colonization: multicultural, 25; norrhward, 24-25; rationale for, 2.3-24; social consequences of, 24; stereotypes and, 24 Colorado Labor Council, z43 Cornisi6n Femenil Mexicana Naciona l

Index

(CFMN), 82, 90; immigration and, 299 Comite Estudiantil

-

Index personal consciousness theories, IO-II personal dynamics: class and, 3; ethnjcity and, 3; gender and, 4; politics of, 4; sexua lity and, 4 personal positioning posture, n Pesota, Rose, 93 Pingarron, Luis, I39 pintos, u3 Piraiia Coffee House, I29 Plan de La Raza Unida, 208 Plan de! Barrio, I17- I8 Plan de Sama Barbara, 143-44, I58, 168-69, I78, 289, 321;reactions to, 17I-72 Plan Espiritual de Azrhin, 148, 19I- 92 Please, Don't Bury Me Alive (Gu tierrez, E.), 269 Plessy v. Ferguson (I896), 30 Pluma y Corazon, Io8 Plyer v. Doe (I982), 3 I4 pocho,286 Pocho (Villareal), 239 poetry: reading aloud, 271-72; on technology, I87-88. See also specific poems; specific poets police: interferences, 203-4 ; presence, 119; surveillance, I96, 202-3, 309 Political Association of SpanishSpeaking Organizations (PASSO), I60-6I,206 political equality foundations, xvi political history criticism, xxx political integration, 1 political participation, xvii- xviii; underrepresentation, xxvi political relations, 3 A Political Renaissance, 269 political rokenism, 3I8 Poor People's Campaign, Io8 population: age, 39; d iversity of, 49; ethnically constructed, ix- x; gender, 39; groupi ngs, 52-54; growth, 39, 61, 123; regional differences in, 49 Portillo, Jose Lopez, 287, 288, 292 Portillo, Miguel Leon, 194, 272 Portrait of the Artist as the Virgen de Guadalupe, 280 posadas, I37

Primera Conferencia Internacional por los Derechos Plenos de los Trabajadores Indocumentados, 299 Primer Congreso Nacional de Trabajadores Migratorios, 299 prisoners, 113; a rt, II3-14, 239; ethics, II3-14; reform, Io; rights, I22 proactive articulation, 11 profit seeking, 23 property rights, 29-30; Trearv of Guadalupe H idalgo and, ~8-29; for women, 27 protection, n9-20; of youth, I20 Protestant chu rches, 2I5 public discourse, 14; immigration c riticized in, 34-35 public health appeals, Io Pueblo Unido, 212 Py/er v. Doe, 302

Quetzalcoatl, 282 Quintana, Leroy, 275 Quintero, Otilio, 327 Race and Class in the Southwest (Barrera), I93 Racho, Susan, 82, 137, 269 racism, 317; covert, xiv; denouncing, 46; education and, I7o; rationalization of, 50; technology and, I88 radio, 234 Rain of Scorpions (Trambley), 274 RAM. See Revolutionary Ac tion Movement Ramirez, Jesus, 161 Ramirez, Ralph, 120 ranflas, 2 37 Rangel, Irma, 87 rasquache, 232 rasquachismo, 232 Razo, Joe, 218 Reagan, R onald, 142-43, 294-95 Rechy,John,270-7I redefinition periods, xxix- xxx religiosit}', 66- 67 "Reports on the }vlexican American Issues Conference," I8 5 reproductive choice, 90 Revista Chicano-Riquena, 27I

Index

Revolt of the Cockroach People (Acosta), 276 Revolutionary Action Movement (RAM), 309 revolutionary humanism , 72, 331 revolutionar;, nationalism, 72 Reyes de Albuquerq ue, 260, 261 Richard Calderon v. the City of Los Angeles (1971), JI2 Riddell, Ada ljiza Sosa, 86 right-to-work laws, 38 Risco, Eleazar, 128, 234 Rivera, Tomas, 276 The Road to Tamazunchale (Arias), 276 Robinson, Ruth, 169 Robinson v. Memphis Charleston RR Co. (1883), 30 Rodriguez, Alfonso, 97 Rodriguez, Isabel, 224 Rodriguez, Patricia, 282- 83 Rodriguez, Pedro, 146 Rodriguez, Ricardo, 30 Rodriguez v. B oard of Education (1973), 303 Rodriguez v. Brown (1973), 314 Roe v. Wade (1973), 87 Romano-V, Octavio, 193 Romero, lsrael, 9 5 Romero, Lynne, 274 Roos, Peter, 11 2 Rosa les, Rosa Salazar, 87 Royba l, Edward, 306 Rubalcava, Roberto, 284 Ru iz, Jose Luis, 269 Ru iz, Raul, 234 Russell, Andy, 258

Salazar, Antonio, 218 Salazar, Ruben, 201 Salinas, Luis Omar, 271, 272 Salinas, Porfirio, 278 Salinas, Raul, 272 Sal Si Pu edes, 153 Salvadorian liberation movement, 295 Samora, Julian, 339 Sanchez, Andrea, 120, 328 Sanchez, Corrine, 91 Sanchez, David, 120, 128 Sanchez, Dolores, 78

Sanche~ Georg~ 165, 339

Sanchez, Jose, 148 Sanchez, Paul, 169 Sanchez, Ricardo, 269, 271, 273 Sanchez, Robert, 217 sanctioned rhetoric, 14 Sandoval, Art, 130 Sandoval , Arturo, 189 San Francisco Lau v. Nichols (1974), 303

Santa Fe, i.5 SASO. See Spanish American Student Organization school strikes, 159 SCLC. See Southern Christian Leadership Conference SDS. See Students fo r a Democratic Society Seale, Bobby, 213 Secretariat for Hispanic Affai rs, 2.16 segregation, 164 Segura, Andres, 220 self-definition, 169 self-determination, l, n6, 121, 169 self-help organizations, 66 self-identification, 68 Sembradora, Prensa, 225 SER. See Service Employment and Redevelopment Serrano v. Portales (1974), 303 Serrano v. Priest (1971), 303 Service Employment and Redevelopment (SER), 131 sexual harassment, 81 sexuality, n; discrimination and, 4 ; fear and, 4; nonnormative, 12; personal dynamics and, 4; as political, 12; theories, n-12 Sierras, Manuel , 96 Sifuentes, Loretta Ayala, 86 Silva, Chelo, 257 Sin Fronteras, 85, 2i.3 Siqueiros, David, 202 SLATE, 125 slavery, 20- 21, 27; African America ns reaffirmed in, 28 S:-.l"CC. See Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee Sobre el Chicano, 289 Social Action Training Center, 128

45::::;

•8

Index social diversity, xxvii social equality, xxxi-xxxii social gradualism, 318 social involvement, l Socialist Workers Parry (SWP), 141, 156, 2.II, 319 social justice, xxx social movement process, 2 social movement/resource theory, 10 social relations, 3; foundations for, 23-26 social services, 37 social survival, xxxi-xxxii solidarities, 5 Sosa-Riddell, Adaljiza, 275 Soto, Ricardo, 269 Sotomayor, Marta, 87 Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), II8; United Farm Workers parallels with, 307 Southwest Council of La Raza (SWCLR), IIO, 134; reorganization of, no-rr Southwest Hispanic Research Institute, I 4 5 Southwest Voter Regi stration Education Project (SV REP), rro, 311, 314 Spanish American Student Organization (SASO), 145-46; alliances with, 146 Spanish Myth, 285 spousal rights, 27 Steelworkers' Chicano Caucus, 96 Steinem, Gloria, 77 stereotypes, 28 5-86; acceptance of, 34; colonization and, 24; in film, 268-69; passive, 33; su bversive, 33-34 Strike Teatro, 25 I student groups, 56; contradictions of, 140-41, 158-59; decline of, 151-52; disruption in, 149-50; ethnicism of, 139; factionalism in, t52-53 ; ideology of, 138-39; influences on, 125; internal restructuring of, 133-34; origins of, 123; reaffirma tion of, 154, 155-56; women, 149· See also specific student groups

Student Initiative at San Jose, 127, 135 Student Nonviolent Coo rdin ating Committee (S:-.l"CC), 81, 125 Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), 81, 125 "Stupid America" (Delgado, A.), 272 subcultures, 52-54 Sun Mad, 283 support networks, 5 SVREP. See Southwest Voter Registration Education Project SWCLR. See Southwest Counci l of La Raza SWP. See Socialist Workers Party symbols, 14 Symposium Internacional Sohre Problemas de los Trabajadoces, 293 Tafolla, Carmen, i.74-75 Talamantes, Olga, 84, 246 Tallmadge Amendment (1973), 87 tamborazo, 261 "Taste of Honey," 259 Teatro Campesino, 262, 270 Teatro de las Chicanas, 86, 263 Teatro Quetzalcoatl, 263 Teatros acional de Aztlan (TENAZ), 86, i.63 technology: poetry, 187-88; racism and, 188; reaction s against, 18690; war, 188-89 Tejano, 260 TELACU. See East Los Angeles Community Union Tenayuca, Emma, 93 TENAZ. See Teatros Nacional de Aztlfo Texas Independent Workers Association (TIWA), 102 theatec, 262-63; women in, 249. See a Isa specific plays Thee Midniters, 259 Third Women (Alarcon), 275 Thicd World tendency, 141, 158-59 Thirteenth amendment, xxxi Thirty and Seen A Lot (Vigil, Evangelina), 275 Tierra, 259, 268

Index Tierra Amarilla, I06 Tijerina, Pete, 112, 332 Tijerina, Reies Lopez, 105, 133, 192, 289; arrest of, I08 time markers, 6-8; Immigrant Rights Conference October 1977, 6; Unjted Farm Worker march of 1966, 6

TIWA. See Texas Independent Workers Association Tlatelolco, n6, 179 Tobin v. Walkinshaw (1856), 29 tolerance, xx toma de conciencia, 154-55 Torres, Estevan, 294, 325 Torres, Lorenzo, 94 Torres, Salvador, 279, 282 Tortuga (Anaya), 7, 277 Trambley, Estela Portillo, 193, 274 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, 27, 2930, 106, 301; civil rights recognized in, 29, 30-31; Native Americans and, 31; precedent established by, 28-29; property rights and, 28-29 Trevino, Jesus, 269 Trotskyism, 156, 319 Trudell, John, 246 "25 Miles" (Gutierrez), 270

UC Chicano Task Force Report, 153 UCCSC. See University of California Chicano Steering Committee UE. See United Electrical UFW. See United Farm Workers Ugarte, Sandra, 82 UMAS. See United Mexican American Students Union del Barrio, 122 United Auto Workers, 93 United Electrical (UE), 94 United Farm Workers (UFW), 56, 69, 94, 330-31; Aztlanenses on stage for, 25 r; Chichimeca on stage for, 2 5 r; Democratic Parry association of, 101; family participation in, 100; guiding principle of, IOI; lettuce agreement, 162-63; march of 1966, 6; membersh ip, 102;

Mexican ties with, 289; opposition to, 102; origins of, 99- 100; SCLC parallels with, 307; success of, 102 United Mexican American Students (UMAS), 82, 133, 135, 157; community politics involvement of, 138; functions of, 135; posadas hosted by, 137; second conference, 136

United eighborhoods Organization (UNO), 218 United States v. Lucero, 31 United Steel Workers, 93 University of California Chicano Steering Committee (UCCSC), 1 53 -

54

UNO. See United Neighborhoods Organization Urquides, Maria , 78 Urquidez v. General Telephone Company (1969), 301 US , 308; adjustments of, 309 U.S.-Mexican War, xi, 26 U.S. v. Lucero (1869), 30 U.S. v. Santiesteban (1874), 30 Valdez, Armando, 135, 136, 169, 269, 3 2 4- 25

Valdez, Daniel , 262 Valdez, Luis, 258, 262, 268, 269, 271, 274, 284

Valdez, Patssi, 280 Valens, Richie, 258 Valley Interfaith, 218-19 Va rela, Maria, 84 Vasconcelos, Jose, 61 Vasquez, Carlos, 234 Vasquez, Enriqueta Longeaux, 85 Vasquez, Esperanza, i.69 Vaughn, Clifford, 308 vehicle art, 237-38 Velasquez, Baldemar, 326 Velasquez, Willie, 206 Vigil , Ernesto, 247 Vigil, Evangelina, 274, 275 Villa, Francisco, 260 Villalobos, Richard, 128 Villanueva, Alma, 275 Villanueva, Tino, 273

;;;;o

Index Villareal, Jose Antonio, 239 Vi lla cusa, Henrietta, 7 8 villista, 260 Virgen de Guadalupe, 233 Viva La Raza demonstration 1970, 252 Voice of Women, 89 Voices, 27 1 voting: patterns, 42-43; registration, 42; turnout, 205- 6 Voting Rights Act (1975), 87 Voz Fronteriza, 153 wage disparity, 185 war criticism, 190-91 Ward, Lynn, 201 Ward v. Broadwell (1854), 29 war on poverty, 62, 305 western liberalism, x; class bias of, 2 western republicanism, x White, Hayden, 13 White v. Regester (1972), 314 "Whittier Blvd," 259 " Who are the Real Outlaws" (Brown, H. Rap), 306 \Vinter Garden Project, 159, 206 With His Pistol in His Hand: A Border Ballad and Its Hero (Paredes), 193 women: activities specific to, 78; art by, 279; Brown Berets, 242; Centro de Acci6n Social Aut6noma-Hermandad Genera l de Trabajadores and, 223-24; Chicana and Chicano Movement and, xxi; church and, 216; civil rights, 31; contradictions of, 76; on cooperation, 187; demo planning at Big Buy, 244; deprioritizing of, 77; dignity of, 45; as feminists, 81; film by, 269; historical agency of, 20; historical inequality of, 20;

leadership, 5, 81 , 88; leadership panel at Corazon de Aztlfo , 248; literature by, 274; as loyalists, 81; marching, 253 ; meeting, 245; at National Chicano .Nloratorium, 253; participation of, 76- 77; property rights for, 27; psychological freedom of, 79; rights, xvi; roles of, 77; as social actors, 76; student groups, 149i in theate r scene, 249; writers, 85 women's groups, 56, 82, 84 . See also specific women's groups Women's Strike for Peace, 89 workers, 21-22; covert support networks for, 298; undocumented, 298, 299 World Wall, 280 Yarborough, Ralph, 165 Ybarra, Lea, 88 YCCA. See Young Chicanos for Community Action Yepes, Maria Elena, 82 Y nose lo trag6 la tierra (Rivera), 276 Youngblood, Guadalupe, 161 Young Chicanos for Community Action (YCCA), 82, I2o, I28- 30 Younger, Evelle, 197 Young Lords, 244 Young Socialist Alliance (YSA ), 141, 158 Zamora, Bernice, 275 Zamora, Emilio, 161 Zapata , Emiliano, 260 zapatista, 260 Zedong, Mao, 228 Zermenio, Andy, 234, 235 zona fronteriza, 52 zoot suit, 240-41 Zoot Suit, 258, 268