Delano grape strike
César Chávez shakes hands with John Giumarra Jr. after signing an agreement to end the strike
DateSeptember 7, 1965 – July 29, 1970 (1965-09-07 – 1970-07-29)
Location
Delano, California
GoalsIncreased wages and working conditions
MethodsStrikes, boycotting, demonstrations
Resulted inCollective bargaining agreement
Parties

1965–1966

  • Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee
  • National Farmworkers Association

1966–1970

Table grape growers
Lead figures
Number
2,000+ Filipino Americans[1]
1,200+ Mexican Americans[2]
Total: 10,000+[3]

The Delano grape strike was a labor strike organized by the Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee (AWOC), a predominantly Filipino and AFL-CIO-sponsored labor organization, against table grape growers in Delano, California to fight against the exploitation of farm workers.[4][5] The strike began on September 8, 1965, and one week later, the predominantly Mexican National Farmworkers Association (NFWA) joined the cause.[5][6] In August 1966, the AWOC and the NFWA merged to create the United Farm Workers (UFW) Organizing Committee.[5][7][8]

The strike lasted for five years and was characterized by its grassroots efforts—consumer boycotts, marches, community organizing and nonviolent resistance—which gained the movement national attention.[6][9] On July 1970, the strike resulted in a victory for farm workers, due largely to a consumer boycott of non-union grapes, when a collective bargaining agreement was reached with major table grape growers, affecting more than 10,000 farm workers.[6][7][9][10]

The Delano grape strike is most notable for the effective implementation and adaptation of boycotts, the unprecedented partnership between Filipino and Mexican farm workers to unionize farm labor, and the resulting creation of the UFW labor union, all of which revolutionized the farm labor movement in America.[11][12][13]

Background

Preceding the Delano grape strike was another grape strike organized by Filipino farm workers that occurred in Coachella Valley, California on May 3, 1965.[14][15] Because the majority of strikers were over 50 years old and did not have families of their own due to anti-miscegenation laws (first overthrown in 1949), they were willing to risk what little they had to fight for higher wages.[15][16] The strike succeeded in granting farm workers a 40-cent-per-hour raise, which resulted in a wage equivalent to the $1.40-per-hour wage that the recently outlawed braceros were paid.[17] After the strike in Coachella, farm workers followed the grape-picking season and moved north to Delano.[15][18][19] The Filipino farm workers who came up from Coachella were led by Larry Itliong, Philip Vera Cruz, Benjamin Gines, and Elasco under the AWOC.[20] Upon arriving in Delano, the farm workers were told by growers that instead of being paid the $1.40-per-hour wage they received in Coachella, they would be paid $1.20-per-hour, which was below the federal minimum wage.[19][20][21][22] Despite attempts at negotiation, growers were not willing to raise wages since workers were easily replaceable.[21] This pushed Itliong, who was the leader of the AWOC, to organize Filipino farm workers and pressure growers into granting them higher wages and better working conditions.[11][18] On September 7, 1965, Itliong and Filipino farm workers gathered inside Filipino Community Hall, and the AWOC unanimously voted to go on strike the next morning.[16]

Events of the strike

On September 8, 1965, Itliong, Vera Cruz, Gines, Imutan, and more than 1,000 Filipino farm workers walked off of vineyards and began their strike against Delano table grape growers.[17] In response to strikers, grape growers hired Mexican farm workers to cross the picket lines and break the strike, a tactic typically used to create conflict and reinforce divisions between Filipino and Mexican farm workers.[13] To prevent the strike from ending in failure, Itliong sought out Cesar Chavez, who was the leader of the newly established NFWA.[8] Chavez initially declined Itliong's request because he believed the NFWA was not financially stable enough to join the strike. However, because NFWA members expressed a desire to support the Filipinos' efforts, Chavez decided to hold an emergency conference at the Our Lady of Guadalupe Church (Iglesia Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe) on September 16 to allow NFWA members to decide for themselves whether or not to join the struggle at Delano.[23][24][25] A crowd of more than twelve hundred supporters attended the meeting and overwhelmingly voted in favor of joining the strike, with members repeatedly chanting, "Huelga!" – the Spanish word for strike – in favor of supporting the Delano grape farmer workers.[23][24][25] September 16, 1965 marked the day that Filipino and Mexican farm workers officially joined forces to picket together and fight for farm labor justice.[8][16]

The Forty Acres complex in Delano was made a National Landmark in 2008

On March 17, 1966, Cesar Chavez embarked on a 300-mile pilgrimage from Delano, California to the state's capital of Sacramento. This was an attempt to pressure the growers and the state government to answer the demands of the Mexican American and Filipino American farm workers which represented the Filipino-dominated Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee and the Mexican-dominated National Farm Workers Association. The pilgrimage was also intended to bring widespread public attention to the farm worker's cause. Shortly after this, the National Farm Workers Association and the Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee merged and became known as the United Farm Workers Organizing Committee, with Cesar Chavez and Larry Itliong being head and assistant director respectively.[26][27] In August 1966, the AFL-CIO charted the UFW, officially combining the AWOC and the NFWA.[28]

After a record harvest in the fall of 1965, thousands of California farm workers went on strike and demanded union representation elections. Many were arrested by police and injured by growers while picketing.[29] The growers used many tactics to intimidate and harass the picketers, whom they were sure would maintain a position of nonviolence. The growers would push protesters, punch the strikers and jab their elbows into their ribs. Some growers drove their cars towards the protesters, swerving just as they reached the strikers. There were several cases where pesticide spraying equipment was used to drench picketers with deadly surfer, which temporarily blinded them. Despite this, the UFW continued to avoid violent protest. Chavez repeatedly encouraged the people to "not react against the violence," stating that "we can change the world if we do it nonviolently."[30] There was a lot of support towards nonviolent protest across the country and Chavez wanted to continue with that focus. The UFW sent two workers and a student activist to follow a grape shipment from one of the picketed growers to the end destination at the Oakland docks. Once there, the protestors were instructed to persuade the longshoremen to refrain from loading the shipment of grapes. The group was successful in its course of action, and this resulted in the spoilage of a thousand ten-ton cases of grapes which were left to rot on the docks. This event sparked the decision to use the protest tactic of boycotting as the means through which the labor movement would win the struggle against the Delano grape growers.[25]

This initially successful boycott was followed by a series of picket lines on Bay Area docks. The International Longshoremen's and Warehousemen's Union, whose members were responsible for loading the shipments, cooperated with the protesters and refused to load non-union grapes.[25]

The UFW's successful boycotting campaigns in the docks inspired him to launch a formal boycott against the two largest corporations which were involved in the Delano grape industry, Schenley Industries and the DiGiorgio Corporation.[25]

Starting in December 1965, the UFW participated in several consumer boycotts against the Schenley corporation.[25] The increased pressure from supporters in the business sector led to the farm workers’ victory and acquisition of union contracts that immediately raised wages and established hiring halls in Delano, Coachella, and Lamont.[29]

Francisco 'Pancho' Medrano speaks at conference on the boycott of grapes around 1965-1967. In the back, an unidentified man holds a sign that reads "Don't buy grapes"

The large corporations affected by the strikes led by Chavez employed fear tactics in order to protect profits. The documentary The Wrath of Grapes mentions that the Delano-based company, M Caratan Inc., hired criminals to break up farm workers voting to unionize. They attacked voters, overturned tables and even smashed ballot boxes.[31]

The DiGiorgio Corporation was finally pressured into holding an election among its workers allowing them to choose the union they wanted to represent them on August 30, 1967. This came as a result of the boycott tactic of blocking grape distribution centers. With their products not on the shelves of retailers as a result of the boycott, the DiGiorgio Corporation was pressured to answer to the demands of the farm workers. The result of the vote favored the union representation of the UFW, a 530 to 332 vote, against the representation of The Teamsters, which was the only union that was competing against the UFW in the election.[25]

On July 29, 1970, the grape strike and boycott ended, when grape growers signed labor contracts with the union.[32][33] The contracts included timed pay increase, health, and other benefits.[34]

Geography

The grape strike officially began in Delano in September 1965. In December, union representatives traveled from California to New York, Washington, D.C., Pittsburgh, Detroit, and other large cities to encourage a boycott of grapes grown at ranches without UFW contracts.

In the summer of 1966, unions and religious groups from Seattle and Portland endorsed the boycott. Supporters formed a boycott committee in Vancouver, prompting an outpouring of support from Canadians that would continue throughout the following years.

In 1967, UFW supporters in Oregon began picketing stores in Eugene, Salem, and Portland. After melon workers went on strike in Texas, growers held the first union representation elections in the region, and the UFW became the first union to ever sign a contract with a grower in Texas.

National support for the UFW continued to grow in 1968, and hundreds of UFW members and supporters were arrested. Picketing continued throughout the country, including in Massachusetts, New Jersey, Ohio, Oklahoma, and Florida. The mayors of New York, Baltimore, Philadelphia, Buffalo, Detroit, and other cities pledged their support, and many of them altered their cities’ grape purchases to support the boycott.

In 1969, support for farm workers increased throughout North America. The grape boycott spread into the South as civil rights groups pressured grocery stores in Atlanta, Miami, New Orleans, Nashville, and Louisville to remove non-union grapes. Student groups in New York protested the Department of Defense and accused them of deliberately purchasing boycotted grapes. On May 10, UFW supporters picketed Safeway stores throughout the U.S. and Canada in celebration of International Grape Boycott Day. Cesar Chavez also went on a speaking tour along the East Coast to ask for support from labor groups, religious groups, and universities.[29]

Mapping UFW Strikes, Boycotts, and Farm Worker Actions 1965-1975 shows over 1,000 farm worker strikes, boycotts, and other actions.

Impact of the strike

Black and white brochure highlighting the solidarity between Black and Latino communities during the Delano Grape Strike.

The Delano strike and the events that transpired throughout 1960 to 1975 resulted in a victory for the UFW and farm workers. By 1968, the UFW had signed contracts with 10 different table grape growers, which included Schenley Industries and DiGiorgio Corporation, but strikes and boycotts did not cease until 1970, when 26 table grape growers signed contracts with the UFW.[35] Contracts between the UFW and grape growers were the first of their kind in agricultural history, and alongside the immediate effects of these initial contracts such as the increase in wages and improved working conditions, some contracts included provisions regarding unemployment insurance, paid vacation days, and the creation of a special benefits fund.[35][36]

After the end of the grape strike in 1970, a strike against lettuce growers began.[37] This led to conflict with the Teamsters union, in the Salinas Valley.[38]

In June 1975, California passed a law allowing for secret ballot union representation elections for farm workers. By mid-September, the UFW won the right to represent 4,500 workers at 24 farms, while the Teamsters won the right to represent 4,000 workers at 14 farms. The UFW won the majority of the elections in which it participated.[29]

The Teamsters signed an agreement with the UFW in 1977, promising to end its efforts to represent farm workers. The boycott of grapes, lettuce, and Gallo Winery products officially ended in 1978.[29]

Despite the successes achieved by the UFW, there were also negative outcomes that farm workers experienced. The most significant of these was the deteriorated relationship between the Filipino and Mexican farm workers.[18] In the initial contracts, the UFW implemented the hiring hall system.[39] The hiring hall system was established with the intent of ending farm workers' migration cycle, which the UFW believed would make for more organized and efficient harvesting.[39] However, the hiring hall system disadvantaged many of the Filipino who were accustomed to migrating with the harvesting season.[18][39] The hiring hall system replaced the old system of foremen which Filipino workers relied on for job stability and forced workers to line up at the union and compete with younger Hispanic farmworkers. Furthermore, the hiring hall system favored settled workers, who in the union were primarily Hispanic workers.[12] As a result of this, many Filipino leaders and union members such as Larry Itliong left the union, as they felt overlooked and their needs, especially of the older Filipino workers, unprioritized.[40]

Following the strike, the actions of Cesar Chavez were highlighted and remembered.[41] The 2014 film Cesar Chavez[42] highlights his role in the labor movement. Less remembered are the many others who collaborated with him to organize strikes and fight for farmer rights.[43] Particularly forgotten was the efforts of Filipino Americans in the strike.[40][44] For example, in the 2014 film, the Filipinos role was largely absent, except for one speaking line and a few group shots.[45]

References

  1. ↑ Nelson, Eugene (1966). "Huelga" (PDF). Delano, California: Farm Worker Press. Retrieved September 3, 2018. More Filipinos walk out—2,000 men on strike now.
  2. ↑ Magagnini, Stephen (September 6, 2015). "The grape strike that transformed a nation, 50 years later". Sacramento Bee. Retrieved September 3, 2018. Twelve days later, labor organizer Cesar Chavez and more than 1,200 Mexican workers joined the strike that led to the first United Farm Workers contracts primarily with growers in 1970.
  3. ↑ "La Causa: The Delano Grape Strike of 1965-1970". Smithsonian. September 16, 2005. Retrieved September 3, 2018. his historic strike lasted more than 5 years and resulted in contracts for more than 10,000 workers.
  4. ↑ Garcia, R. A. (April 1, 1993). "Dolores Huerta: Woman, Organizer, and Symbol". California History. 72 (1): 56–71. doi:10.2307/25177326. ISSN 0162-2897. JSTOR 25177326.
  5. 1 2 3 Goldstein, Darra; Du Puis, E. Melanie (August 2007). "Food Politics". Gastronomica. 7 (3): iii–v. doi:10.1525/gfc.2007.7.3.iii. ISSN 1529-3262.
  6. 1 2 3 Feriss, Susan; Sandoval, Ricardo; and Hembree, Diana. The Fight in the Fields: Cesar Chavez and the Farmworkers Movement. New York: Houghton Mifflin Courtyard, 1998. ISBN 0-15-600598-0
  7. 1 2 Hurt, R. Douglas and for farm growers to cease exposing farm workers to dangerous pesticides. American Agriculture: A Brief History. Lafayette, Ind.: Purdue University Press, 2002. ISBN 1-55753-281-8
  8. 1 2 3 Barbadillo, Mariel (2017). "A Minority Within a Minority": Filipinos in the United Farmworkers Movement (PDF). University of California Davis. pp. 56–69. Archived from the original (PDF) on September 26, 2019. Retrieved November 18, 2019.
  9. 1 2 Weber, Devra. Dark Sweat, White Gold: California Farm Workers, Cotton, and the New Deal. Berkeley, Calif.: University of California Press, 1996. ISBN 0-520-20710-6
  10. ↑ Matt Garcia (May 2016). "Cesar Chavez and the United Farm Workers Movement". Oxford Research Encyclopedia of American History. American History. Oxford Research Encyclopedias. doi:10.1093/acrefore/9780199329175.013.217. ISBN 9780199329175.
  11. 1 2 Garcia, Matt (2013). "A Moveable Feast: The UFW Grape Boycott and Farm Worker Justice". International Labor and Working-Class History. 83 (83): 146–153. doi:10.1017/S0147547913000021. ISSN 0147-5479. JSTOR 43302714. S2CID 146323070.
  12. 1 2 Garcia, Matt (2012). From the Jaws of Victory: The Triumph and Tragedy of Cesar Chavez and the Farm Worker Movement (1 ed.). University of California Press. ISBN 9780520259300. JSTOR 10.1525/j.ctt1ppts0.
  13. 1 2 Imutan, Andy (September 2005). "When Mexicans and Filipinos joined together". UFW. Retrieved November 18, 2019.
  14. ↑ Morehouse, Lisa (September 7, 2015). "The Forgotten Filipino-Americans Who Led the '65 Delano Grape Strike". KQED. San Francisco. Retrieved September 3, 2018.
  15. 1 2 3 "COACHELLA VALLEY: Filipinos' 1965 strike set stage for farm labor cause". Press-Enterprise. Riverside. September 3, 2005. Retrieved September 3, 2018.
  16. 1 2 3 Aroy, Marissa, film director, narrator. McKay, Niall, producer. Fifer, Sally Jo, producer., Delano Manongs : forgotten heroes of the United Farm Workers, OCLC 948843630{{citation}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  17. 1 2 Nelson, Eugene (1966). Huelga: The First Hundred Days of the Great Delano Grape Strike. Farm Worker Press. OCLC 36365530.
  18. 1 2 3 4 Bacon, David (June 2018). "How Filipino Migrants Gave the Grape Strike Its Radical Politics | Dollars & Sense". dollarsandsense.org. Retrieved November 17, 2019.
  19. 1 2 Madsen, William; Steiner, Stan (1970). "La Raza: The Mexican Americans". The Hispanic American Historical Review. 50 (4): 788. doi:10.2307/2512343. hdl:2286/R.I.36569. ISSN 0018-2168. JSTOR 2512343.
  20. 1 2 Ardis, Kelly (September 1, 2015). "Filipino-Americans: The forgotten leaders of '65 grape strike". The Bakersfield Californian. Bakersfield, California: TBC Media.
  21. 1 2 Pawel, Miriam (2014). The Crusades of Cesar Chavez : A biography. Bloomsbury Publishing USA. ISBN 9781608197132. OCLC 910628545.
  22. ↑ John Gregory Dunne (October 4, 2007). Delano: The Story of the California Grape Strike. University of California Press. ISBN 978-0-520-25433-6.
  23. 1 2 Street, Richard Steven (2009). "Delano Diary: The Visual Adventure and Social Documentary Work of Jon Lewis, Photographer of the Delano, California Grape Strike, 1966-1970". Southern California Quarterly. 91 (2): 191–235. doi:10.2307/41172470. JSTOR 41172470.
  24. 1 2 London, Joan; Anderson, Henry (1971). So Shall Ye Reap. Crowell. OCLC 31809534.
  25. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 [Shaw, Randy. Beyond the Fields: Cesar Chavez, the UFW, and the Struggle for Justice in the 21st Century. California: U of California P, 2008. Print]
  26. ↑ Ballis, George (January 3, 2006). "La Causa: The Delano Grape Strike of 1965-1970" (PDF). National Museum of American History. Smithsonian Institution. Retrieved November 11, 2009.
  27. ↑ Courtney, Ross (April 27, 2006). "Wapato man honors a forgotten hero". Yakima Herald-Republic (WA). Archived from the original on November 7, 2021. Retrieved October 22, 2023.{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: bot: original URL status unknown (link)
  28. ↑ "UFW timeline". depts.washington.edu. Retrieved April 22, 2016.
  29. 1 2 3 4 5 "United Farm Workers geography". depts.washington.edu. Retrieved April 22, 2016.
  30. ↑ Kallen, A Stuart.We are Not Beasts of Burden Cesar Chavez and The Delano Grape Strike. Minneapolis.2011. A Division of Lerner Publishing Group, Inc.
  31. ↑ Parlee, L., Bourin, L., Farrell, M., Chavez, C., Lopez, D., Rosales, C., & United Farm Workers of America (1986). "The Wrath of Grapes". Keene, Calif: United Farm Workers. {{cite web}}: Missing or empty |url= (help)CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  32. ↑ Nevarez, Griselda (September 26, 2015). "50 Years Later, Remembering the Delano Grape Strike". NBC News. Retrieved September 3, 2018.
  33. ↑ Times, Steven V. Roberts Special to The New York (July 30, 1970). "26 Grape Growers Sign Union Accord; Boycott Nears End". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved August 27, 2022.
  34. ↑ Meister, Dick (1970). "Victory in Delano" (PDF). San Francisco Chronicle. Retrieved September 3, 2018 – via University of California, San Diego.
  35. 1 2 Cohen, Irving J. (1968). "La Huelga! Delano and After". Monthly Labor Review. 91 (6): 13–16. ISSN 0098-1818. JSTOR 41837326.
  36. ↑ Koziara, Karen S. (1968). "Collective Bargaining on the Farm". Monthly Labor Review. 91 (6): 3–9. ISSN 0098-1818. JSTOR 41837324.
  37. ↑ Roberts, Steven V. (September 6, 1970). "Fear and Tension Grip Salinas Valley in Farm Workers' Strike". The New York Times. Retrieved September 3, 2018.
  38. ↑ "Looking back on the year that forever changed farming in the Salinas Valley". Monterey County Weekly. January 1, 1998. Retrieved September 3, 2018.
  39. 1 2 3 Garcia, Matthew (2007). "Labor, Migration, and Social Justice in the Age of the Grape Boycott". Gastronomica. 7 (3): 68–74. doi:10.1525/gfc.2007.7.3.68. ISSN 1529-3262.
  40. 1 2 Morehouse, Lisa (September 19, 2015). "Grapes Of Wrath: The Forgotten Filipinos Who Led A Farmworker Revolution". Food for Thought. National Public Radio. Retrieved September 3, 2018. Because it was here that, on the night of Sept. 7, 1965, farmworkers — almost all Filipino — voted to go on strike the next day.
  41. ↑ Larry Dane Brimner (October 21, 2014). Strike!: The Farm Workers' Fight for Their Rights. Highlights Press. p. 115. ISBN 978-1-62979-272-9.
    Pawel, Miriam (November 2013). "How Cesar Chavez Changed the World". Smithsonian Magazine. Retrieved September 3, 2018.
    Carney, Francis (November 13, 1975). "The Progress of Cesar Chavez". New York Review of Books. Retrieved September 3, 2018.
  42. ↑ Scott, A.O. (March 27, 2014). "Amid Chants of '¡Huelga!,' an Embodiment of Hope". The New York Times. Retrieved September 3, 2018.
    Rodriguez, Cindy Y. (March 28, 2014). "Why the 'Cesar Chavez' biopic matters now". Retrieved September 3, 2018.
    Puig, Claudia (March 27, 2018). "'Cesar Chavez': A compelling tale of activism, resolve". USA Today.
  43. ↑ Barker, Tim (April 9, 2014). "Out of the Fields, Onto the Screen: What 'Cesar Chavez' Gets Wrong About the Labor Movement". The Nation. Archived from the original on September 4, 2018. Retrieved September 3, 2018.
  44. ↑ "Strike! Filipino Activism and the Delano Grape Strike". Asian American Activism: The Continuing Struggle. Brown University. Retrieved September 3, 2018.
    Guillermo, Emil (September 8, 2015). "Eclipsed by Cesar Chavez, Larry Itliong's Story Now Emerges". NBC News. Retrieved September 3, 2018.
    Arguelles, Dennis (May 25, 2017). "Remembering the Manongs and Story of the Filipino Farm Worker Movement". National Park Conservation Association. Retrieved September 3, 2018.
  45. ↑ "Historical society pans 'Cesar Chavez' film for inaccuracies". Philippine Daily Inquirer. April 1, 2014. Retrieved September 3, 2018.
    Garcia, Matt (April 2, 2014). "What the New Cesar Chavez Film Gets Wrong About the Labor Activist". Smithsonian Magazine. Retrieved September 3, 2018.
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