United Farm Workers Movement

Summary

The United Farm Workers Movement was a political movement in the United States that intended to provide greater rights for farmworkers throughout the country and was headed by several organizations and labor unions, most notably the United Farm Workers of America. Initially named the "National Farm Workers Association," the United Farm Workers of America was started by Cesar Chavez in 1962. The labor union soon began to campaign for greater rights of farm workers, especially in areas with large populations of migrant workers such as California. Beginning in the mid-1960's and continuing throughout the subsequent decades, the United Farm Workers was successful in providing higher wages and greater benefits for farmworkers throughout the country using the tactics of protests, strikes, and boycotts.

Origin:

The United Farm Workers grew from already well established migrant laborer support groups in the early 1960’s that campaigned for the rights of migrant farm workers. The Community Services Organization, a Latino civil rights group prominent in the 1950’s, was especially important in that it helped train Cesar Chavez and Dolores Huerta, the co-founders of the United Farm Workers, in the process of organizing workers and lobbying the government. The main goal for the United Farm Workers Movement was to establish greater civil and political rights for farm workers in the United States at a time when these workers had very little power and to do so in a nonviolent manner.

Chronology:

1962: Cesar Chavez founded the National Farm Workers Association (NFWA), a farmworkers labor union that would eventually be named the United Farm Workers of America

1965: With the help of mostly Filipino Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee, Chavez and the NFWA boycotted grape farms that refused to pay their farmworkers a wage of $1.50 an hour. The strike and the success it has catapult the NFWA (who would change their name to United Farm Workers) into the public spotlight.

1968: Cesar Chavez fasts for the first time to protest farm worker injustice, highlighting his commitment to nonviolent struggles.

1970: In a large in farm labor activism, several powerful growers agree to the United Farm Workers' demands, ending the strike in Delano.

Significant People:

Cesar Chavez - Born on March 31, 1927 to migrant Mexican farm workers in Yuma, Arizona, Cesar Chavez was an influential activist that helped form the United Farm Workers. After working at farms in Arizona and California, Chavez worked his up the ranks of the Community Services Organization. In 1962, Chavez dropped out of the CSO to co-found National Farm Workers Association, which would eventually be named the United Farm Workers of America, with Dolores Huerta. Chavez tirelessly campaigned peacefully for the rights of farm workers throughout the United States with the help of UFW until his death 1993.

Dolores Huerta – Dolores Huerta was born on April 10, 1930 in Dawson New Mexico to Alicia Chavez and Juan Fernandez, a former migrant laborer who became a union activist before eventually graduated from college. After graduating from Stockton High School and receiving an A.A. degree from Stockton College, Huerta became a teacher but left her profession to help poor migrant laborers like her students’ parents by working with the CSO. Together with Cesar Chavez, Huerta founded the National Farm Workers Association and with Chavez continued to campaign for the rights of migrant workers through the 1960’s and 70’s.

Outcomes/Long Term Effects on U.S. Culture:

Although the United Farm Workers continue to campaign for the rights of farm workers in America, their pioneering work in the 1960’s led to many benchmarks in the struggle for recognition for the farm workers of the United States. While lobbying by growers and the continual use of pesticide which affects workers’ health continue to pose problems for the UFW and other groups, Cesar Chavez, Dolores Huerta, and other significant figures in the United Farm Workers Movements gave the American public eye its first real look at the plight of farm workers in the country, and in doing so helped farm workers gained rights that were never before afforded to them.