Today is Cesar Chavez Day, an official holiday in 8 states, but unfortunately, not here in Minnesota. For those of you not familiar with Mr. Chavez, he founded the United Farm Worker's union to fight for the rights of the largely Hispanic migrant farm workers in the 1960's. A devotee of Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr., Chavez led a non-violent movement to bring dignity to migrant farm workers, which spilled over to Hispanics in general. Pretty incredible, when you think that Chavez took a bunch of poor farm workers who were severely marginalized by society, and ended up forcing concessions from the huge California corporate growers.
Unfortunately, not many folks know about Cesar Chavez. Everyone knows about King, but Chavez gets kind of dusted into a corner. Usually gets about a paragraph in American history survey texts. Which is too bad, because he truly was a great man, someone to be respected.
I'd encourage you to sign the UFW's petition to make Cesar Chavez Day a national holiday here.
Si se puede!
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