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'New Civil Rights Movement': CSU-Monterey Bay: Labor Leader Huerta Honors Chavez

Posted on: Thursday, 30 March 2006, 09:00 CST

By Julia Reynolds, The Monterey County Herald, Calif.

Mar. 30--Reviving the union-rally spirit of old, labor leader Dolores Huerta spoke to a crowd of cheering students Wednesday evening in what she called a "celebration."

"We're here celebrating a new civil rights movement, and it's headed up by Latinos," Huerta, 75, told an audience of several hundred people at CSU-Monterey Bay's World Theater. The event was held to honor Cesar Chavez Day, March 31, the day of his birthday.

Huerta and Chavez co-founded the United Farm Workers Union.

She said the day was a celebration of successes she said are the result of pro-immigrant marches held across the country this week.

She said the marches added pressure that led to changes in the U.S. Senate's version of an immigration reform bill.

The Senate version, which is still in committee, takes away proposed felony charges for illegal immigrants and those who assist them that were a controversial part of an earlier House of Representatives version.

"None of that would have happened had it not been for the marches," Huerta said. "But our work is not done." She urged the audience to maintain pressure on legislators and local governments. She said the Los Angeles and San Jose city councils recently passed resolutions saying they would not enforce the House's version of the bill if it is enacted.

While her message was as serious as ever, her talk was peppered with humor. The House legislation, known as the Sensenbrenner bill, became the "Sensen-stupido" bill, and her fluid speech eased from topics such as "waffly, woozy" Democrats to feminism, corporate media and the war in Iraq.

The great thing about the recent marches by high school students in Watsonville and Salinas, she said, was that "kids today don't keep their place. They didn't wait to get invited" to get out and express themselves, she said.

She urged students to continue to march, and to keep their activities nonviolent.

The important thing, she said, is to educate others about Latino history in the United States.

"We are the indigenous people of this continent," she said, citing the oft-quoted Mexican-American mantra, "We didn't cross the border, the border crossed us."

To cheers, Huerta had her own way of saying it:

"If they tell us to go back where we came from," she said, "well, we are where we came from."

Julia Reynolds can be reached at 648-1187 or jreynolds@montereyherald.com .

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Copyright (c) 2006, The Monterey County Herald, Calif.

Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.

For information on republishing this content, contact us at (800) 661-2511 (U.S.), (213) 237-4914 (worldwide), fax (213) 237-6515, or e-mail reprints@krtinfo.com.

Source: The Monterey County Herald (Monterey, Calif.)

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