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he has a good issue. That's right. That's right. That's right. And there really screwing those dads here. That's right. Really? Okay. I got to make one more call in and it may be uh uh pr campaign and they always invested a lot of money in pr

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and that's always missed the boat, because that's not what it is. What it is, is his people uh union people, students, church people, housewives in all these communities across the country who have taken a deep interest in the farmworker movement and are willing to back it

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up by activity, organized activity in their communities. Well, you said you get getting support. Well, General Trade Union Movement generally supports the farmworker movement. It's kind of like a ray of light, you know, because it's a real movement of people who really are fighting for the

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right to have a union uh, support has uh, generally come from A. F. L. C. I. O. Unions from U. A. W. And so forth. Um, Of course, it's difficult for these unions, like those involved directly in handling produced to back up a boycott by refusing

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to handle because that's against their own collective bargaining agreements and against most state and federal laws. I mean, the long the boycott so far is that it it caused a lot of misunderstanding around the country. Just like you're here asking for certain facts. It's

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impossible. This is such a complex issue as you know, that it's hard to one side is saying one thing and the other side is saying the other thing, you have a disruption. You just have a disruption of the normal business throughout the colours retailers change stars.

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What are these guys on the phone doing? They're selling they're taking orders and selling them selling the merchandise and okay, getting rid of it. What are the, what are these guys in the room behind us doing this is our transportation, uh, we're able here to, uh,

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follow the merchandise as it goes across the country to be sure that the customer gets the delivery on the day that he wants it at the time. He wants it to the best of our ability. And this is the center for our export business to settle.

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Then labor contractors are growers. So the way you get a job is you go, you pay the guy off, you give him a kick back, you bring them some tequila, you do this, you do that. And that's how you get a job and that's how you

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keep a job. Now, the union proposes to concentrate all that employment through one agency operated on the basis of seniority and operated by the workers. Now I see that threatens not just the growers, it threatens even more directly what we call the coyotes, The coyotes, The

00:03:21.830 - 00:03:36.140

guys who've been living off their own people for so many years by bleeding them because they occupy a position of power. Now. See teamsters can't understand why that's important. But see that's essential if the workers are to be able to have any kind of security or

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dignity in a work. Now workers know that will fight for it. Another thing is the issue of angles or the chicano. Well, the crew foreman are mostly chicano. The supervisors are of course, mostly anglo. But watch this, see the supervisors, the supervisors who are anglo generally

00:03:52.590 - 00:04:07.280

have vacation plans and their legitimate part of management. We don't contest that. They are management, they have management benefits, they drive around in their pickups, they have all the all the things that go with being management. Uh, see the crew leaders, their families are farm workers

00:04:07.280 - 00:04:18.450

and the crew leader himself may work as a farm worker. What the grower is looking for is a guy to put it in the middle state. A dupe, you know, like a middle guy that takes all the heat from the workers and then we'll have to

00:04:18.450 - 00:04:29.660

take all the heat from the company and then takes it back on the workers because he's, he has no job security. If he's not in the union, he has no protection whatever. So the company just dumps on him and then he has to dump on the

00:04:29.660 - 00:04:44.320

workers in turn in order to keep his job with the company. That's the arrangement that's always existed. That's what they want to continue to exist and that's what we won't see continue to exist. Then there's pesticides and what Chavez his role is. How well do people

00:04:44.320 - 00:04:57.700

revere him as a leader or do they see him as the guy who's head of their union now or is he becomes some kind of demagogue in there, in there? Well, I think people have tremendous respect for caesar and a great deal of love for him

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because he's really brought hope for the first time and shown people how they can do it and that it can be done. You know, I mean this is an incredible thing because see, see a lot of our members come from Mexico and in Mexico, the system

00:05:15.640 - 00:05:34.100

works a little different in Mexico. Everything operates by money. See, you know like we can see this if we just when we go down into Mexicali and it's brutal. It's like a jungle and everything is controlled in Mexico by the pri the party, the revolutionary institutional

00:05:34.100 - 00:05:48.620

party, uh and the government. So that when a leader, a popular leader comes along, either he winds up out in the middle of the desert somewhere where nobody ever sees him again or else he winds up being bought off and he becomes part of the system.

00:05:48.630 - 00:06:03.630

He begins getting the cars and filling his pockets and all that. Now, that's what a lot of people maybe thought caesar was, then they discovered that he was, it wasn't that they didn't have any selfish motivations in this, and he wasn't trying to fill his pockets,

00:06:03.630 - 00:06:23.750

he wasn't trying to, you know, and so the people just responded, you know, tremendously because he was someone that could really trust and someone who represents their aspirations. I mean, this is just, this is how I think human beings are, you know, people respond to leadership,

00:06:23.760 - 00:06:44.700

respect leadership, good leadership, and the important thing is what that leader does with it. See now, what caesar's doing with it is building an organization, translating that movement into an organization that has firm roots and a firm base and that has a damn good secondary leadership

00:06:44.710 - 00:07:03.450

in it, where people are just developing left and right all the time and assuming leadership positions and where uh well really the nonviolent development of the movement is CAesar's doing. I mean, it's just an ability to, I don't know, maybe his various gifted as a teacher,

00:07:03.450 - 00:07:19.440

you know, an ability to translate concepts to a real living reality among people in the form of a movement. So that like at the courthouse here the other day, There were 3000 farm workers here at the courthouse. They were on all floors of the courthouse, they

00:07:19.440 - 00:07:34.980

were all over the courtyard, everywhere you looked, there were farm workers going to court with CAesar. Um but there wasn't a single incident of any kind. I mean, in fact it was just the opposite. There were there was periods of silence, periods of prayer and all

00:07:34.980 - 00:07:56.560

this and is much more powerful then going in and you know, breaking the windows of the courthouse much more so. Mr Cesar Chavez who is the president of the Youth walk and asked him if he, if he were willing to meet with the ankles and with

00:07:56.560 - 00:08:17.360

all of the parties concerned. His answer was a categorical yes, that he certainly is willing to meet. But however, since he at the present time is a non person, since he happens to be in jail, he was delegating all the right to negotiate for youth walk

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to Dolores huerta. Now, both glorious were to what I would say is that there's hardly any problem this world is not in some way moral and I think that's why clergymen are present here and my con prayers are here for that very reason. But I don't

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like that statement made because sometimes it's interpreted to mean that you folk is not really a real labor organization can truly represent the workers and deliver inadequate workforce to the growers. It's true. There's a moral aspect to all of this, but you've walk is a labor

00:08:50.180 - 00:09:08.210

organization that truly represents its workers and also can deliver to the growers. Uh, the kind of work that they work hands the field workers that they need. How did you find the bus have the same kind of resolve the dispute that would presumably lead to the

00:09:08.210 - 00:09:32.130

lifting of the boycott? How can it be resolved? I think that a uh, again, the best step would be assurance that workers are going to be covered under Labour Relations Management Act in the very near future. And Congress should take this up immediately uh, at the

00:09:32.130 - 00:09:52.010

first of the year, when they come back, there's quite a move to do this, uh, the dispute between the farm workers union and but analysts, and then how would that be solved if the Liberal Relations Board we're operative here? And, yep, the union is asking for

00:09:52.010 - 00:10:10.290

recognition it Five years in the grapes, they wanted recognition. They have always stated that they'll stand on a vote under the Labour Relations Labor Management Relations Act. A vote would be automatic. So there would be a vote here and then that would resolve the issue. Sure,

00:10:10.520 - 00:10:26.760

that the union represents the workers and you're you're bound to good faith negotiations under the labour relations. Why couldn't you have a vote here in the valley? Have all voted? The growers had to recognize it. You know, there's three ways of, in our own specific instance

00:10:26.760 - 00:10:42.520

here. Mr many of the A. F. Of L. C. I. O. Which flock is an organizing committee of the A. F. Of L. C. I. O. Has a gave us through the teamsters Union three weeks ago and then again, Thursday December three Assurance that the boycott

00:10:42.520 - 00:10:59.360

against But anna link is a jurisdictional dispute and it has to end. That's not the way to. It's just not the battle. Let's let's quit it. Why it has not been quit? I don't know. Let me let me go. No, it's fast and afforded all of

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its protections and all of its rights and the enforcement of the of this act should also through the National Labor Relations Board should be the vehicle that the employer, the employees and the union all operate within. It has been much more successful in industry than what

00:11:22.790 - 00:11:41.980

we're going through in agriculture today. There's a lot of talk about modifying the bill or, or coming up with a substitute bill to provide for an agricultural board to administer coverage under the Labour Relations Management Act. Uh, since this board is really a form of a

00:11:41.980 - 00:12:01.710

judicial board and it's a process, a legal process, a new board to me covering just agricultural work. Yes, they are. Well, how the dispute, urine. We talked a moment ago when your father was and you said that you were talking about how you felt about Chavez

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being in jail and how does but animal intuition being resolved now. What kind of actions country and and produce moves in a real true supply and demand market? You know the price changes daily on on supplies and what people think are going to happen and if

00:12:21.090 - 00:12:41.770

the weather turns bad in a certain market area and it's influenced by many things and yeah, produce people that the teamster presence here just wasn't able to deal with that and can't deal with that. They could no more develop following among farm workers than you know,

00:12:41.770 - 00:13:00.570

then they well they probably have more chance among President Nixon's cabinet because ours, the teams are very attractive to the growers because they're responsible, responsible union, which means that they are very much committed to this system and uh that uh they and the growers see eye

00:13:00.570 - 00:13:17.720

to eye on more issues than they would with the workers. We're supposedly not responsible. In spite of the fact we have contracts in the whole table grape industry and had contracts in the wine grape industry for years. Because some of the demands in the contracts that

00:13:17.730 - 00:13:42.750

we have come directly from the workers and change the social relations of the jobs. The heart. One thing about our business very everything is different every day. Go Hello, tell me how you got into this kind of work. Right right from the fields of how long

00:13:42.750 - 00:14:05.790

you been doing it? Got out of high school where you just do it in Watson Rome. You're from California. Was born in Fort Worth. I was raised in California. It's a big business now. Huh? Pretty good science. What do you do about 40 million a year

00:14:05.790 - 00:14:23.600

bomb wow. We got customers on the board that I had when I started with some of the same people used to doing business with you do business with a lot of other firms to with independence in the state. And the market through you market were the

00:14:23.600 - 00:14:41.720

largest. That's what I'm trying to stand out with. Yeah. Who has, Yeah, celery. And it used to be grapes. And the thing about it is it isn't something that runs on a whole lot of money or the growers thinking these are structured in this country so

00:14:41.720 - 00:14:58.380

that unions can't take effective, direct, effective action in support of one another ever since the time came illegal to pick it. Why then we had to move to the boycott And of course that's what they're trying to take away from us now. Um Well of course

00:14:58.420 - 00:15:23.930

caesars according to boycott. So what I'm really doing right now is just kind of helping be his link with the outside world. Is the outside world responding? What are they doing there were finding theoretically the hence the Judge Brazil's injunction on 16 September which was nicely

00:15:23.930 - 00:15:45.300

timed to coincide with Mexican Independence Day. Um The injunction that the boycott is being strengthened considerably, we don't find any but anti lettuce in about seven or eight major cities since this has happened. How does the boycott, how mechanically does it work if people stop buying

00:15:45.300 - 00:16:21.800

or what what is it that makes the boycott effective? Well it's boycott is really Herring Hall is one of the one of the toughest things for the growers to accept because whoever controls jobs in a farmworker community, that's

00:16:21.800 - 00:16:41.420

a cat that has the power in that community. Now up to now, it's all the whole life, blood and goal and ambition has been centered around lettuce and then what becomes related with lettuce, celery and artichokes now and in certain field crops essentially we grow lettuce

00:16:42.140 - 00:17:00.280

All the functions of a farmer. We prepare the land 10 million packages of lettuce and celery a year. Uh There's just there's just on completely different different roads and they don't understand what farm worker needs are and what the farmworker problem is. They don't understand it.

00:17:01.040 - 00:17:17.910

And so even if they came in with what is happening and what has happened and what is going to happen in the future, all should have been avoided. The problem is not unique with us, It's not going to stop with us. Farm workers have been denied

00:17:19.740 - 00:17:42.510

and road blocks have been put in their way by agriculture. Ah These roadblocks have kept unionization out of the fields. Ah We're not against the contracts that these employers signed with uh with the teamsters local here back in july uh they were like where workers had

00:17:42.510 - 00:17:58.160

a contract without a union, they didn't have a union, they had a contract which means that that they got a wage improvement under the teamster contract, they got a diamond. Our increase, they got a couple of cents more a box for packing lettuce. And this work

00:17:58.160 - 00:18:17.610

is in the lettuce and an Imperial valley in Arizona and all over been our members for a long time. Most of them, most of the lettuce cutters come from mexicali and san luis down on the border and they want their own unionization in the least. Uh

00:18:17.620 - 00:18:37.720

We recognize the importance of, of unions. We've had unions here since the day we went into business, our farm workers and field workers Starting in 1961 with the people involved in the harvest. And then we in this last july About 150 people who had not been

00:18:37.720 - 00:18:57.690

covered under union agreements before were covered this past July. And this represents. Today we have 1400 field workers, Of which about 11,100 work each and every day. Ah They're all members of the teamster union. They're represented by the teamsters union and they're covered under a teamster

00:18:57.690 - 00:19:16.150

union contract. We use violence. That is that against property or is that people, I mean, where does that come from? Teams don't give a damn about pesticides. We have to give a damn about pesticides because they're killing our people. See and you know, again, the growers

00:19:16.150 - 00:19:28.950

are up. Well, you know, you've got to look at the economic question and so forth. Will farm worker health is one of the most important questions areas. But again, you know, it's not in other words, that's where our bases, that's where our leaders come from. That's

00:19:28.950 - 00:19:49.970

what this union is all about as farm workers and that's why caesar has the the following he does. That's why two or 3 cars pass by and give us a review but handle or uh four letter words, you know, so just how the bob and I'll

00:19:49.970 - 00:20:05.580

feel about it, about Chavez being in the county jail, we wish you were not there because if he was not there there would be no boycott against us around the country and the boycott is disrupting our business. Is the boycott effective? Yes. How is it? How

00:20:05.580 - 00:20:59.460

is it? Yeah. Mhm. Mhm. Okay. Right. We plant the seed and then we harvest the crop and we harvest the the thing is I have to be here because I have to keep a watch that this place isn't left alone. Yeah. Yeah. Thanks. Yeah. All

00:20:59.460 - 00:21:36.270

right. The way he teaches us how to fight because that's the way we have gained everything with using Nonviolence. Yeah. Well we use violence. I don't think so. I don't think so. You're gonna win. Oh right. You got that. Yeah. Yeah.

00:21:38.540 - 00:22:40.510

Before in order Sarah feels Yeah, I left. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Mhm. Yeah. Yeah. Go ahead. Tell the board shows production uh coming from improve our fresh picked and that prompted the fresh pick strike. They

00:22:40.510 - 00:22:47.670

were fired for refusing to sign cards with the teamsters. And then that in turn led to a general strike in the valley around the issue.