Asians in these political struggles was frequent and complicates the role of race in the relationship between the UFW and the black freedom struggle. Whites not only boycotted grapes and sent financial contributions to civil rights organizations, they also were important staff members within the UFW and SNCC. In some cases, they even played vital roles in the development of coalitions between movements. The UFW allied with the Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee (AWOC), many of whose members were Filipino, in their first strike against Delano grape growers in 1965. The role of whites and Filipinos thus moves this story beyond one of black/brown relations and proves that the coalitions between la causa and the black freedom struggle were truly multiracial.
Perhaps due to its prominence in our society, race has overshadowed other important factors in the study of dynamics between different racial groups. For example, much of the recent scholarship on African American and Mexican American relations focuses on racial similarities or differences. Although race figured prominently in multiracial alliances, it was by no means the only factor at work.12
Class identity also played a decisive role in the coalitions considered here. The formation of one’s class identity included one’s relationship to the economic system: one’s occupation (or relationship to the means of production) and financial standard of living. However, class identity is also based on lived experience within the home and one’s community. In these settings, an awareness of economic inequality and power, shaped before entering the workforce, created a firm sense of class position. For both African Americans and Mexican Americans, their class was intertwined with their race. Racial discrimination in the workplace relegated the majority of both groups to the working classes and justified their continued economic exploitation. While a common class identity does not guarantee solidarity, class provided another point of cooperation between the black freedom struggle and the UFW. Civil rights activists who had experience with agricultural labor and rural poverty were especially apt to feel class solidarity with the farmworkers. However, middle-class civil rights activists had to cross both the divides of class and race to connect with the Mexican American farmworkers.13
The importance of class takes on additional force here because both the black freedom struggle and la causa were fights for economic justice as well as racial equality. Both movements conceptualized the fight for equitable hiring practices, fair wages, and safe working conditions as integral to the pursuit of racial equality. Wendy Goepel Brooks, a white UFW organizer, succinctly explained, farm labor “has been a civil rights issue since the first Negro was brought to America to work in the fields as a slave.” However, the emphasis on economic justice in both movements created the opportunity for coalition building around class while sidestepping the racial divide. Indeed, some civil rights activists were motivated to support the farmworkers because of a commitment to fighting economic inequality rather than a concern for racial discrimination against Mexican Americans.14
Region played an important role in narrowing racial and class divides. The UFW was based in California, a state renowned for its racial and ethnic diversity. The state’s diversity made race relations more complex than in other regions and rigid Jim Crow segregation became impossible. Even when confined to segregated neighborhoods, African Americans lived and worked alongside other minority groups, including Mexican Americans. Sharing social spaces caused the two groups to participate in cultural exchanges, learning and enjoying each other’s customs, foodways, music, and languages. They also became intimately familiar with each other’s experiences of discrimination. This close knowledge often led to collaboration in the pursuit of social change. Multiracial coalition building was also a practical strategy for the civil rights organizations in the West because the African American population was small in relation to the entire region, making strategic alliances essential to achieving their goals. Furthermore, in reflection of the West’s demographics, the fight for civil rights took on a decidedly multiracial form by demanding social justice on behalf of Latinos, Asian Americans, and American Indians, as well as African Americans. In contrast, race relations in the South operated around a black/white binary and thus the civil rights movement revolved around equality for African Americans. The lack of significant numbers of other minority groups (the Latino population in the South was less than 1 percent in both 1960 and 1970) also meant that multiracial coalition building was neither a priority nor a necessity. Although the Northeast—the urban areas in particular—were more diverse, there were few Mexican Americans in the region. Civil rights activists in the South and Northeast thus had little if any firsthand knowledge of Mexican Americans and their issues. It was therefore more challenging for civil rights organizations in these regions to find common cause with the UFW.15
Regional differences in the United States were not the only ways that geography affected coalition building. The rural Central Valley in which the UFW organized was the agricultural epicenter of the West, if not the entire country. The UFW’s organizing program therefore revolved around the challenges faced by rural agricultural workers and addressed itself to the economic and social structures of rural areas. Of the five civil rights organizations considered here, only SNCC prioritized rural organizing. Members of SCLC and the BPP, however, had been raised in rural areas and had personal experience with farm work. Familiarity with the character of agricultural labor and rural poverty facilitated connections between the black freedom struggle and the UFW.
Race, class, and region all created a sense of common cause among individual activists, but these factors alone were not enough to sustain coalitions between large organizations. It was important that they had compatible ideologies and praxis. Although organizations did not have to have identical interests, philosophies, strategies, and tactics in order to form an alliance, likeminded organizations were better able to work together. Historical context was also an important factor in determining whether an organization would and could enter into a coalition. Although the UFW conceived of itself as part of the civil rights movement, it also embodied the labor movement. Whether an organization of the black freedom struggle supported the UFW thus depended on its historic relationships with both Mexican Americans and organized labor. Many activists were reluctant to support the UFW because of organized labor’s history of discrimination against African Americans and its complicated relationship with the civil rights movement.16
Leadership also played a decisive role in coalition building in the black freedom struggle. No matter how similar or compatible organizations may have been, coalitions did not occur spontaneously. The formation of coalitions depended on the work of bridge leaders who, by crossing the divides that separated movements or organizations, created the impetus for alliances to develop. Although some scholars define bridge leaders as individuals, particularly women, who connect formal movement leaders to their constituencies, I argue that bridge leadership can operate between movements as well as within. These leaders were willing to overlook differences in favor of similarities and had to convince their colleagues and constituencies to do the same. Accordingly, individuals could also explain why alliances between analogous and likeminded organizations did not occur.17
As all of these factors indicate, the coalitions that formed between the UFW and the organizations of the black freedom struggle were complex and contextual, shaped by the dynamics of race and class, but also reflective of the organizations’ histories, ideologies, praxis, circumstances, and geographic locations. Though SNCC, the NAACP, the Urban League, SCLC, and the BPP—five organizations that represented a wide spectrum of black activism—all supported the UFW, the extent of their support for the union varied. This book seeks to uncover the factors that explain the organizations’ differing approaches to the UFW and, more broadly, to multiracial coalition building writ large.
Although the extent and duration of the alliances between the black freedom struggle and the UFW varied, they were all significant. As a historian of interracial activism has argued, “Whether coalitions were rare or common is not the important question here, but rather their significance and long-term import. Interracial cooperation influenced civil rights outcomes and trajectories disproportionate to the number of people involved.” The support of the black freedom struggle, in addition to that of the farmworkers’ other allies, helped the UFW to achieve the first union
