Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee [SNCC]: influence on US second-wave feminism, and outreach tactics.

[Billy L]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Student_Non-violent_Coordinating_Commi...

SNCC and feminism

SNCC activist Bernice Johnson Reagon described the Civil Rights Movement as the "borning movement" of the 1960s.^[14] The Women's' Liberation Movement was one of the many movements born out of and inspired by the Civil Rights Movement. SNCC consisted of mostly college-age activists, and therefore provided opportunities for young women. Participation in organizations such as SNCC essentially marked the beginning of second-wave feminism in the US, which focused on changing social inequalities as opposed to the previous focus on legal issues in first-wave feminism. The influence of the Civil Rights movement also introduced mass protests and awareness campaigns as the main methods to obtain sexual equality.

Many black women held prominent positions in the movement as a result of their participation in SNCC. Some of these women include[d] [...] Anne Moody.

Anne Moody published her autobiography, Coming of Age in Mississippi, in 1970, detailing her decision to participate in SNCC and later CORE, and her experience as a woman in the movement. She described the widespread trend of black women to become involved with SNCC at their educational institutions. As young college students or teachers, these black women were often heavily involved in grassroots campaign by teaching Freedom Schools and promoting voter registration.^[15

[...]

[Billy L]

http://www.latinamericanstudies.org/latinos/chavez-chronology.htm

Cesar Chavez Chronology

"One of the heroic figures of our time." -- Robert F. Kennedy

1927, March 31--Cesario Estrada Chavez is born on the small farm near Yuma, Ariz. that his grandfather homesteaded in the 1880s.

1937--After Cesar's father, Librado, is forced from his farm, the Chavez family becomes migrant workers in California.

1942--Cesar quits school after the eighth grade and works in the fields full time to help support his family.

1944--He joins the U.S. Navy during World War II and serves in the western Pacific. Just before shipping out to the Pacific, Cesar is arrested in a segregated Delano, Calif. movie theater for sitting in the "whites only"
section.

1948--Cesar marries Helen Fabela. They eventually have eight children.

Late 1940s--He begins studying the social teachings of the Catholic Church.

1952--Community organizer Fred Ross discovers the young farm worker laboring in apricot orchards outside San Jose, Calif., and recruits him into the Community Service Organization (CSO).

1952-1962--Together with Fred Ross, Cesar organizers 22 CSO chapters across California in the 1950s. Under Cesar's leadership, CSO becomes the most militant and effective Latino civil rights group of its day. It helps Latinos become citizens, registers them to vote, battles police brutality and presses for paved streets and other barrio improvements.

1962, March 31--On his birthday, Cesar resigns from CSO, moves his wife and eight small children to Delano and dedicates himself full-time to organizing farm workers.

1962, Sept. 30--The first convention of Cesar's National Farm Workers Association (NFWA) is convened in Fresno, Calif.

1962-1965--Often baby-sitting his youngest children as he drives to dozens of farm worker towns, Cesar painstakingly builds up the membership of his infant union.

1965, Sept. 16--On Mexican Independence Day, Cesar's NFWA, with 1,200-member families, votes to join a strike against Delano-area grape growers already begun that month by the mostly Filipino American members of the Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee, AFL-CIO (AWOC). Thus begins the five-year Delano Grape Strike.

March-April 1966--Cesar and a band of strikers embark upon a 340-mile Peregrinacion (or Pilgrimage) from Delano to the steps of the state Capitol in Sacramento to draw national attention to the suffering of farm workers. During the march and after a four-month boycott, Schenley Vineyards negotiates an agreement with NFWA--the first genuine union contract between a grower and farm workers' union in U.S. history.

Spring-summer 1966--A boycott of the struck DiGiorgio Fruit Corp. forces the giant grape grower to agree to an election among its workers. The company brings in the Teamsters Union to oppose Cesar's NFWA. The NFWA and the Filipino American AWOC merge to form the United Farm Workers and the union affiliates with the AFL-CIO, the national labor federation. DiGiorgio workers vote for the UFW.

1967--The UFW strikes the Giumarra Vineyards Corp., California's largest table grape grower. In response to a UFW boycott, other grape growers allow Giumarra to use their labels. So the UFW begins a boycott of all California table grapes. Meanwhile, strikes continue against grape growers in the state.

1967-1970--Hundreds of grape strikers fan out across North America to organize an international grape boycott. Millions of Americans rally to La Causa, the farm workers' cause.

February-March 1968--Cesar fasts for 25 days to rededicate his movement to nonviolence. U.S. Sen. Robert F. Kennedy joins 8,000 farm workers and supporters at a mass where Cesar breaks his fast, calling the weakened farm labor leader "one of the heroic figures of our time."

Spring-summer 1970--As the boycott continues picking up steam, most California table grape growers sign UFW contracts.

Summer 1970--To keep the UFW out of California lettuce and vegetable fields, most Salinas Valley growers sign contracts with the Teamsters Union. Some 10,000 Central Coast farm workers respond by walking out on strike. Cesar calls for a nationwide boycott of lettuce.

1970, Dec. 10-24--Cesar is jailed Salinas, Calif. for refusing to obey a court order to stop the boycott against Bud Antle lettuce. Coretta Scott King, widow of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and Ethel Kennedy, widow of Robert Kennedy, visit Cesar in jail.

1971--The UFW moves from Delano to its new headquarters at La Paz in Keene, Calif., southeast of Bakersfield. With table and wine grape contracts, and some agreements covering vegetable workers, UFW membership grows to around 80,000.

1972--The UFW is chartered as an independent affiliate by the AFL­CIO; it becomes the United Farm Workers of America, AFL-CIO (UFW).

1972, May 11-June 4--Cesar fasts for 25 days in Phoenix over a just-passed Arizona law banning the right of farm workers to strike or boycott.

Spring-summer 1973--When the UFW's three-year table grape contracts come up for renewal, instead sign contracts with the Teamsters without an election or any representation procedure. That sparks a bitter three-month strike by grape workers in California's Coachella and San Joaquin valleys. Thousands of strikers are arrested for violating anti-picketing injunctions, hundreds are beaten, dozens are shot and two are murdered. In response to the violence, Cesar calls off the strike and begins a second grape boycott.

1973-1975--According to a nationwide 1975 Louis Harris poll, 17 million Americans are boycotting grapes. Many are also boycotting lettuce and Gallo wine after winery workers strike the mammoth Modesto, Calif.-based producer.

June 1975--After Jerry Brown becomes governor, the boycott convinces growers to agree to a state law guaranteeing California farm workers the right to organize and bargain with their employers. Cesar gets the landmark Agricultural Labor Relations Act through the state Legislature.

September 1975-January 1976--Hundreds of elections are held. The UFW wins the majority of the elections in which it participates. The Agricultural Labor Relations Board (ALRB), which enforces the law, briefly shuts down after running out of money and pro-grower lawmakers refuse to approve an emergency appropriation.

Mid-to-late 1970s--The UFW continues winning elections and signing contracts with growers. In 1977, the Teamsters Union signs a "jurisdictional" agreement with the UFW and agrees to leave the fields. In 1978, the UFW calls off its boycotts of grapes, lettuce and Gallo wine.

January-October 1979--In a bid to win decent wages and benefits, the UFW strikes several major lettuce and vegetable growers up and down the state. Rufino Contreras, 27-year old striker, is shot to death in an Imperial
Valley lettuce field by grower foremen.

September 1979--After a strike and boycott, the UFW wins its demands for a significant pay raise and other contract improvements from SunHarvest, the nation's largest lettuce producer. Other growers also soon settle.

Early 1980s--With election victories and contract negotiations, the number of farm workers protected by UFW contracts grows to about 45,000.

1982--Republican George Deukmejian is elected California governor with $1 million in grower campaign contributions.

1983-1990--Deukmejian begins shutting down enforcement of the state's historic farm labor law. Thousands of farm workers lose their UFW contracts. Many are fired and blacklisted. Fresno-area dairy worker Rene Lopez, 19, is shot to death by grower agents after voting in a 1983 union election. Cesar declares a third grape boycott in 1984.

1986--Cesar kicks off the "Wrath of Grapes" campaign to draw public attention to the pesticide poisoning of grape workers and their children.

July-August 1988--At age 61, Chavez conducts his last--and longest--public fast for 36 days in Delano to call attention to farm workers and their children stricken by pesticides.

Late 1980s-early 1990s--After recovering from his fast, Cesar continues pressing the grape boycott and aiding farm workers who wish to organize.

Spring-summer 1992--Working with UFW First Vice President Arturo Rodriguez, Cesar leads vineyard walkouts in the Coachella and San Joaquin valleys. As a result, grape workers win their first industry-wide pay hike in eight years.

1993, April 23--Cesar Chavez dies peacefully in his sleep at the modest home of a retired San Luis, Ariz. farm worker while defending the UFW against a multi-million dollar lawsuit brought against the union by a large vegetable grower.

1993, April 29--40,000 mourners march behind Cesar's plain pine casket during funeral services in Delano.

May 1993--Veteran UFW organizer Arturo Rodriguez succeeds Cesar as union president.

March-April 1994--On the first anniversary of Cesar's passing, Arturo Rodriguez leads a 343-mile march retracing Cesar's historic 1966 trek from Delano to Sacramento. Some 17,000 farm workers and supporters gather on the state Capitol steps to help kick off a new UFW field organizing and contract negotiating campaign.

1994, August 8--President Bill Clinton posthumously presents the Medal of Freedom--America's highest civilian honor--to Cesar Chavez. His widow, Helen, receives the medal during a White House ceremony.

1994-2000--Since the new UFW organizing drive began in 1994, farm workers vote for the UFW in 18 straight union elections and the UFW signs 24 new--or first-time--agreements with growers. UFW membership rises from around 20,000 in 1993 to more than 27,000. The Cesar Chavez-founded union organizes and bargains on behalf of major rose, mushroom, strawberry, wine grape and lettuce and vegetable workers in California, Florida and Washington state.

(Updated: April 2000)

--Chronology supplied by the United Farm Workers.
 

[Billy L]

http://www.democracynow.org/2012/4/18/alec_drops_push_for_voter_id

NERMEEN SHAIKH: In the wake of a national outcry over the shooting death of Trayvon Martin, the secretive right-wing American Legislative Exchange Council, known as ALEC, is halting its push for Florida’s controversial Stand Your Ground law. Florida passed the law in 2005 after massive lobbying by the National Rifle Association. Shortly afterward, a nearly identical bill was adopted by ALEC as model legislation, and [ALEC] went on to push the law in multiple states. The group also drafted voter identification measures that passed across the country.

Well, on Tuesday, ALEC announced it would shift its focus away from social issues. ALEC chairman and Indiana State Representative David Frizzell said, quote, "We are eliminating the ALEC Public Safety and Elections task force that dealt with non-economic issues, and reinvesting these resources in the task forces that focus on the economy."

AMY GOODMAN: The announcement comes on the heels of an exodus from the corporate lobbying group. Snack food giant Mars, as well as Wendy’s, McDonald’s, Kraft Foods, Coca-Cola, Pepsi and Intuit, they’ve all recently declined to renew their membership in ALEC. In addition, the Gates Foundation has announced it will not continue to fund ALEC.

Meanwhile, at an event during last weekend’s National Rifle Association annual meeting, NRA chief lobbyist Chris Cox said the group doesn’t "apologize" for its support for Stand Your Ground self-defense legislation, as he put it.

CHRIS COX: There’s support across the board for the Second Amendment. There’s support across the board—even post-media hysteria over the last few weeks, there’s support across the board for legitimate self-defense, that we don’t apologize for supporting our—whether you call it a national right or a God-given right—that we don’t apologize for supporting legislation that recognizes our right to defend ourselves.

AMY GOODMAN: Well, for more, we’re joined now by two guests: from Washington, D.C., Lisa Graves, executive director of the Center for Media and Democracy, which built ALEC Exposed, a website showcasing more than 800 of the group’s model bills; here in New York, we’re joined by Rashad Robinson, executive director of Color of Change, which has criticized corporations for working with ALEC to pass laws that hurt people of color, young people and the elderly.

Lisa Graves, Rashad Robinson, we welcome you both to Democracy Now! I want to begin with Lisa Graves. The significance of the announcement by ALEC itself this week?

LISA GRAVES: It shows the potency of the tremendous grassroots outpouring of objection to ALEC’s agenda and ALEC’s procedures, where corporate lobbyists and politicians actually vote behind closed doors on these proposed model legislation without the press or public present on this extreme agenda. And groups like Color of Change and others have really helped spearhead a breakthrough here on ALEC, based in part in the work we’ve done through ALEC Exposed to expose these bills and help connect the dots between the corporations, the politicians and this extraordinarily extreme agenda. [...]

[...]NERMEEN SHAIKH: Rashad Robinson, I want to ask you how significant you think the work of organizations, the advocacy work done by organizations such as yours, Color of Change, was in bringing ALEC to make this decision.

RASHAD ROBINSON: Absolutely. You know, we started this campaign last year, last December, as we were trying to bring voices of everyday people to the conversation around discriminatory voter ID. And we went out to our membership. Color of Change is the largest online black political organization. We have over 900,000 members nationally. And there’s nothing more important than sort of the right to vote when you’re doing civic participation work. I think the work that’s happened here, not just by Color of Change, but by a number of organizations, really does show the power that everyday people’s voices can have in our democracy, and that even while corporations continue to have more power in our political process, we can still hold them accountable.

And this was really about letting folks like Coca-Cola and Pepsi and Kraft know that they can’t come for black folks’ money by day and try to take away our vote by night. And by pushing these corporations to make a different decision about their relationship with ALEC, we’ve also shined the light on ALEC, making it much harder for them to do what they do in state legislatures around the country. And so, this is, I think, not just important in terms of what it tells everyday people about their ability to raise their voices and make a difference, but also about the long-term impact ALEC is going to be able to have in the future. [...]

[Billy L]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second-wave_feminism