A Moveable Feast: The UFW Grape Boycott and Farm Worker Justice

Abstract

When most people think of the United Farm Workers, two things come to mind: Cesar Chávez and the grape boycott. Regarding the former, Chávez distinguished himself as perhaps the best-known Mexican American labor and civil rights leader in the country through his advocacy for farm worker rights in California during the 1960s and 1970s. In 1970, the union he led forced growers to the bargaining table for the first farm labor contracts in the history of the Golden State. This achievement would not have been possible without Chávez's embrace of the boycott, a strategy that, until proven important to the struggle, had been regarded by labor leaders as supplemental to the main strategies of strikes and marches. In fact, when we evaluate the contributions of the United Farm Workers to the history of labor in the United States, the grape boycott might well be its most enduring legacy, even more so than Chávez's leadership.