Cesar Chavez

Cesar Chavez was a Mexican American labor leader, civil rights activist, and co-founder of the United Farm Workers (UFW). He dedicated his life to improving the working and living conditions of farmworkers in the United States through nonviolent activism, grassroots organizing, and persistent advocacy.

Early Life

Chavez was born near Yuma, Arizona, to a Mexican American family. During the Great Depression, his family lost their farm and became migrant farmworkers, moving from place to place in search of work. Chavez experienced firsthand the hardships of agricultural labor, which shaped his lifelong commitment to justice for the working poor.

Activism and Organizing

After serving in the U.S. Navy during World War II, Chavez became involved in community organizing. In 1962, he co-founded the National Farm Workers Association (later renamed the United Farm Workers) with Dolores Huerta. Together, they led efforts to unionize farmworkers, many of whom were underpaid, overworked, and exploited.

Chavez gained national attention in the 1960s and ’70s through strikes, marches, fasts, and the now-famous Delano grape strike and boycott, which lasted five years and brought widespread awareness to the plight of farmworkers. His tactics were deeply influenced by the nonviolent philosophies of Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr.

Legacy

Cesar Chavez became a symbol of grassroots activism and Latino empowerment. He remained committed to nonviolence and to the belief that ordinary people could change the world through persistence and unity. He died in 1993 at the age of 66.

In 1994, he was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian honor in the United States. His legacy lives on in labor rights movements, in schools and streets named in his honor, and in the annual Cesar Chavez Day, celebrated in several U.S. states.