Cesar Chavez & the Labor March of 1966

In 1966, farm workers from the Rio Grande Valley seeking ethical working conditions and a pay raise from 60 cents per hour to $1.25 an hour went on strike. After numerous arrests and assaults, they decided to march 491 miles to the state capitol in Austin in protest. Joined by the trailblazing co-founder of the United Farm Workers Union, Cesar Chavez, the act brought much-needed attention to their cause and with each new city their numbers grew, reaching an estimated 10,000 by the end. Before completing the last 4 miles of their journey, the marchers slept overnight at St. Edward's University. The group's efforts launched the farmworkers' movement in Texas and ultimately led to the first statewide minimum wage.

Fifty years later, on September 11, 2016, journalist Phil Oakley, who had taken photographs and conducted interviews with the marchers during those fateful final miles, spoke at a commemorative event at SEU. His remarks are shared below.

Listen to his interviews from that day here.

I am grateful to all of you for inviting me to be here in this historic place in American Civil Rights history.

St. Edward’s University in 1966 remembered what their founder, Jesus, the savior, the light of the world had told them.

The marchers from the Rio Grande Valley arrived thirsty and the disciples at St. Ed’s gave them water. They were hungry and you gave them food. They were dusty and their feet hurt and you washed the aching feet of your guests. They were weary and you gave them a place to rest.

Did I mention they were hungry?

Well, apparently they were hungry again the next morning and you prepared for them a breakfast feast before sending them up the road three miles farther to the Capitol.

You kept the faith in 1966. You shared God’s blessings with the poor. And as I have witnessed this week with my own eyes, you here at St. Edward’s still do those things in 2016.

I am humbly, but deeply honored to be in your presence on this day … for this very special commemoration and dedication.

I met Cesar Chavez right in the middle of a hot Texas street: the one that runs just to west of where we have gathered today. I walked with him and I stood in his presence as all of us shared a good old fashioned Texas sweat. I took his picture and I recorded his words.

I asked him why he had come to Austin.

"We are here to lend whatever support we can,” he said.

“[We are here] to be with them and share in their joys after marching into Austin,” he said.

I asked him about the red bandana he wore. Did that mean he was one of the hearty handful who had walked the whole 491 miles from Rio Grande City, I asked?

“No,” he answered. “No,” he repeated.

“I guess it was given to me because I'm one of the guests," he said.

One of the guests? Guests? I thought. My God, did he really say: one of the guests?”

I knew Cesar Chavez for about three hours one sweltering Texas midday fifty years ago … and he has been with me ever since.

Please allow me to share with you part of what I wrote in last weekend’s edition of The Dallas Morning News.

“On Labor Day 1966, there was confusion and uncertainty in our newsroom.

“No one knew what might happen when the marchers from the Rio Grande Valley seeking a minimum wage for farm workers arrived in Austin. Governor John Connally had told the marchers they would not be welcome and no one would be there to greet them at the Capitol. My editors viewed the Valley March as just a Texas political story. There was no hint that history would be made.

[That Monday for me had been chaotic, confusing and for the most part a whole lot of waiting.]

“The waiting finally ended with the faint sounds of a distant bass drum, followed by voices singing irregularly in Spanish. Eventually, a small group of marchers came into focus around the middle of the Congress Avenue bridge.

“In a few more minutes, Cesar Chavez led the protesters off the crossing and toward the Capitol, marking his emergence from the fields and vineyards of California and onto a national stage.

“Microphone in hand, I had joined him about the time he crossed East 1st Street. Neither of us could possibly have imagined one day that crossroad would be renamed East Cesar Chavez Street.”

[March organizer Eugene Nelson, early in the march, had bought a prototypical donkey, a Mexican burro, to symbolize his compatriots: the farm workers of the Rio Grande Valley, men and women who worked in the fields from sunup until dark every day for 30 or 40 cents an hour.]

“I have a bill of sale right here in my wallet,” [he told me, then spoke his version of why the donkey was marching with them at the head of the procession.]

[After he had answered, Eugene Nelson turned to Father Antonio Gonzalez, who had come from Houston to join the march in the early days and asked the Catholic priest to add his response to my question.]

[Father Gonzalez’ words were less moderate, less restrained.]

“The reason why this donkey’s in the march is because the Valley growers were driving by and yelling at us: ‘animals!’ And we have this animal here in order to explain to the Valley growers the difference between an animal and a human being,” Gonzalez said.

We gathered here at St. Edward’s all of this week to remember September 1966, and the question asked repeatedly was what did the march accomplish? What did it mean?

Very much, the Rio Grande Valley march was about one thing: human dignity. And for me, the single sentence that best answered the question came from attorney and activist James Harrington.

“The march was to the Hispanic community in Texas what Rosa Parks was to African Americans,” Jim wrote in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram last weekend and repeated in a panel discussion of the march here on the campus of this university last Wednesday.

I’m not an historian by trade. I’m not an expert on the history of LaHuelga in Texas and I don’t have a lot of detailed knowledge about the story of the United Farm Workers movement: just what anyone could read on the internet and in a book or two.

I knew Cesar Chavez for one brief shining moment on a day fifty years ago. In a lifetime, I have never met anyone like him: so humble, so quiet and so extremely blessed by God with a determination and courage like I have never seen in any other human.

Thank you Jack Mussleman and everyone at St. Edward’s University for allowing me to tell you what I saw one day … September 5th 1966 … A day that has lasted all the rest of my life.

God bless you all. God bless all those who still toil in the blazing hot fields of the Texas Rio Grande Valley for wages not very much better in equivalent terms to what their grandparents were paid in 1966.

We haven’t forgotten. We haven’t forgotten what you said that day in 1966, Mr. Chavez.

"We are here to lend whatever support we can.”

And we haven’t forgotten what you said, Father Gonzalez.

“We have this animal here in order to explain to the Valley growers [and indeed to the whole world] the difference between an animal and a human being.”

Amen, Father Gonzalez. Amen.

Amen and “Viva La Huelga!”

Phil Oakley 

Download a PDF of these remarks here.