Farm Worker Pioneers Inducted into DOL Hall of Honor

(Metropolitan Washington Council, AFL-CIO)Saying that “They built a union like no other and turned a community into a movement,” Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis on March 26 inducted the pioneers of the farm worker movement into the U.S. Department of Labor’s Hall of Honor (formerly the Labor Hall of Fame). Solis also dedicated the department’s auditorium to César Chávez, founder and longtime president of the Farm Workers (UFW). Among the hundreds of farmworker, labor and community activists in attendance were UFW President Arturo Rodriguez, UFW co-founder Dolores Huerta and Paul Chavez, Cesar Chavez’s middle son and president of the Cesar Chavez Foundation. Actor Michael Pena – who will portray Cesar Chavez in an upcoming biopic – was the master of ceremonies. “My father said that the job of an organizer is to help ordinary people do extraordinary things,” Paul Chavez said. The farm worker movement “took the very best of other social justice movements — including lessons from Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr., effective civil disobedience and other peaceful tactics — and married them with modern strategies that involved consumers, students and effecting change by working within existing institutions,” said Solis. “It wasn't just about one single person. It was thousands of ordinary people inspired to act with extraordinary courage.” Rodriguez and Solis also paid special tribute to five UFW activists — Nan Freeman, Nagi Daifalla, Juan De La Cruz, Rufino Contreras and Rene Lopez — killed during strikes and other union actions who Rodriguez said “gave up their only lives for a movement that was bigger than they were.” The Hall of Honor is located inside the North Plaza of DOL's Frances Perkins Building on 200 Constitution Avenue, N.W., Washington, D.C. The exhibit is open during government working hours. The portraits and brief biographies of the inductees are included in the online section of the Hall of Fame. This year also marks the 50th anniversary of the union’s founding. In conjunction with the anniversary, the UFW launched a campaign to collect stories from workers, strikers, full-time organizers and staff, volunteer pickets, marchers and countless consumers who boycotted grapes and other products. Click here to learn more. - report by Chris Garlock; graphic courtesy DOL