Luisa Moreno
Encyclopedia
Luisa Moreno was a leader in the United States
labor movement and a social activist. She unionized workers, led strikes, wrote pamphlets in English
and Spanish
, and convened the 1939 Congreso de Pueblos de Habla Española, the "first national Latino civil rights assembly", before "voluntarily" returning to Guatemala in 1950.
, Guatemala. While still a teenager, she organized La Sociedad Gabriela Mistral
, which successfully lobbied for the admission of women to Guatemalan universities. Rejecting her elite status, she went to Mexico City
in her teens to pursue a career in journalism. While there, she also wrote poetry. She married Angel De León, an artist, in 1927, and together they moved to New York City
the following year. There, her daughter Mytyl was born.
While in New York, the Warner Brothers movie Under a Texas Moon (1930) was protested as anti-Mexican by a group of Latinos led by Gonzalo González. Police brutalized the picketers, killing González. The murder sparked a Pan-Latino protest, in which Moreno participated. She later told Bert Corona
that the experience "motivated her to work on behalf of unifying the Spanish-speaking communities."
She was a graduate of the Catholic women's university College of the Holy Names in Oakland, California
.
struck in 1929, and in order to support her daughter and unemployed husband, Moreno worked as a seamstress in Spanish Harlem
. She organized her co-workers, most of whom were Latinas, into a garment workers union.
In 1935, Moreno was hired by the American Federation of Labor
(AFL) as a professional organizer. She left her husband, who had become physically abusive, and settled with her daughter in Florida
, where she unionized African-American and Latina cigar-rollers. She joined the Congress of Industrial Organizations
(CIO) and became a representative of the United Cannery, Agricultural, Packing, and Allied Workers of America
(UCAPAWA), becoming the editor of its Spanish-language newspaper in 1940.
As UCAPAWA representative, she helped organize workers at pecan
-shelling plants in San Antonio, Texas
, and cannery workers in Los Angeles
. There, she encouraged alliances between workers at different plants. Her leadership was of the type that empowered other workers, especially women, and she strongly encouraged women to take leadership roles in union organizations.
In 1937, she settled the Encanto neighborhood of San Diego, which she used as a base for her nationwide activism.
In 1939 she was one of the main organizers, alongside Josefina Fierro de Bright
and Eduardo Quevedo, of the Congreso de Pueblos de Habla Española (Spanish-speaking People's Congress). She took a year off from UPACAWA to travel throughout the U.S., visiting Latino workers on the East Coast, in the Southwest, and allying refugees of the Spanish Civil War
to her cause.
In 1940, she was asked to speak before the American Committee for the Protection of the Foreign Born (ACPFB). Her speech, which became known as the "Caravan of Sorrow" speech, eloquently described the lives of migrant Mexican workers. Portions of it were reprinted in Committee pamphlets, creating a legacy that lasted much longer than the duration of the speech itself. In it, she stated,
In the same year, she co-founded an employment office in San Diego with her friend Robert Galván. She also organized San Diego-area cannery workers and persuaded employers not to hire scab workers. With the dawn of World War II
, the defense industry became a major employer in the United States, particularly in San Diego. Mexicans, however, were forbidden to work in the petroleum industry, shipyards, and other war-related fields, and were relegated to the lowest-paying jobs. Moreno criticized the discrimination, pointing out that "California has become prosperous with the toil and sweat of Mexican immigration attending to its number one industry, agriculture. Now they have sustained a true and lasting patriotism to a democratic country that refuses to give them citizenship or even basic civil rights."
In 1942, Moreno became involved in the Sleepy Lagoon murder
trial, a cause célèbre for the American left and Mexican-American civil rights activists. Along with longtime friend Bert Corona
and attorney Carey McWilliams
, she organized the Sleepy Lagoon Defense Committee to exonerate the indicted youths. In addition to mounting a legal defense, the Committee sought to put to rest rumors about "violent gangs" of Pachuco
s and to counter sensationalist reports of urban "guerrilla warfare" between Pachucos and servicemen. (The press had dubbed the 1943 attacks of Pachucos the "Zoot Suit Riots
".) She also investigated abuses on the part of servicemen in San Diego, advising city councilperson Charles C. Dail on the matter. She invited Admiral David W. Bagley
, commandant of the Eleventh Naval District in San Diego, to a meeting of San Diego-area community and labor leaders. Bagley did not respond to the invitation. Continuing to press for an investigation, Moreno collaborated with McWilliams to gather evidence. The investigation outraged California State Senator Jack B. Tenney, who lashed out at Moreno, publicly accusing her of engaging in an "anti-American conspiracy."
During her Zoot Suit campaigns, she continued to work in the labor movement. In the city of El Monte
, she represented walnut pickers, receiving the assistance of the California Walnut Growers Association. One Association representative "came to have a high regard for her character, ability and honesty."
In 1947, she married Gray Bemis, a navy veteran from Nebraska who had been a delegate to the 1932 Socialist Party of America
national convention. Bemis shared Moreno's interest in the civil rights of Mexican Americans, and photographed many of her activities.
In the late 1940s, Moreno established a San Diego chapter of the Mexican Civil Rights Committee. In speeches to chapters of the Young Progressives of America, she warned that racial tensions and communist hysteria provoked racial profiling
, stereotyping and police brutality
against Mexican Americans and other ethnic minorities.
(INS) conducted Operation Wetback
to forcibly deport Mexicans and Mexican Americans. The Operation targeted labor leaders in particular. Although she had always been polite and abided by the law in her activities, her activism earned her powerful enemies. She and her husband began receiving threatening letters from "patriotic" organizations for their work against police brutality. Tenney, who labeled her a "dangerous alien", was the prime factor in her deportation. She was offered citizenship in exchange for testifying against Harry Bridges
, but refused to be "a free woman with a mortgaged soul."
On November 30, 1950, Moreno and her husband left the United States via Ciudad Juárez
, slowly making their way to Mexico City. Her warrant of deportation had been issued on the grounds that she had once been a member of the Communist Party.
Eventually, the couple settled in Guatemala, but were forced to flee when a 1954 CIA-sponsored coup ousted progressive President
Jacobo Arbenz Guzmán
.
After the triumph of the 1959 Cuban Revolution
, Moreno spent time teaching on the island. She later returned to Guatemala, where she was interviewed by several historians before she died.
Mexican-American civil rights movement and the American labor movement
, her role is often overlooked. Since the 1970s, however, activists and historians have attempted to reconstruct her role in the movements and give her the appropriate credit. Among them are the muralist and professor Judy Baca
, who memorialized the organization of Cal San workers in her Great Wall of Los Angeles
. The wall, a visual representation of the history of Los Angeles, pays tribute to Moreno by including an image of her face surrounded by images of strikers.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
labor movement and a social activist. She unionized workers, led strikes, wrote pamphlets in English
English language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
and Spanish
Spanish language
Spanish , also known as Castilian , is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several languages and dialects in central-northern Iberia around the 9th century and gradually spread with the expansion of the Kingdom of Castile into central and southern Iberia during the...
, and convened the 1939 Congreso de Pueblos de Habla Española, the "first national Latino civil rights assembly", before "voluntarily" returning to Guatemala in 1950.
Early life
Moreno was born Blanca Rosa López Rodríguez to a wealthy family in Guatemala CityGuatemala City
Guatemala City , is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Guatemala and Central America...
, Guatemala. While still a teenager, she organized La Sociedad Gabriela Mistral
Gabriela Mistral
Gabriela Mistral was the pseudonym of Lucila de María del Perpetuo Socorro Godoy Alcayaga, a Chilean poet, educator, diplomat, and feminist who was the first Latin American to win the Nobel Prize in Literature, in 1945...
, which successfully lobbied for the admission of women to Guatemalan universities. Rejecting her elite status, she went to Mexico City
Mexico City
Mexico City is the Federal District , capital of Mexico and seat of the federal powers of the Mexican Union. It is a federal entity within Mexico which is not part of any one of the 31 Mexican states but belongs to the federation as a whole...
in her teens to pursue a career in journalism. While there, she also wrote poetry. She married Angel De León, an artist, in 1927, and together they moved to New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
the following year. There, her daughter Mytyl was born.
While in New York, the Warner Brothers movie Under a Texas Moon (1930) was protested as anti-Mexican by a group of Latinos led by Gonzalo González. Police brutalized the picketers, killing González. The murder sparked a Pan-Latino protest, in which Moreno participated. She later told Bert Corona
Bert Corona
Humberto Noé "Bert" Corona was an American labor and civil rights leader. Throughout his long career, he worked with nearly every major Mexican-American organization, founding or co-founding several. He organized workers for the Congress of Industrial Organizations and fought on the behalf of...
that the experience "motivated her to work on behalf of unifying the Spanish-speaking communities."
She was a graduate of the Catholic women's university College of the Holy Names in Oakland, California
Oakland, California
Oakland is a major West Coast port city on San Francisco Bay in the U.S. state of California. It is the eighth-largest city in the state with a 2010 population of 390,724...
.
Union and civil rights activism
The Great DepressionGreat Depression
The Great Depression was a severe worldwide economic depression in the decade preceding World War II. The timing of the Great Depression varied across nations, but in most countries it started in about 1929 and lasted until the late 1930s or early 1940s...
struck in 1929, and in order to support her daughter and unemployed husband, Moreno worked as a seamstress in Spanish Harlem
Spanish Harlem
East Harlem, also known as Spanish Harlem and El Barrio, is a section of Harlem in the northeastern part of the New York City borough of Manhattan. East Harlem is one of the largest predominantly Latino communities in New York City. It includes the area formerly known as Italian Harlem, in which...
. She organized her co-workers, most of whom were Latinas, into a garment workers union.
In 1935, Moreno was hired by the American Federation of Labor
American Federation of Labor
The American Federation of Labor was one of the first federations of labor unions in the United States. It was founded in 1886 by an alliance of craft unions disaffected from the Knights of Labor, a national labor association. Samuel Gompers was elected president of the Federation at its...
(AFL) as a professional organizer. She left her husband, who had become physically abusive, and settled with her daughter in Florida
Florida
Florida is a state in the southeastern United States, located on the nation's Atlantic and Gulf coasts. It is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the north by Alabama and Georgia and to the east by the Atlantic Ocean. With a population of 18,801,310 as measured by the 2010 census, it...
, where she unionized African-American and Latina cigar-rollers. She joined the Congress of Industrial Organizations
Congress of Industrial Organizations
The Congress of Industrial Organizations, or CIO, proposed by John L. Lewis in 1932, was a federation of unions that organized workers in industrial unions in the United States and Canada from 1935 to 1955. The Taft-Hartley Act of 1947 required union leaders to swear that they were not...
(CIO) and became a representative of the United Cannery, Agricultural, Packing, and Allied Workers of America
United Cannery, Agricultural, Packing, and Allied Workers of America
The United Cannery, Agricultural, Packing, and Allied Workers of America was a CIO-affiliated trade union during the late 1930s and 1940s....
(UCAPAWA), becoming the editor of its Spanish-language newspaper in 1940.
As UCAPAWA representative, she helped organize workers at pecan
Pecan
The pecan , Carya illinoinensis, is a species of hickory, native to south-central North America, in Mexico from Coahuila south to Jalisco and Veracruz, in the United States from southern Iowa, Illinois, Missouri, and Indiana east to western Kentucky, southwestern Ohio, North Carolina, South...
-shelling plants in San Antonio, Texas
San Antonio, Texas
San Antonio is the seventh-largest city in the United States of America and the second-largest city within the state of Texas, with a population of 1.33 million. Located in the American Southwest and the south–central part of Texas, the city serves as the seat of Bexar County. In 2011,...
, and cannery workers in Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
. There, she encouraged alliances between workers at different plants. Her leadership was of the type that empowered other workers, especially women, and she strongly encouraged women to take leadership roles in union organizations.
In 1937, she settled the Encanto neighborhood of San Diego, which she used as a base for her nationwide activism.
In 1939 she was one of the main organizers, alongside Josefina Fierro de Bright
Josefina Fierro de Bright
Josefina Fierro , later Josefina Fierro de Bright, was a Mexican American leader who helped organize resistance against discrimination in the American Southwest during the Great Depression. She was the daughter of migrants who had fled revolution in Mexico to settle in California...
and Eduardo Quevedo, of the Congreso de Pueblos de Habla Española (Spanish-speaking People's Congress). She took a year off from UPACAWA to travel throughout the U.S., visiting Latino workers on the East Coast, in the Southwest, and allying refugees of the Spanish Civil War
Spanish Civil War
The Spanish Civil WarAlso known as The Crusade among Nationalists, the Fourth Carlist War among Carlists, and The Rebellion or Uprising among Republicans. was a major conflict fought in Spain from 17 July 1936 to 1 April 1939...
to her cause.
In 1940, she was asked to speak before the American Committee for the Protection of the Foreign Born (ACPFB). Her speech, which became known as the "Caravan of Sorrow" speech, eloquently described the lives of migrant Mexican workers. Portions of it were reprinted in Committee pamphlets, creating a legacy that lasted much longer than the duration of the speech itself. In it, she stated,
In the same year, she co-founded an employment office in San Diego with her friend Robert Galván. She also organized San Diego-area cannery workers and persuaded employers not to hire scab workers. With the dawn of World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, the defense industry became a major employer in the United States, particularly in San Diego. Mexicans, however, were forbidden to work in the petroleum industry, shipyards, and other war-related fields, and were relegated to the lowest-paying jobs. Moreno criticized the discrimination, pointing out that "California has become prosperous with the toil and sweat of Mexican immigration attending to its number one industry, agriculture. Now they have sustained a true and lasting patriotism to a democratic country that refuses to give them citizenship or even basic civil rights."
In 1942, Moreno became involved in the Sleepy Lagoon murder
Sleepy Lagoon murder
Sleepy Lagoon murder was the name that newspapers and radio commentators used to describe the alleged murder of Jose Diaz, whose body was found on the Williams Ranch near a lagoon in southeast Los Angeles, California, on August 2, 1942...
trial, a cause célèbre for the American left and Mexican-American civil rights activists. Along with longtime friend Bert Corona
Bert Corona
Humberto Noé "Bert" Corona was an American labor and civil rights leader. Throughout his long career, he worked with nearly every major Mexican-American organization, founding or co-founding several. He organized workers for the Congress of Industrial Organizations and fought on the behalf of...
and attorney Carey McWilliams
Carey McWilliams (journalist)
Carey McWilliams was an American author, editor, and lawyer. He is best known for his writings about social issues in California, including the condition of migrant farm workers and the internment of Japanese Americans in concentration camps during World War II...
, she organized the Sleepy Lagoon Defense Committee to exonerate the indicted youths. In addition to mounting a legal defense, the Committee sought to put to rest rumors about "violent gangs" of Pachuco
Pachuco
Pachucos are Chicano youths who developed their own subculture during the 1930s and 1940s in the Southwestern United States. They wore distinctive clothing and spoke their own dialect of Mexican Spanish, called Caló or Pachuco...
s and to counter sensationalist reports of urban "guerrilla warfare" between Pachucos and servicemen. (The press had dubbed the 1943 attacks of Pachucos the "Zoot Suit Riots
Zoot Suit Riots
The Zoot Suit Riots were a series of riots in 1943 during World War II that erupted in Los Angeles, California between white sailors and Marines stationed throughout thehi c mlc city and Latino youths, who were recognizable by the zoot suits they favored...
".) She also investigated abuses on the part of servicemen in San Diego, advising city councilperson Charles C. Dail on the matter. She invited Admiral David W. Bagley
David W. Bagley
David Worth Bagley was an admiral in the United States Navy during World War II. He was also the brother of Ensign Worth Bagley, who was the only United States Navy officer killed in action during the Spanish-American War....
, commandant of the Eleventh Naval District in San Diego, to a meeting of San Diego-area community and labor leaders. Bagley did not respond to the invitation. Continuing to press for an investigation, Moreno collaborated with McWilliams to gather evidence. The investigation outraged California State Senator Jack B. Tenney, who lashed out at Moreno, publicly accusing her of engaging in an "anti-American conspiracy."
During her Zoot Suit campaigns, she continued to work in the labor movement. In the city of El Monte
El Monte, California
El Monte is a residential, industrial, and commercial city in Los Angeles County, California, United States. The city's slogan is "Welcome to Friendly El Monte," and historically is known as "The End of the Santa Fe Trail." As of the 2010 census, the city had a total population of 113,475,...
, she represented walnut pickers, receiving the assistance of the California Walnut Growers Association. One Association representative "came to have a high regard for her character, ability and honesty."
In 1947, she married Gray Bemis, a navy veteran from Nebraska who had been a delegate to the 1932 Socialist Party of America
Socialist Party of America
The Socialist Party of America was a multi-tendency democratic-socialist political party in the United States, formed in 1901 by a merger between the three-year-old Social Democratic Party of America and disaffected elements of the Socialist Labor Party which had split from the main organization...
national convention. Bemis shared Moreno's interest in the civil rights of Mexican Americans, and photographed many of her activities.
In the late 1940s, Moreno established a San Diego chapter of the Mexican Civil Rights Committee. In speeches to chapters of the Young Progressives of America, she warned that racial tensions and communist hysteria provoked racial profiling
Racial profiling
Racial profiling refers to the use of an individual’s race or ethnicity by law enforcement personnel as a key factor in deciding whether to engage in enforcement...
, stereotyping and police brutality
Police brutality
Police brutality is the intentional use of excessive force, usually physical, but potentially also in the form of verbal attacks and psychological intimidation, by a police officer....
against Mexican Americans and other ethnic minorities.
Deportation
During the 1950s, the Immigration and Naturalization ServiceImmigration and Naturalization Service
The United States Immigration and Naturalization Service , now referred to as Legacy INS, ceased to exist under that name on March 1, 2003, when most of its functions were transferred from the Department of Justice to three new components within the newly created Department of Homeland Security, as...
(INS) conducted Operation Wetback
Operation Wetback
Operation Wetback was a 1954 operation by the United States Immigration and Naturalization Service to remove illegal immigrants, mostly Mexican nationals from the southwestern United States.-History:...
to forcibly deport Mexicans and Mexican Americans. The Operation targeted labor leaders in particular. Although she had always been polite and abided by the law in her activities, her activism earned her powerful enemies. She and her husband began receiving threatening letters from "patriotic" organizations for their work against police brutality. Tenney, who labeled her a "dangerous alien", was the prime factor in her deportation. She was offered citizenship in exchange for testifying against Harry Bridges
Harry Bridges
Harry Bridges was an Australian-American union leader, in the International Longshore and Warehouse Union , a longshore and warehouse workers' union on the West Coast, Hawaii and Alaska which he helped form and led for over 40 years...
, but refused to be "a free woman with a mortgaged soul."
On November 30, 1950, Moreno and her husband left the United States via Ciudad Juárez
Ciudad Juárez
Ciudad Juárez , officially known today as Heroica Ciudad Juárez, but abbreviated Juárez and formerly known as El Paso del Norte, is a city and seat of the municipality of Juárez in the Mexican state of Chihuahua. Juárez's estimated population is 1.5 million people. The city lies on the Rio Grande...
, slowly making their way to Mexico City. Her warrant of deportation had been issued on the grounds that she had once been a member of the Communist Party.
Eventually, the couple settled in Guatemala, but were forced to flee when a 1954 CIA-sponsored coup ousted progressive President
President of Guatemala
The title of President of Guatemala has been the usual title of the leader of Guatemala since 1839, when that title was assumed by Mariano Rivera Paz...
Jacobo Arbenz Guzmán
Jacobo Arbenz Guzmán
Colonel Jacobo Árbenz Guzmán was a Guatemalan military officer and politician who served as Defense Minister of Guatemala from 1944–1951, and as President of Guatemala from 1951 to 1954....
.
After the triumph of the 1959 Cuban Revolution
Cuban Revolution
The Cuban Revolution was an armed revolt by Fidel Castro's 26th of July Movement against the regime of Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista between 1953 and 1959. Batista was finally ousted on 1 January 1959, and was replaced by a revolutionary government led by Castro...
, Moreno spent time teaching on the island. She later returned to Guatemala, where she was interviewed by several historians before she died.
Legacy
Although Luisa Moreno is undoubtedly one of the major figures in the pre-Chicano MovementChicano Movement
The Chicano Movement of the 1960s, also called the Chicano Civil Rights Movement, also known as El Movimiento, is an extension of the Mexican American Civil Rights Movement which began in the 1940s with the stated goal of achieving Mexican American empowerment.-Origins:The Chicano Movement...
Mexican-American civil rights movement and the American labor movement
Labor unions in the United States
Labor unions in the United States are legally recognized as representatives of workers in many industries. The most prominent unions are among public sector employees such as teachers and police...
, her role is often overlooked. Since the 1970s, however, activists and historians have attempted to reconstruct her role in the movements and give her the appropriate credit. Among them are the muralist and professor Judy Baca
Judy Baca
Judith Francisca Baca is an American artist, activist, and University of California, Los Angeles professor of fine arts...
, who memorialized the organization of Cal San workers in her Great Wall of Los Angeles
Great Wall of Los Angeles
The Great Wall of Los Angeles is a mural designed by Judith Baca and executed by community youth and artists coordinated by the Social and Public Art Resource Center...
. The wall, a visual representation of the history of Los Angeles, pays tribute to Moreno by including an image of her face surrounded by images of strikers.