1972.10.20-en-article-UFWstrike.txt

UFW strike returns to Delano Vineyards
The United Farm Workers’ struggle has returned to the vineyards where it first began near Delano, California. The renewed conflict has been accompanied by a wave of violence directed against Cesar Chavez' union which stresses non-violence. Picketers have been subjected to mass arrests; harassment from low-flying aircraft; the union office was fired upon by vigilantes; and the growers have brought in illegal aliens in an attempt to break the strike. The latest dispute in the grape farms began on Aug. 28 of this year when negotiations to renew UFW contracts broke down. The strike is directed against the White River Farms, formerly owned by Schenley Industries. They have been under UFW contract for nearly six years and the contracts have been renegotiated successfully many times. The contract expired on Aug. 28 and the new owners, the Butte Gas & Oil Company baulked on renewing the six year old contract. The owners of White River Farms are using labor contractors from throughout the San Joaquin Valley, as well as the Nisei Farmer's league in Fresno County to recruit strikebreakers. According the the UFW, the White River Farms have failed to recruit sufficient numbers of strikebreakers and have been using illegal aliens. On September 25, 140 farmworkers and several union staff, including Richard Chavez, Dolores Huerta and Poplar Field Office Director, A1 Rojar were arrested. The arrests resulted when 500 pickets gathered at the White River Farm’s Poplar ranch to protest the use of “illegals.'' When Chavez, Huerta and Rojas led the pickets onto the ranch for a prayer meeting to appeal to the aliens for solidarity with the strikers, 74 adults and 10 children were taken to jail. Another 55 pickets were arrested the same day at White River Farm’s
Delano ranch for violations of the picketing injunction obtained by the company. Immigration officials arrested 68 illegal aliens at the entrance roads into the ranch the same day, UFW representatives said. On Sept. 19, Maria Arevelle, a union picket, was struck and injured by a truck driven by Earl Brown, brother-in-law of Bill Taber; Taber was hired by White River Farms to contract and organize strike breaking operations, the union said. During the month of September, pickets were being harrassed by low-flying airplanes which were buzzing the strikers. “These tactics of terror . . . suffered a setback for the month of September when one of the planes buzzing pickets flew into an equally low hanging power line.” UFW sources said. The aircraft was destroyed but the pilot was not harmed. On Sunday night, Oct. 8, 50 vigilantes laid siege to the UFW Poplar Field Office for four hours, firing rifles, pistols and throwing bricks at the field office. Elena Rojas, wife of the field office director, was hit by a brick and was hospitalized. Union officials said that police refused to respond to an emergency call for help. The police arrived after the vigilantes had left; four hours late. They ordered everyone out of the office. When the officers left, the vigilantes returned and ransacked the office. The Union has filed suit against the Sheriffs Department of Kern and Tulare Counties citing the departments for for aiding and abetting citizen vigilante groups and provoking racial war. "The abuse of power by the authorities has fostered an era of violence similar to the days of the KKK in the South. Any form of violence is totally against the basic precepts of our union,” Richard Longoria said. Longoria is the director of the Denver UFW Boycott Office.