Frank Bardacke

The title of this book was brilliantly chosen - it is of course the phrase from the famous abolitionist song The Battle Hymn of The Republic that immediately precedes the words "the grapes of wrath" - and it connects this superb biography of Cesar Chavez and his union to the famous grape boycott, to the downtrodden California farmworkers in Steinbeck's epochal novel, to the similar struggles of abolitionists in the 19th century, and to the religious faith that propelled Chavez and so many others throughout their quest to organize their fellow farm workers. For many people in America today Chavez has long stopped symbolizing the cause of labor rights and has instead become a sort of demi-saint of Mexican-American culture, the Chicano equivalent of MLK. This is a tragedy, because the deeper you get into the book the more impressive his accomplishments become, and even though he was just as responsible for the decline of the United Farm Workers as he was for its rise, as the man who founded one of the only independent unions to actually survive the brutal combat against bosses and other labor organizations chronicled here he deserves a closer look at his contributions to society. Bardacke is eminently well-qualified to write this story: he's one of the few "Anglos" who has actually done farm work, and his descriptions of the labor in the chapter "The Work Itself" help bring home just how backbreaking something like celery- or lettuce-picking can still be. How Chavez forged his association and then the union out of an odd mix of Mexicans, Filipinos, and Anglos by protesting, striking, and boycotting is fascinating to read even as Bardacke scrupulously records the "mischief" committed by all parties and Chavez's increasingly despotic rule. It's a real challenge to see Chavez as a "good guy", per se - though you continually root for him to keep outwitting the truly horrible agricultural aristocrats and rival unions like the Teamsters (surely one of the worst labor organizations ever in terms of corruption and brutality) to bring benefits to his fellow workers, as he tightens his grip on the United Farm Workers you can see why exactly so many people don't like unions or powerful associations in general. Chavez was a strongly religious person, and there are many points in the book where he comes off like a cult leader - the burdens he placed on his subordinates, the personal loyalty he demanded, the marches/pilgrimages, the fasting, the Versailles-esque isolated retreat where he ran the whole union. It's a truism that centralized power is very good for initiating things when they're small but bad for sustaining things as they get larger, as the decisiveness and speed of the central authority starts making more and more mistakes and slides into sclerosis; Bardacke is brilliant at showing how Chavez's refusal to give any but a small inner circle of devoted associates and relatives any real power in the organization doomed it into its current state of irrelevance. It's very instructive to compare the bunker mentality of Chavez with the inhuman generosity of someone like Eugene Debs, a real-life saint if there ever was one. Check out Ray Ginger's amazing The Bending Cross for more on Debs and how he was able to inspire an enduring labor movement beyond himself rather than focus people's energies on his own projects only like Chavez did. Pretty much the only flaw with the book is that Bardacke briefly lapses into badly-chosen caricature. E.g. he trashes Walter Reuther, one of the greatest labor leaders of all time, for the fact that the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party didn't get fully seated at the 1964 Democratic Convention, when in reality Reuther not only funded the MFDP but helped it get more than it would have otherwise. There's similar mis-moralizing when it comes to illegal immigrants, who Chavez had a complicated relationship with, seeing them as potential allies but more as competition, undercutting the wage agreements he kept trying to set. Overall though this was an excellent biography, and you will gain a new understanding of the hidden side of agribusiness, such as its creation of the table grape market, as you learn about this still-relevant guy.… (mehr)