Citrus Strike of 1936

The Citrus Strike of 1936 was a strike in southern California among citrus workers for better working conditions that took place in Orange County from June 10 to July 25. The strike was significant for ending the myth of "contented Mexican labor."[1] It was one of the most violently suppressed strikes of the early 20th century in the United States. The sheriff who suppressed the largely Mexican 3,000 citrus pickers was himself a citrus rancher who issued a "shoot to kill" order on the strikers. 400 pickers were arrested in total, while others were ordered to either face jail time or deportation to Mexico.[1][2][3] It has also been referred to as the Citrus War[4] and the Citrus Riots.[5]

Orange fruit pickers, Santa Ana, Orange County, California c. 1900 (California Historical Society collection at USC Libraries, CHS-154)
Orange fruit pickers, Santa Ana, Orange County, California, c. 1900 (California Historical Society collection at USC Libraries, CHS-154)

The strikes

Prior to the strikes, wages had dropped from 4$ a day to 3$ while an orange picker could be publicly identified by "his single drooping shoulder, deeply scarred from the strap of the bag he was required to fill with fifty pounds of oranges while perched on a precarious ladder." Men worked as pickers while women worked in packing houses.[6]

On June 11, 2,500 men and women workers left the orange groves of The Pressel Orchard, where the strike began.[6] Local media attempted to downplay the strike, portraying it initially as a farce. By early July, law enforcement was stopping anyone who "looked Mexican" and was near the orange groves. In some cases, strikers were severely beaten, with their injuries being disregarded in court as "sympathy propaganda." Strikers were intentionally characterized as "communists" who were engaging in a "little Mexican revolution" to stoke fears in the Orange County population.[2]

Associated Farmers organized groups of vigilantes to attack those striking, who used physical violence while law enforcement simply observed.[5] Women in the labor community organized the Cuerpo Auxiliar de Mujeres (the Union Women’s Auxiliary) as an organization to prevent growers from hiring scabs.[5] The strike ended on July 25 with workers gaining a "20-cent-an-hour wage for a nine-hour day plus three cents for each box picked over 30"[7] despite the growers refusing to recognize the union's right to collective bargaining.[5]

Aftermath

In 1939, a congressional investigation found that the growers had illegally blacklisted people and used violent tactics to crush the strike. However, no charges were filed.[2]

Carey McWilliams referenced the strikes in a chapter of his nationally released book Factories in the Field (1939), stating that "No one who has visited a rural county in California under these circumstances will deny the reality of the terror that exists. It is no exaggeration to describe this state of affairs as fascism in practice."[2] In 1946, he further compared the conditions to that of a Nazi concentration camp, writing "I met former classmates of mine in college, famous athletes of the University of Southern California, armed with revolvers and clubs, ordering Mexicans around as though they were prisoners in a Nazi concentration camp."[2]

The strike has been noted as largely forgotten, such as in a 1971 dissertation on the subject[8] and in a 1975 article for the Los Angeles Times, which referred to it as "one of the least-chronicled incidents in the history of the citrus belt."[2] According to Gustavo Arellano, the event continues to be left out of historical chronicles of Orange County history.[2]

The strike has been credited with ending the myth of Mexican laborers being content with poor working conditions at the time, which was a myth heavily promoted by the Anglo agricultural industry, as well as for inspiring a conservative hostility against labor organization in Orange County and elsewhere.[9][8]

See also

References
  1. "UCI Libraries - Immigrant Lives in the OC and Beyond: Work". www.lib.uci.edu. Retrieved 2022-12-05.
  2. "The Citrus War of 1936 Changed Orange County Forever and Cemented Our Mistrust of Mexicans – OC Weekly". www.ocweekly.com. Retrieved 2022-12-05.
  3. Tour, Jesse La (2019-12-17). "The Roots of Inequality: The Citrus Industry Prospered on the Back of Segregated Immigrant Labor -". fullertonobserver.com. Retrieved 2022-12-05.
  4. "Orange County's lost essence". Los Angeles Times. 2008-08-10. Retrieved 2022-12-05.
  5. "Blood Orange: The 1936 Citrus Strike in Orange County". UFCW 324. 2008-07-01. Retrieved 2022-12-05.
  6. "How Farmworkers Fought for Their Rights in OC's Last Orange Groves". KCET. 2022-06-07. Retrieved 2022-12-05.
  7. Staff, OC Tribune (2014-07-23). "A citrus 'war' in the OC". ORANGE COUNTY TRIBUNE. Retrieved 2022-12-05.
  8. RECCOW, LOUIS (2014). "History, Modern". THE ORANGE COUNTY CITRUS STRIKES OF 1935-1936: THE 'FORGOTTEN PEOPLE' IN REVOLT (Thesis). University of Southern California Digital Library (USC.DL). doi:10.25549/usctheses-c17-217960.
  9. Gonzalez, Gilbert G. (January 1994). "The Mexican Citrus Picker Union, The Mexican Consulate, and The Orange County Strike of 1936". Labor History. 35 (1): 48–65. doi:10.1080/00236569400890031.
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