Brown Berets

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For the group founded in 1994, see Brown Berets (Watsonville)

The Brown Berets were a Chicano nationalist activist group of young Mexican Americans during the Chicano Movement. Modeled after the Black Panther Party, the Brown Berets focused on community organizing against police brutality and were in favor of educational equality.

1 Predecessors
2 Actions
3 See also
4 External links

[edit] Predecessors

In 1966, as part of the Annual Chicano Student Conference in Los Angeles County, a group of high school students discussed different issues affecting Mexican Americans in their barrios and schools. Among the students at the conference were Vickie Castro, Jorge Licón, John Ortiz, David Sanchez, Rachel Ochoa, and Moctesuma Esparza. These high school students formed the Young Citizens for Community Action the same year, and worked together to support Dr.Julian Nava’s campaign as a Los Angeles school board member candidate in 1967. Sanchez and Esparza had trained with Father John B. Luce’s Social Action Training center at the Church of the Epiphany (Episcopal) in Lincoln Heights and with the Community Service Organization.

The organization’s name was then changed to Young Chicanos For Community Action or "YCCA". In 1967, the YCCA founded the Piranya Coffee House. In September of 1967, Sal Castro, a Korean War veteran and teacher at Lincoln High School, met with the YCCA at the Piranya Coffee House. The group decided to wear brown berets as a symbol of unity and resistance against oppression. As a result, the organization took on the name "Brown Berets". The agenda of the Brown Berets was to fight police harassment, inadequate public schools inadequate heath care, inadequate job opportunities, minority education issues , the lack of political representation and the Vietnam War. It set up branches in Texas, New Mexico, New York, Florida, Chicago, St. Louis and other metropolitan areas with Chicano populations.

[edit] Actions

On March 1, 1968, the Brown Berets planned and participated in the East L.A. walkouts or "blowouts", the largest and lengthiest in the history of California, in which thousands of students left their classrooms to join the protest for quality education. The Brown Berets were able to unite college and high school students and begin the urban stage of the Chicano Movement. Shortly afterwards, other Chicano students led walkouts all over the Southwestern United States, and the Brown Berets became a national organization.

The Brown Berets also were involved in community issues such as unemployment, housing, and democracy, which became important elements in their agenda. The publication of La Causa by Eleazar Risco and the Brown Berets helped to bring awareness of the problems faced every day in the barrios of East L.A.

In 1969, Brown Berets Gloria Arellanes and Andrea Sánchez produced and distributed a newspaper called "La Causa." They also started the first free medical clinics and free breakfast programs.

The Brown Berets also came to be known in the barrio for their direct action against police brutality. They protested the killings and abuses perpetrated by the Los Angeles Sheriffs at the station in the barrio. They supported the United Farm Workers movement and the Land Grant Movement in New Mexico. In the summer of 1968, they participated in the first Rainbow Coalition in the Poor Peoples Campaign. In 1969, they were invited to be part of the first Chicano Youth Liberation Movement organized by Corky Gonzales in Denver, Colorado.

The Brown Berets organized the first Chicano Moratorium against the Vietnam War in 1970, and a few months later the National Chicano Moratorium in which close to 20,000 Chicanos marched and protested the high casualty rate of Chicanos in Vietnam and the draft. This peaceful protest became chaotic when the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s department decided to end the event by attacking attendees. Three Chicano activists were killed (two of them Brown Berets), including journalist Ruben Salazar.

In 1972, twenty-six Brown Berets occupied the Santa Catalina Island and claimed it for Mexico. However, by this time, the organization had been weakened by internal conflicts and police (and possibly CIA) infiltration. There were approximately thirty chapters throughout the Southwest when the Los Angeles chapter dissolved, but not all the members abandoned the organization.

The Brown Berets set up Benito Juarez Health Clinic ("BJHC") in Chicago in 1972. This was a free health clinic that provided free medical care to all people located throughout the Chicago area. Working in conjunction with Cook County Hospital and other major hospitals in the Chicago area, BJHC served the needs of the uninsured and those with no ability to pay for health care services. It was located at 1818 S. Racine it was call the Casa Aztlán Center, the community building located on the west side of Chicago just outside of downtown Chicago had as its Center Director MS. Dorthy Cutler. The medical center was open to the public four days a week from noon until after 11:00 PM. It provided all types of medical help from colds, major cuts, x-rays, blood test, health screening, shots, medical tests, and full pharmacy services all at no cost. The community knew of its existence through word of mouth. Each day it would handle up to a hundred medical cases. The only question asked from anyone seeking medical help was their name. It served a great need to many who had nowhere to turn for health care. It worked on its own and no political or institutional hospitals throughout the Chicago area had control of it. The main people who helped organize and were the forefront for the clinic in other community matters were Maurice "Mori" Mendoza, Rudy and Gogi Cabello. The Brown Berets also fought for public Education issue. They Took over a middle High School called Frobel Middle 9th Grade School. The Brown Berets alongside families, community members and students took over the school for a full day. The Chicago Police force was called to the location to help remove people from the occupied school at the end of the day. A riot broke out that evening and one police man was injured alongside many innocent people that the police beat with their clubs. The Police had 6 cars that were destroyed that day along with other victims. The community wanted a school built in their community, and in 1979 a School was built in the Pilson community now called the Benito Juarez High School.

In San Antonio, Texas SNCC and Brown Berets often supported each other in marches against the Vietnam War and jail conditions at the Bexar County Jail. SNCC ran African American candidates for State offices under the La Raza Unida Party and often supported Mexican American activists.