The Defense Committees of Sleepy Lagoon

The Defense Committees of
Sleepy Lagoon
A Convergent Struggle against Fascism, 1942–1944
Frank P. Barajas
ABSTRACT: The Sleepy Lagoon Defense Committee originated as an ad hoc committee
and evolved to a broad-based movement for legal justice on behalf of seventeen youths
convicted of murder and assault charges in connection with the Sleepy Lagoon case in Los
Angeles in January 1943. This essay chronicles the multidimensional organizing to shift
public opinion in the case, in which activists skillfully utilized the specter of a fifth-column
element made up of Mexican Sinarquistas and fascist sympathizers to achieve their goal. A
diverse array of individuals and organizations, including those in the Mexican community
as well as prominent writers and activists of other ethnic backgrounds, contributed to the
successful effort to win public support and finance the appeal that ultimately overturned
the convictions and won the release of the young men who were behind bars.
The courtroom in Los Angeles Superior Court was packed on the morning
of October 23, 1944, as family, friends, and supporters of the appellants
awaited the final results of their appeal. Almost two years earlier, in January
1943, seventeen youths had been convicted on various charges of murder or
assault in the celebrated case known as Sleepy Lagoon. Confusion reigned
as reporters and spectators jostled to catch sight of the appellants. Finally,
Los Angeles deputy district attorney John Barnes brought a motion before
Judge Clement D. Nye to dismiss the charges, citing the unanimous decision
of the Second District Court of Appeals of the State of California to reverse
all the convictions and set aside the sentences, a decision based upon the
insufficiency of the evidence that had been offered to prove the young men
responsible for the crime. The courtroom erupted in applause and shrieks.
Alice Greenfield turned to the mother of Henry “Hank” Leyvas and
comfortingly remarked, “Don’t get excited, Mrs. Lupe Leyvas. All that has
Aztlán: A Journal of Chicano Studies 31:1 Spring 2006
© University of California Regents
33
Barajas
happened is that we have just mumbled in a few words up here that will
take your oldest boy out of prison . . . just give back your favorite son. Tall,
handsome, proud Henry Leyvas.” The audience then cleared the courtroom.
Many awaited the release of Hank, Gus Zamora, Jose “Chepe” Ruiz, and
Robert “Bobby” Telles in the hall of the building. Pleadingly, Mrs. Leyvas
cried, “Dónde está mi hijo? Dónde está mi hijo?” (fig. 1). Bobby’s mother,
Margaret Telles, was more patient: “We expected to wait years. I guess we
can wait minutes, or a few hours.” As the elevator door delivering “the boys”
opened, cheers greeted them (fig. 2). The crowd pressed forward to welcome
and photograph the newly freed. After nearly two years of fundraising and
organizing by national and international coalitions against a backdrop of
world war, a spirit of victory filled the building.1
The history of the Sleepy Lagoon case has been detailed by many
authors since the late 1940s. It is closely associated with the so-called zoot
suit riots—the servicemen’s riots of June 1943—as many of the original
twenty-two defendants and their girlfriends wore the contentious fashion.
Monographs and essays have deconstructed the layered significance of the
zoot-suit style in connection to the milieu of World War II and the coming
of age of a generation of young men and women reared in households
headed by Mexican parents but “Americanized” by social programs, school
curricula, and the era’s popular culture.2 For nearly thirty years, Luis Valdez’s
Zoot Suit, as both a play and a movie, has enhanced the mystique of the
Sleepy Lagoon case as it has enlaced “fact and fantasy.”
With the passage of time, the reality and the myth have become more
tightly entwined. Scholars, particularly those within Chicano studies, have
debated questions about the case. Who really created the Sleepy Lagoon
Defense Committee (SLDC) that sought legal justice on behalf of the young
men? Was the committee effective in utilizing the resources of the Mexican
community? And what was the plight of the young women of Sleepy Lagoon
who were incarcerated in the notorious Ventura School for Girls?
Indeed, in relation to the drama Zoot Suit, Chicana studies scholar
Yolanda Broyles-González contends that the tireless labor leader Luisa
Moreno or the civil rights activist Josefina Fierro de Bright should have
FRANK P. BARAJAS, assistant professor in the History Program at California State University
Channel Islands, examines the social and political issues that Mexican communities faced
during the early twentieth century. He is currently writing about the institution of a civil
injunction against gangs in the city of Oxnard and researching the history of the sugar beet
industry in Southern California. He can be contacted at [email protected].
34
The Defense Committees of Sleepy Lagoon
Figure 1. Mrs. Lupe Leyvas, center, and Henry “Hank” Leyvas’s sisters awaiting his release at the
Los Angeles Hall of Justice, October 23, 1944. His younger sister, Lupe Leyvas, is at far right.
Collection of Alice McGrath.
Figure 2. Bobby Telles and his family after his release at the Los Angeles Hall of Justice, October 23,
1944. Hank Leyvas and Alice Greenfield are in the background. Negative 32252-4, Los Angeles
Daily News Negatives (Collection 1387). Department of Special Collections, Charles Young Research
Library, University of California, Los Angeles.
35
Barajas
been the SLDC protagonist in the screenplay rather than Alice Greenfield,
a Jewish woman whom Broyles-González pointedly labels a “white savior”
(1994, 181–204). Historian Eduardo Obregón Pagán faults the SLDC for
apparently discounting the social networks of the Mexican community in the
effort to free the young men (2003, 86). In a more evenhanded and nuanced
analysis, historian Edward J. Escobar portrays the SLDC as a fundamentally
static entity (1999, 272–84). He does not analyze the evolution of the committee from an ad hoc group of activists to, in the end, a formalized and
focused organization of volunteers and paid staff ultimately headed by Carey
McWilliams. Such critiques, particularly those raised by Broyles-González
and Pagán, reflect a desire to highlight the agency and leadership within
the Mexican community by challenging the actual influence and work of
indispensable allies such as Greenfield, McWilliams, and LaRue McCormick.
The story of Sleepy Lagoon, however, involved many “saviors,” none of
whom can take individual credit for the successful result. Rather, a diverse
array of people and organizations with complementary origins, motives, and
abilities came together in a collective fight for justice.
This essay focuses on the growth of the SLDC, a process in which
existing social networks of the Mexican community formed partnerships
with individuals such as McCormick and Fierro de Bright. Since 1944, some
of these players have received more attention than others, but the reality
is that many different people were involved. Some raised funds by selling
pamphlets in the streets and hosting benefits in homes in Los Angeles and
throughout the state and nation. Activists like Fierro de Bright and writers
like McWilliams used their status to gain a public platform for the cause,
giving speeches at conferences and on radio. Then there were the Sleepy
Lagoon family members, notably Hank Leyvas’s younger sister, Lupe, and
Bobby Telles’s mother, Margaret. In addition to providing critical moral
support to their incarcerated loved ones, they organized fundraising events
and mobilized segments of a weary Mexican community traumatized but
not completely immobilized by the deportation campaigns of the 1930s.
Numerous organizations, in Los Angeles and beyond, augmented the indefatigable work of these individuals. They included groups like Las Madres del
Soldado Hispano-Americano (Mothers of Hispanic American Servicemen)
as well as affiliates of the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO) and the
Communist Party. It was the cumulative efforts of all these individuals and
groups that achieved the goal of legal justice after two years of struggle.
The drama took place against the backdrop of world war and the
growth of the European fascist regimes, whose sympathizers included
36
The Defense Committees of Sleepy Lagoon
the right-wing Sinarquistas, or Sinarchists, in Mexico. Activists drew a
disturbing parallel between the experience of the convicted young men
in California and the fascist persecutions in Nazi Germany, particularly in
light of the discrimination and abuses that Mexicans and labor organizers
in the United States endured. The specter of a Sinarquista fifth column in
the United States, lurking in the shadows to recruit disaffected members of
the Mexican community, was highlighted by the activists of Sleepy Lagoon
to gain sympathy for their cause. Seen through this lens, the SLDC can be
understood as an organization that enjoyed support from a wide range of
organizations and individuals with varying ethnic and political origins and
varying motives—not a single group of paternalistic “white saviors.”
The Trial
On the evening of August 2, 1942, the body of José Diaz was found near
the Sleepy Lagoon reservoir in southeast Los Angeles. Diaz had died from
massive trauma to the head and had also suffered stab wounds to the body.
A police dragnet subsequently swept up more than 300 male youths, most
of Mexican origin. A Los Angeles grand jury indicted twenty-four youths on
charges of conspiracy to commit murder and assault with a deadly weapon.
Two of the defendants with astute legal representation asked for separate
trials, and the charges against those two were later dropped.
The Los Angeles district attorney’s office prosecuted the remaining
twenty-two young men as alleged members of the 38th Street Gang.
The trial began in October 1942 and lasted three months. Although the
physician attending Diaz in the hospital emergency room attributed the
death to a massive contusion and brain hemorrhage, a homicide was never
legally established at the trial. Several scenarios were proposed to explain
Diaz’s death—that he was hit by a car, suffered repeated falls while under
the influence of alcohol, or sustained blows to the head in a fight.3 The
fairness of the trial was questioned on various grounds. In addition to the
fact that the defendants were tried en masse, Judge Charles W. Fricke
prohibited them from sitting with their lawyers. Early in the proceedings
the defendants were not allowed to have clean clothes or haircuts, giving
them a disreputable image in jurors’ eyes.
The court found Hank Leyvas (age 19), Chepe Ruiz (17), and Bobby
Telles (17) guilty of first-degree murder and sentenced them to life in prison.
Nine other youths were found guilty of second-degree murder and given
sentences of five years to life: Victor Thompson (20), Angel Padilla (18),
37
Barajas
John Matuz (18), Gus Zamora (20), Henry Ynostroza (18), Jack Melendez
(21), Manuel Delgaldo (18), Ysmael “Smiles” Parra (22), and Manuel
Reyes (17). These two groups were initially sent to San Quentin prison.
Five other young men—Andrew Acosta (17), Eugene Carpio (17), Victor
Segobia (16), Benny Alvarez (18),
and Joe Valenzuela (18)—were
found guilty of assault and given
one-year sentences.4 The youthfulness of the defendants—their
average age was 18—explains why
their supporters regularly referred
to them as “the boys.”5
Although never tried or convicted, nine young women connected to the case were also detained
by the police for months in a virtual state of solitary confinement.
Three of them—Dora Barrios (18),
Lorena Encinas (19), and Frances
Figure 3. From left: Dora Barrios, Frances Silva, Silva (18)—were arrested as murand Lorena Encinas. Herald-Examiner Collection,
der suspects (fig. 3). As juveniles,
Los Angeles Public Library.
Barrios and Encinas, along with
Juanita “Jenny” Gonzales and Betty
Nuñez Zeiss, were sent to the notorious Ventura School for Girls of the
California Youth Authority, where
they served an average of sixteen
months (Escobedo 2004, 67; Pagán
2003, 203; Ramírez 2000, 20).6
From the start of the trial, the
proceedings were monitored by
LaRue McCormick, a member of
the Communist Party and executive director of the International
Labor Defense (ILD) on the West
Coast, a cognate of the Communist
Figure 4. LaRue McCormick, 1940. Photo from
LaRue McCormick (1976), “Activist in the Party (fig. 4). Since the early 1930s,
Radical Movement, 1930–1960” (Regional Oral McCormick had frequented the
History Office, Bancroft Library, University of
courtrooms and jails of Southern
California, Berkeley).
38
The Defense Committees of Sleepy Lagoon
and Central California, aiding agricultural workers, labor union members,
and minorities charged with crimes primarily related to strike activity.
Supported by other Communists such as Dorothy Ray Healey, she informed
defendants of their legal rights and advised them on securing representation
in court. In this effort she tapped into a cadre of lawyers on the political
left who were committed to protecting the civil liberties of migrant farm
workers and labor organizers. Many worked for or were members of the
American Civil Liberties Union or unions affiliated with the CIO during
the 1930s and 1940s (McCormick 1976, 68; Healey and Isserman 1995,
68). Among them were Leo Gallagher, Al Wirrin, and George Shibley.
With the elimination of so many Communists in Nazi Germany, the
Communist International forged a strategy (known as the Popular Front) of
creating coalitions with liberal and progressive organizations. In line with
this, McCormick worked closely with El Congreso Nacional del Pueblo
de Habla Española (National Congress of Spanish-Speaking Peoples). She
most likely became aware of the Sleepy Lagoon case as part of her regular
monitoring of the courts and news reports (Denning 1996, 4, 17–18;
McCormick 1976, 68–69; Healey and Isserman 1995, 76; Kelley 1990,
119–28; Susman 1973, 203, 212). Convinced there had been a miscarriage
of justice and appalled by the violations of the defendants’ constitutional
rights, McCormick quickly organized a news conference to publicize the
case. She subsequently formed an ad hoc committee of the ILD called the
Citizens’ Committee for the Defense of Mexican-American Youth. The ILD
also sent out over 200 telegrams asking for support.7 Days into the trial, on
October 16, 1942, McCormick sent out a letter calling on “public-spirited
citizens” to organize an effective defense.8
The ILD viewed the courtroom as a venue to highlight injustices as
well as to educate workers and others about their rights under the U.S.
Constitution. In this regard, McCormick was much more a champion of
civil liberties than a Communist Party ideologue. Speaking of the violations of constitutionally protected freedoms of association, expression, and
redress of grievances, McCormick eloquently declared, “That’s what we [the
ILD] did—turn the courtroom into a classroom. Don’t let them get away
with this. Do it in such a way that you will educate the greatest number of
people. And, of course, we filled the courtroom to capacity. We kept picket
lines going if we could. We did all of the things that you possibly could to
direct attention at what kinds of things were going on” (1976, 45).
The denial of legal justice in the Sleepy Lagoon trial was the main reason
the Communist Party and the ILD took an interest. McCormick and a cadre
39
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of like-minded activists held a genuine faith in the ideas embedded within the
Constitution, with all of its rights, protections, and immunities. In 1931, well
before Sleepy Lagoon, the Communist Party and ILD had championed the
legal rights of nine black male teenagers unjustly convicted of assault and the
rape of two white women in the nationally renowned Scottsboro, Alabama,
case (Kelley 1990, 78–80, 86–88). This counters the view of historian Pagán,
who asserts that McCormick, along with other “Irish and Jewish activists,”
held close the reins of the SLDC and patronizingly made it “her primary goal
. . . to organize what seemed to her and other labor activists to be a largely
unorganized Mexican American community.” Pagán also claims, without
evidence, that a “vast network of political, community, and cultural organizations that had long existed among the Mexican Americans of Los Angeles”
stood ready to assist but failed to do so because, somehow, the controlling
leadership of the SLDC shut them out (2003, 86). This is completely incorrect, as the archival evidence presented below will demonstrate. Indeed, in a
1976 oral history, McCormick states, “They [the Sleepy Lagoon defendants]
were all charged with first-degree murder. We waited around thinking that
somebody was going to come to their defense. But they didn’t. So I finally
called a conference and we had several hundred people turn out to it and set
up a Sleepy Lagoon Defense Committee” (68).
Struck by the incompetent and uncoordinated legal representation
of the defendants, McCormick recruited Shibley, a seasoned CIO lawyer,
to join the defense. Because Chepe Ruiz was a Mexican national, the
Mexican consulate retained attorney Benjamin Van Tress, who worked
closely with Shibley (McGrath 1987, 111). Convinced that the conduct
of Judge Fricke blatantly biased the jury against the defendants and that
the lawyers of individual defendants undermined the collective defense,
Shibley, with the aid of Van Tress, adopted the strategy of entering into
the court record legal objections to serve as the basis for an appeal of the
expected guilty verdicts.9
Formation of the CCDMAY
As the trial was underway, the ad hoc committee of the ILD formalized
itself into the Citizens’ Committee for the Defense of Mexican-American
Youth (CCDMAY). To pay for the legal services of Shibley and related
expenses, the committee continued to publicize the case and raise funds.
Having worked closely with El Congreso Nacional del Pueblo de Habla
Española and other progressives in Los Angeles, McCormick ably called
40
The Defense Committees of Sleepy Lagoon
upon her network of allies. This brought much-needed backing from
union and political activists such as Bert Corona, Josefina Fierro de
Bright, and, after the trial, Carey McWilliams, who became chair of the
SLDC. Meanwhile, Lupe Leyvas, the mother of Hank, contacted Trini
Quinn, the mother of the Mexican-born Hollywood film actor Anthony
Quinn. Leyvas had aided the Quinn family decades earlier as they trekked
across the border from Chihuahua to escape the ravages of the Mexican
Revolution (Quinn 2003, 82).
A different narrative is advanced by Bert Corona, who contends that
Fierro de Bright, as a leader of El Congreso, created the SLDC. Corona
conflates, as does McCormick, the role of the CCDMAY and the SLDC
(Corona 1983, 16; Mario García 1989, 171, and 1994, 114–15). But the
CCDMAY existed primarily during the trial, whereas the SLDC worked to
finance the appeal to the Second District Court. These points are significant
for several reasons. First, they highlight two distinct phases of the Sleepy
Lagoon case: the trial, and the appeal. Second, each phase illustrates the
shifting roles of people involved within and outside these committees.
Third, Alice Greenfield McGrath—probably the only remaining living
member of the SLDC—identifies McCormick as the one who initiated the
CCDMAY committee by way of the ad hoc committee of the ILD, thereby
contradicting Corona’s account (McGrath 1987, 107). With this in mind,
the best estimation that can be made is that various aspects of an intricate
social network in Southern California converged at the start of the trial
phase of the Sleepy Lagoon case.
In mid-1942, however, progressive and leftist organizations such as the
ILD, the Communist Party, and El Congreso found themselves paralyzed
by indecision. The dilemma they faced pertained to whether and how
they would maintain an aggressive critique of the abuses of capitalism and
racism in the United States during an era that demanded wartime unity,
especially in light of early Axis victories in Europe and Asia. El Congreso,
in particular, lost its vitality as a result of a split among its members
over these questions. Moderate members of the organization wanted to
emphasize wartime unity and downplay criticism of the status quo, while
the more militant sought to continue advocating for the guarantee of
civil rights (McCormick 1976, 55–58; Healey and Isserman 1995, 85–86;
Mario García 1989, 170).
During El Congreso’s waning days, general secretary Fierro de Bright
transferred her energies to supporting the CCDMAY. Fierro de Bright was
charismatic and imbued with the radical spirit of her parents, who were
41
Barajas
products of Mexico’s Revolution and adherents of the ideals of Mexican
anarchist Ricardo Flores Magón. She worked tirelessly on behalf of the
underdog, raising funds in the entertainment industry for the legal defense of
the youths on trial. Her husband, John Bright, a Hollywood screenwriter and
member of the Council of Pan American Democracies, provided sympathetic
contacts with deep pockets. Consciously or unconsciously, in speeches before
audiences and on radio programs, Fierro de Bright linked the persecution of
the Sleepy Lagoon defendants to a Sinarquista fifth-column plot to promote
racial disunity in the nation. This shielded the committee from accusations
of being unpatriotic during a time of war (Marez 2004, 62–65).10
Early on, Bert Corona of the CIO-affiliated International Longshoremen's and Warehousemen’s Union, editor Charlotta Bass of the
California Eagle newspaper, and Gray Bemis of the International Workers
Order (IWO), as well as other activists and organizers, joined the efforts
of the CCDMAY. The fundamental involvement of Luisa Moreno with
the committees of Sleepy Lagoon was adamantly argued by Corona (1983,
16), and the subsequent perspective of Broyles-González (1994, 201–2)
is largely based on his account. Corona held that Moreno, of the CIOaffiliated United Cannery, Agriculture, Packing and Allied Workers of
America (UCAPAWA), was closely engaged in the cause, and he lamented
Luis Valdez’s decision not to centralize either Moreno or Fierro de Bright
in the production of Zoot Suit. The archival record, however, does not
support Corona’s perspective. As historian Vicki Ruiz has recently posited
(2004, 12–18), although Moreno spoke on behalf of the Sleepy Lagoon
defendants at union locals to help finance the legal expenses, she was not
closely involved with the CCDMAY or the SLDC.
In an October 21, 1942, document signed by Bemis, the CCDMAY
detailed its objectives. The committee, first and foremost, sought legal
justice, and announced the arrangement of “adequate and competent”
legal representation for the youths. Responding to the commercial press’s
stereotyping of the Mexican community as predisposed to criminality, the
CCDMAY also made the mobilization of “popular sentiment” one of its
primary objectives, using the newspapers, public meetings, leaflets, and
the radio for this purpose. Although the documents speak generally about
systemic problems affecting youths of Mexican origin, the CCDMAY
tailored its language to suit the immediate challenges facing the Sleepy
Lagoon defendants. A second tier of objectives called for improving the
social and economic condition of the Mexican community as a whole, as
well as combating any influence on the part of fifth-column agents.11
42
The Defense Committees of Sleepy Lagoon
Community Reluctance
As the Left in Los Angeles mustered forces, family members of the defendants took part by sponsoring their own fundraising events. Community
networks were called upon for assistance. Parents of the defendants reached
out to Fierro de Bright and other members of El Congreso for support
(Acuña 2004b, 249; Mario García 1989, 171). However, a large segment
of the Mexican community did not initially support the activities of the
families and the CCDMAY. There were several reasons for this.
First, the Mexican community was vulnerable to vicious reprisals by
government agencies. The deportation campaigns that ravaged Los Angeles
profoundly intimidated this population, as city officials intended. Although
the detention and interrogation of thousands took place within a brief
period in 1931, Mexicans endured continuous harassment from immigration
officials throughout the Great Depression years. During seasonal agricultural
migrations, Mexicans also witnessed, if they did not experience firsthand,
the harassment of labor protestors by law enforcement agencies throughout the state. In fact, before the Sleepy Lagoon trial, the ILD devoted a
large portion of its time and resources to representing Mexicans who had
been jailed for protesting working conditions and were facing deportation
(Escobar 1999, 85–88; Gutíerrez 1995, 72, 126; Hoffman 1974, 43–59;
McCormick 1976, 17–18, 35, 38, 87; Monroy 1995, 149).
Anthony Quinn’s initial response to his mother’s entreaties to assist
Hank Leyvas and the other defendants illustrates the deep-seated fear of
government institutions that Mexicans had collectively internalized. Quinn
understood that his association with the CCDMAY, correctly considered
by many as an organization with links to the Communist Party, had the
potential to jeopardize not only his acting career but also his residency in
the country. To his mother’s persistent pleas to aid Hank and the other
defendants, Quinn responded, “Mama, I can’t become involved in a murder
case. Jeez, you’ve read the papers. Everybody who has come to the defense
of the kids is being called a Communist. That’s all I would need. Mama, we
could be run out of the country!” (2003, 83). However, after being reminded
of the assistance that the Leyvas family had provided them during their trip
to the United States, Quinn gave in to his mother’s wishes.
Second, the Mexican community of Los Angeles as a whole, like many
immigrant communities, was conservative. They hesitated to advocate on
behalf of youths perceived as pochos (culturally adulterated Mexicans)
and pachucos (gangster youth). Many parents of the emerging Mexican
American generation viewed the pachucos as troublemaking mechudos vagos
43
Barajas
(long-haired bums) who sullied the community’s reputation (Acuña 2004a;
Matt Garcia 2001, 182, 225, 230; Ruiz 2004, 17). In a letter to Los Angeles
attorney Manuel Ruiz, a person identified only as Johnny, stationed at the
Victorville Army Flying School in California, described the defendants as
“god-damn Mexican punks.”12 His comment was typical of others.
Third, the local parish priest’s denunciation of the work of the committees influenced public opinion, as did the tepid, if not oppositional, early
reporting of La Opinión, the Spanish-language daily in Los Angeles. Both
did much to make the local Mexican community in the beginning highly
unsympathetic to the defendants and even less supportive of white progressives working on their behalf (Escobar 1999, 277). For all these reasons,
many Mexicans in Los Angeles looked upon the work of the CCDMAY
and SLDC with suspicion, if not distrust (Endore 1964, 167).
Bridging the Gulf
Even so, among the defendants’ families were some who supported the
efforts of the activists. In a 1987 oral history, Alice Greenfield (whose
surname after remarriage changed to McGrath), recalled: “I would say
that . . . the responses of the families were pretty much like the responses
of the defendants themselves, all the way from enthusiastic participation
and down to rather, maybe, suspicious, bare acceptance of our presence and
our work” (McGrath 1987, 172). Eventually, the integrated efforts of some
Sleepy Lagoon family members, CIO labor organizers (particularly those of
Mexican origin), and the International Workers Order (IWO) to support
the cause of the CCDMAY and, later, the SLDC did much to breach the
chasm of alienation and suspicion.
The successful bridging of the gulf that existed between the larger
Mexican community and that of the Sleepy Lagoon defendants highlights
the tremendous strategies of inclusion deployed by the impassioned activists. They overcame an array of obstacles—the unpopularity of criticizing
the actions of law enforcement agencies during a “good” war, language
barriers, and the varying political and ideological temperaments of people
not only in the Los Angeles region but throughout the nation. Spanishspeaking activists and labor organizers such as Bert Corona, Frank Corona
(a youth member of the ILD), Lupe Leyvas (the daughter of Mrs. Leyvas
and younger sister of Hank), and Margaret Telles informed people in and
out of the Mexican community about the central issue of the case—the
denial of legal justice to the boys (Leonard 2001, 319).
44
The Defense Committees of Sleepy Lagoon
A key element, however, was the focus on purported outside agitation.
Early in the trial, McCormick rallied supporters by arguing that a fascist
conspiracy of “sinister fifth-column Falangist elements” inside the United
States had instigated Mexican youth delinquency and gang activity.13 Fierro
de Bright, the general secretary of El Congreso, claimed that an American
fifth column was recruiting disaffected Mexicans. Fusing the racism experienced by the Mexican community with the supposed influence of fascist
agents, Fierro de Bright argued that the failure of the U.S. government to
provide wartime employment made the Mexican community all the more
susceptible to a Sinarquista fifth column.14
The need to increase job opportunities for the Mexican community
had been a central focus of Fierro de Bright and allies on the Left in Los
Angeles even before the events of Sleepy Lagoon. As early as April 1942,
El Congreso organized a Victory Program Committee founded on this
principle.15 Indeed, Fierro de Bright, as well as others supporting the cause of
Sleepy Lagoon, linked the fifth-column specter of the Sinarquistas infiltrating the Mexican community with racist government policies in housing,
recreation, and employment.16 Indeed, the Nazis’ rise to power in Germany
framed the worldview of both Sleepy Lagoon committees. Committee leaders arguably drew excessively close parallels between events in Germany
and those in the United States. For example, in April 1943 the CCDMAY
sent out a mailing appealing for financial support in which it stated:
Hitler, too, began his attack against the people of Germany by first
attacking the minorities. It wasn’t long after his success in whipping up
disunity among the various groups that he was able to destroy them all.
We have seen Hitler work too often in too many places not to recognize
the vicious fascist rattle when we hear it in our own midst. Nor indeed,
was it just by chance that the axis radio harped upon the outcome of
this trial for days on end as an example of “democratic justice” and our
“Good Neighbor Policy.”17
After the trial, the CCDMAY sponsored a conference on March
14, 1943, protesting the miscarriage of justice. The IWO sent a telegram
pledging its continued support. Mexican consul Alfredo Calles referred to
the importance of the two nations’ commitment to the Good Neighbor
Policy. Ignacio López, representing the Office of the Coordinator of InterAmerican Affairs, in a measured approach indicated that he was at the
conference to learn the facts of the case. Bently Strather of the committees
for Negro Victory and Civil Liberties promoted the idea of interracial unity
during the war. McWilliams, however, took a more critical posture. He
45
Barajas
denounced the Sleepy Lagoon trial and the sensational newspaper coverage
of Mexican youths in general (“marking them as Zoot Suiters and killers”),
and equated this persecution with the “hate the Japanese campaign” that
was rampant up and down the West Coast. Reactionary forces, he argued,
sought to divide the nation in order to advance fascist objectives.18
Not discouraged by the outcome of the trial, the CCDMAY stepped up
its public relations campaign, announcing in English and Spanish that “WE
HAVE JUST BEGUN TO FIGHT!” The committee emphasized that it
was “composed of leading members of the community” committed to social
justice and harmony.19 This, along with the emphasis on the Sinarquista
fifth column, was to done to guard the committee from being targeted as
an unpatriotic Communist front.
The Sleepy Lagoon Defense Committee
and the Fascist Foil
To broaden the effectiveness of their public relations campaign, at the
March 1943 conference the attendees agreed to rename the CCDMAY as
the Sleepy Lagoon Defense Committee. Joe Marty of the United Electrical
and Machine Workers of America initially served as its national chairman.
Shortly thereafter, McWilliams succeeded him. His prominence attracted
other well-known figures, including academics, attorneys, artists, and
business people.
Strategically, the SLDC continued to emphasize the fifth-column
conspiracy thesis. A 1943 pamphlet entitled The Sleepy Lagoon Case singled
out the Hearst newspapers and the Los Angeles Times as “the defeatist
press.” In addition, it claimed that “native American fascists” or fascist
sympathizers in the nation were working with a “fascist-minded police
force” to incite “pogroms” against the Mexican community. The explicit
reference to fascism of the Nazi variety and to Czarist Russia’s persecution
of Jews during the late nineteenth century distracted the national audience
from the zoot-suit gangsterism and hoodlumism played up by the Hearst
papers and the Los Angeles Times. The pamphlet promoted the notion of an
international fascist threat to American democracy to garner widespread
support from diverse communities and organized labor. It went on to
contend that a struggle for legal justice on behalf of the Sleepy Lagoon
appellants would strike a blow against Adolf Hitler and his domestic
agents—the latter allegedly consisting of Los Angeles County Sheriff
Eugene Biscailuz, Deputy Sheriff Lieutenant Edward Duran Ayres (author
46
The Defense Committees of Sleepy Lagoon
of the infamous report to the Sleepy Lagoon grand jury proposing that
Mexicans held a genetic propensity to engage in bloodletting violence),
and the Hearst press.20 In soliciting financial support for the legal appeal,
Marty forebodingly wrote:
As a leader of a minority group which itself is suffering persecution
throughout Nazi-held Europe, may we ask that you consider for a moment
in which respect the recent riots against our Mexican youth is different
from Nazi pogroms against Jews. . . . If this is permitted to go on unchallenged, how long will it take before 5th columnists in our midst will follow
up these attacks with equal vicious attacks upon the Jews.21
As the new national chairman of the SLDC, McWilliams stressed an
additional point concerning the possible fate of organized labor. McWilliams
brought home the events of Europe by reminding union leaders and their
rank-and-file that Hitler had not only attacked the Jewish minority but
had also viciously eliminated trade unionists. He convincingly argued that
once fascist forces in the United States finished targeting Mexican youths,
labor unions would be next.22 In contending that Axis agents and their
“followers” promoted racist practices in the nation, McWilliams echoed
the central message of The Sleepy Lagoon Case and a subsequent pamphlet,
The Sleepy Lagoon Mystery, written by screenwriter and Communist Party
member Guy Endore. Whereas McWilliams was vague about the “followers,” Endore singled out William Randolph Hearst as the domestic stooge of
Hitler.23 Because gaining broad-based support among diverse communities
was the objective, it is important to recognize the achievement of the SLDC
in convincing the Hispanic American section of the ILD in New York to
publish a Spanish-language edition of The Sleepy Lagoon Mystery titled
Conspiración Racial al Descubierto en el Caso de la “Laguna del Sueño.”
The emphasis on a fascist fifth column in the United States and
specifically on Mexican Sinarquistas in Los Angeles stemmed from the
shared experiences of the Communist Party, labor organizers, and lawyers
and writers of the Left such as Endore, McCormick, and McWilliams. They
witnessed and wrote of integrated fascist-like practices by law enforcement, the press, and business interests. Both Endore and McCormick, as
active and informed members of the Communist Party, were aware of, if
they had not personally experienced, the fierce repression that organized
labor faced regularly. The ILD, a cognate of the Communist Party headed
by McCormick on the West Coast, had a long history in California of
championing the civil liberties of labor organizations such as the California
47
Barajas
Agricultural Workers Industrial Union. It played a role in supporting strikes
in Southern California and the Central Valley throughout the 1930s
(McCormick 1976, 33, 45–46; Healey and Isserman 1995, 68; Barajas 2004,
44–50; Weber 1994, 182). McWilliams published the seminal Factories in the
Field in 1939, documenting how the agricultural industry, working hand in
hand with law enforcement agencies, had used the intimidation of workers
and manipulation of the press to trample on constitutional civil liberties.
Brilliantly, McWilliams termed this exercise of power “farm fascism.” Other
writers, if not utilizing the same language, vividly described analogous
practices in California. John Steinbeck’s In Dubious Battle (1936) and The
Grapes of Wrath (1939) and Carlos Bulosan’s America Is in the Heart (1943)
are examples of literature that affected the nation’s conscience.
The fascism described in the pamphlets and letters of the two Sleepy
Lagoon committees thus played a critical role in shaping the world view
of labor and political activists. The servicemen’s riots that erupted in the
summer of 1943 and the sensationalized reporting of the Hearst newspapers
and the Los Angeles Times validated the views expressed in the pamphlets
and also brought home the atrocities committed by the Axis powers in
Europe. To be sure, Endore and his circle of Communist Party members
felt a genuine urgency that “Hitlerites” in the nation were advancing
(Endore 1964, 227). With each edition and Spanish-language translation
of The Sleepy Lagoon Case and The Sleepy Lagoon Mystery—which sold
approximately 30,000 and 50,000 copies, respectively—both national
and transnational support expanded for the appellants. And through the
diligent personal correspondence of Greenfield, Vicente Peralta C., the
Mexican consul general in Los Angeles, closely monitored the progress of
the case.24 Furthermore, the weekly Hoy in Mexico published The Sleepy
Lagoon Mystery as a series.25 In fact, after reading The Sleepy Lagoon Mystery,
former president of Mexico Lazaro Cardenas addressed McWilliams and
commended the SLDC, stating, “I have read this booklet with great interest
and wish to congratulate you and all other members of your committee for
your great spirit of justice which has led you to enter into a campaign in
defense of the seventeen boys of Mexican extraction.”26
La Comunidad de Sleepy Lagoon
Although a core group of individuals within both the CCDMAY and
the SLDC spearheaded the campaign for legal justice, mobilizing a wideranging, grassroots movement, many individuals and groups within the
48
The Defense Committees of Sleepy Lagoon
Mexican community worked independently for the cause. The appellants’
family members, especially, became tremendously active, promoting public
awareness and raising funds for the legal defense. Recognizing the energy
and importance of tapping into the resources of the Mexican community,
the SLDC welcomed the assistance of Hank’s younger sister, Lupe Leyvas.
She accompanied members of the SLDC along with Orson Welles and
Rita Hayworth to the homes of people hosting fundraising events, among
them Ira Gershwin. Speaking before studio actors, executives, and writers, Lupe charmed audiences, helping raise hundreds of dollars at each
function. Lupe also attended committee meetings and sold copies of The
Sleepy Lagoon Mystery.27
Furthermore, Margaret Telles advised the Youth Committee for the
Defense of Mexican American Youth in its fundraising activities, and she
became involved in a parents’ committee that was formed. Bilingual in
English and Spanish, Telles spoke before diverse audiences while traveling
through the state promoting awareness and raising money for the appeal.
Locally, Telles also sold copies of The Sleepy Lagoon Mystery.28
Through their public activism, Lupe Leyvas and Margaret Telles made
critical contributions on behalf of their brother and son, respectively.
By taking on such a public role, they effectively breached the gendered
cultural restrictions that confined women to the domestic sphere. Perhaps
the transgression of such limiting roles, particularly for women of Mexican
origin, was mitigated by the fact that they worked tirelessly and openly
on behalf of male family members during a wartime period that required
women in general to participate in the public sphere more than before.
Apparently, not being primary household wage earners also allowed women
like Leyvas, Telles, and Greenfield to work on behalf of the young men
of Sleepy Lagoon.
The power of Endore’s pamphlet in broadening the movement cannot
be overstated, for it also recruited the support of people with no direct ties
to the case. For instance, in 1943 Eliseo Hernández walked into the office
of the SLDC in downtown Los Angeles and offered to sell copies of The
Sleepy Lagoon Mystery in the shipyards. When Hernández returned for more
copies to sell, Greenfield asked him to whom he sold the first set of 140
pamphlets. Hernández replied:
Mostly I’ve been selling them to Mexican people. They are very glad to
get it. A lot of them are learning for the first time what the Sleepy Lagoon
case means to them. They are learning the real meaning of the newspaper
lies and of the riots. Once the Mexican people know that, they are that
49
Barajas
much better prepared to unite and fight the fifth column. And the Sleepy
Lagoon case is a good place to start.29
In its constant effort to reach out to and win the support of the larger
Mexican community, the SLDC nurtured relationships with editors of the
Spanish-language press and regularly sent out news releases for publication in Los Angeles’s La Opinión and El Pueblo, New York City’s Pueblos
Hispanos, and Mexico’s Hoy. The SLDC capitalized on the invaluable skills
of persons fluent in the writing and editing of Spanish to effectively relate
the circumstances surrounding the case to Spanish-speaking audiences.30
Indeed, the ledger of accounts and expenses of the SLDC indicates that
two Spanish-surnamed women, Maria Lerma and Adelina Olguin, were
paid employees at one time or another. Persons with non-Spanish surnames
employed intermittently in the SLDC office included the experienced office
manager Bertha Marshall as well as Florence Fletcher, Alice Greenfield,
Bella Joseph, Jean Socis, and Florence Wolchak.31 The performance of
clerical work by female staffers exclusively reflects the relegation of women
to low-status positions during this period. The ledger of accounts does not
indicate any man being on the defense committee’s payroll.
The employment of Lerma and Olguin on the SLDC resulted from
a concerted effort to find individuals who were not only bilingual and
biliterate, but also effective office staff. In its recruitment, the committee, particularly executive secretary Greenfield, called upon employment
agencies and placed advertisements in newspapers. Relatively few Mexican
women had the required skills, however, and the import/export industry
employed many of those who did. Lerma, who translated many of the
committee’s communications into Spanish, bitterly expressed to Greenfield
how the schools tracked Mexican students into shop and home economics
courses, limiting career opportunities outside of domestic service and vocational work. After Lerma persistently petitioned for admittance to a typing
course, a teacher admonished her, “No one will hire you, you’re a Mexican.
Learn something that you can do in your own neighborhood, hairdressing
or housekeeping or something” (McGrath 1987, 236). Undeterred, Lerma
obtained the clerical training that ultimately served the interests of the
Sleepy Lagoon youths so well.
Beyond the inner circle of the SLDC, people and organizations of
diverse origins, from near and far, contributed to the cause célèbre, particularly after the publication of The Sleepy Lagoon Mystery. A review of the
ledger of accounts and expenses reveals the committed work of ordinary
people and groups as well as better-known figures. Some of the unions
50
The Defense Committees of Sleepy Lagoon
that contributed were the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, locals
of the International Longshoremen’s and Warehousemen’s Union, the
United Auto Workers, and numerous other CIO affiliates. As the SLDC
centralized its public relations and fundraising campaign through letters
to unions, progressive organizations, government agencies, churches and
synagogues, and the media, individuals created independent cells of support that transcended race and ethnicity. For example, Anya Goldberg of
West Los Angeles immersed herself in raising funds for the appeal of the
case by organizing functions in the Jewish community and in Hollywood
circles (McGrath 1987, 222). Archival records indicate that during the
appeal phase of the case alone, Goldberg made regular contributions—one
lump sum exceeding $1,000. Adjusted for inflation, this gift would be
worth around $11,000 today. Similarly, throughout the nation, individuals
organized social events and ordered and sold copies of The Sleepy Lagoon
Mystery, creating a chain reaction of interest and support.32
The Communist Party contributed over $1,000, as did several
branches of the International Workers Order, including the Knitting
Circle, the Croatian Lodge, and the Chapultepec Lodge. Considering that
Los Angeles was an open-shop city with a history of repression toward
unions, the Communist Party, the IWO, and CIO apparently understood
that an injustice to the youths of Sleepy Lagoon would lead to injustices
against organized labor. As in Pennsylvania, IWO lodges served as sanctuaries for CIO organizers (many of them Communist Party members),
sheltering them from the brutality of law enforcement and the hired guards
of Los Angeles employers. The records make clear the early and continuous
involvement of Gray Bemis, secretary of the Southern California section
of the IWO, with the Sleepy Lagoon case, as well as the contribution of
monies by the Mexican Chapultepec branch of the IWO and the essential
work of Frank Corona, first a member of the ILD and subsequently a leader
of the IWO in Los Angeles.33
During the first half of the twentieth century, the Communist Party
sought to broaden its support among racial minorities by championing the
civil rights of blacks, most prominently in the Scottsboro case of 1931.
Communists pointed to the similarities between the Scottsboro case (in
which it was involved, along with the ILD) and the case of Sleepy Lagoon.
In fact, Michael Denning, professor of American studies, states that
Sleepy Lagoon “galvanized the California Popular Front” and “became the
West Coast equivalent of Scottsboro” (1996, 18). The Communist Party
also sought to promote interracial cooperation by linking the injustices
51
Barajas
experienced by different ethnic and racial groups. This, particularly,
explains the constant reference to a fascist fifth column and the specter of
Sinarquistas in the midst of the nation. To advance working-class solidarity,
the Communist Party spearheaded the creation of IWO branches, first in
Pennsylvania steel mill towns with large Eastern and Southern European
communities and later in Los Angeles. In Los Angeles, the IWO created
a significant Jewish lodge as well as other ethnic sections (Keeran 1989,
385–89). With Nazi Germany’s blitzkrieg through Europe during World
War II, it is little wonder that the sophisticated and steady public relations
campaign of the two committees and, above all, of Endore emphasizing a
fascist threat resonated so well with the IWO.34
The successful fundraising was vitally important in financing the legal
appeal of the verdicts. The appeal was headed by skilled attorney Ben
Margolis, who prepared a 500-page brief in November 1943 and made oral
arguments before the Second District Court of Appeals in September of
the following year.
The efforts of individuals and grassroots organizations on behalf of the
appellants, however, did not result only in monetary contributions. Much of
the committee’s work involved speaking to groups and contacting influential leaders to gain broad-based political support for the ongoing appeal. In
April 1944, for example, Gabriel Navarro, editor of the Spanish-language
newspaper El Pueblo, spoke to a group of 300 at a church in the Palo Verde
barrio located at Chavez Ravine (today the site of the Los Angeles Dodgers
stadium). After the informational meeting, Reverend Joseph Gutíerrez
issued a telegram on behalf of the group to California attorney general
Robert Kenny, requesting that he ensure that the appellants received
justice. Gutíerrez eloquently wrote:
We 300 residents of Palo Verde convened at El Santo Niño Church . . .
resolved that you the Attorney General of the State of California personally investigate and take charge of the Sleepy Lagoon Case. . . . We are
confident that an examination of these essential facts of this case will
convince you, as one who has always opposed racial discrimination that
the convictions in this case are indefensible, unsupported by the evidence,
and in violation of the defendants’ constitutional rights, and will prompt
you to take decisive action to assure a reversal of these judgments.35
Individual residents of Palo Verde also sent letters to Attorney General
Kenny, expressing their concerns about unequal justice before the law.
Carmen Gilbuena, for example, wrote, “We can never forget what has been
done to them. We expect to be shown that justice is not just another word
52
The Defense Committees of Sleepy Lagoon
in the dictionary.” The entreaties of people like Gutíerrez and Gilbuena
were buttressed by those of well-known personalities such as film actress
Rita Hayworth, who requested a meeting with Kenny along with other
“people concerned in the Sleepy Lagoon case.”36
Building upon the nationwide momentum of this cause, the SLDC
circulated petitions to be sent to Kenny as well as to California governor
Earl Warren. Like the various pamphlets, circulation of the petitions helped
promote public awareness. Las Madres del Soldado Hispano-Americano,
the United Fish Cannery Workers of UCAPAWA, and Japanese American
citizens interned at Manzanar signed the petitions calling for justice for
the Sleepy Lagoon appellants. Greenfield collected and tallied over 10,000
signatures and sent them on to Kenny. Although the petitions were being
sent to a person already sympathetic to the case of the youths, signing
them allowed people in and out of Los Angeles the sense that they were
contributing to the youths’ eventual release.37
“First Lady of Our Cause”
While a bevy of independent groups throughout the nation worked on
behalf of the appellants of Sleepy Lagoon, Alice Greenfield earnestly communicated with the young men. Approximately every six weeks, she visited
them at San Quentin prison. Prison administrators allowed Greenfield to
meet the twelve inmates individually and as a group, a privilege usually
reserved for family and lawyers.
At the time she became involved with the case in 1942, Greenfield was
twenty-three years old and married. Committed to the ideals of social justice
and racial equality, she was attracted to the CIO’s philosophy of multiracial
labor unionism and aspired to becoming an organizer. With the encouragement of Bill Elconin, Greenfield had worked as a volunteer with the local
United Electrical, Radio, and Machine Workers of America to emphasize
among its members the importance of creating cross-cultural coalitions.
During the early weeks of the Sleepy Lagoon trial, Greenfield contracted
pleurisy, a lung infection that was considered life-threatening in the era
before penicillin. While she was recuperating at home, lawyer George Shibley
(whom she had come to know through the CIO) visited her and asked if
she would summarize the daily court transcript of the trial. As she read the
proceedings, Greenfield became outraged. The defendants were being tried en
masse, without being allowed to consult with their lawyers. Judge Charles W.
Fricke treated their defense counsel with contempt and disrespect, especially
53
Barajas
Shibley (McGrath 1987, 109–14). In anticipation of the guilty verdicts,
Shibley made motions, objections, and assignments of judicial misconduct
to serve as the record for an appeal (McGrath 2004). Although Shibley and
others on the defense team believed that the outcome of the trial would not
be favorable, the severity of the verdicts was a surprise.
Minutes after the reading of the sentences, Shibley took Greenfield to
the jail to meet the young men. Recalling that meeting in an interview sixty
years later, Greenfield stated, “I decided at that moment to stay with the
case for as long as it lasted. It was a promise” (McGrath 2004). Greenfield
then spoke to McCormick, offering herself as a full-time volunteer. As
the movement to raise public awareness and funds for the appeal gained
momentum, Greenfield initiated and wrote the biweekly Appeal News
that was sent to the appellants in San Quentin to keep them informed
of the committee’s activities and the growing support from people in
Los Angeles and throughout the country and the world. The newsletter
detailed the grassroots participation of students, professors, and elected
officials such as Augustus Hawkins of the 62nd District of the California
Legislature. Greenfield also recognized the assistance of unions such as the
Ship Scalers and Painters Local of the International Longshoremen’s and
Warehousemen’s Union and the Clay Workers. And she documented the
volunteerism of people literally off the street, who worked at the SLDC
office in downtown Los Angeles and pounded the streets of the city distributing thousands of informational leaflets and selling copies of The Sleepy
Lagoon Mystery (McGrath 2004).38
Greenfield also found the time and energy to visit the young women
at the Ventura School for Girls. She lamented the deplorable conditions
and humiliation that they had to endure at this California Youth Authority
facility, which stood in stark contrast to the experience of the young men
of Sleepy Lagoon imprisoned at San Quentin. Officials had convinced
the parents of these young women to consent to their institutionalization
as a means to insulate their daughters from the influences of the streets.
Essentially, Barrios, Encinas, Gonzales, and Zeiss, along with Bertha
Aguilar, Josephine Gonzales, and Lupe Ynostroza, found themselves wards
of the state because of their mere association with the young men of Sleepy
Lagoon. Furthermore, the parental permission given to authorities coupled
with the absence of a legal process to challenge the incarceration of the
women at the Ventura School meant that the SLDC had no process to
obtain their release. Some, in fact, did not leave the facility until well
after the release of their male counterparts from San Quentin. Even when
54
The Defense Committees of Sleepy Lagoon
released, they continued to be wards of the California Youth Authority,
on parole until their twenty-first birthday (McGrath 1987, 140–42, and
2005; Escobedo 2004, 67–69).
In addition to detailing the activities of people from all walks of life
who worked for the cause of Sleepy Lagoon, Greenfield’s Appeal News
reveals the extent of her personal involvement. Beyond her earnest dedication as both a volunteer and the paid executive secretary of the SLDC,
Greenfield developed an intimate friendship with the imprisoned young
men, becoming more closely involved with them than anyone other than
their immediate families. In one edition of the newsletter, Greenfield
conveyed greetings to the prisoners from their friends whom she had met
at the Mexican Youth Club in the Belvedere section of East Los Angeles.
In another, Greenfield reported the rioting of servicemen against people,
for the most part, of Mexican origin in Los Angeles during the summer
of 1943. Greenfield, too, interpreted the riots as part of the work of “proHitler elements” and linked this experience and that of the appellants’
cause with larger national and international events. For example, in the
July 6, 1943, edition of Appeal News, Greenfield reported the attendance
of approximately fifty persons at the last SLDC meeting and interpreted
the motivations behind their actions and her own:
SO it becomes rather obvious that money isn’t the motive behind the
participation of these people. And as for anyone else getting money
secretly, a complete financial record is kept which accounts for every
penny taken in. Receipts are given to donors for even 10c.
WITHOUT going into reams of detail—the simple solution to the whole
thing is that there are people, many people, who have a deep faith in
democracy. There are those who believe that democracy is the property
of all the people. And that belief is not just something they sit around
and talk about. It is strong enough and sincere enough to deserve action
on their part. To fight a war for democracy and not fight for democracy
at home would be ridiculous. To be an ally of Mexico for the defeat of
fascism, and not allow those of Mexican descent a fair trial—is stupid
and vicious and not to be tolerated.
STIRRING up race hatred and prejudice is not confined to action against
any one group. Today it can be Mexicans and Negroes. Tomorrow it can
be Jews. (For them today in Axis countries.) As a Jew I feel that I am
protecting my future by fighting discrimination in any form.39
As a vivacious young woman in her early twenties, only slightly
older than the appellants, Greenfield had a complex relationship with
55
Barajas
the young men that ranged from older sister to romantic girlfriend. In
their letters, they addressed Greenfield as “darling grandmother,” “chick,”
“sugar,” “honey,” and “first lady of our cause.” Because of the various roles
that Greenfield fulfilled, a palpable tension permeates the correspondence
that the appellants sent to her, revealing a relationship with multiple
dimensions and layers. The boys often asked her to send photographs of
herself, as well as of Adelina Olguin, Maria Lerma, and Rita Hayworth.40
Greenfield meanwhile strongly urged them to write the tireless volunteers
such as Guy Endore, Anya Goldberg, and others who devoted so much
energy to securing their release. As
Luis Valdez dramatized in Zoot Suit,
romantic tension characterized
the closeness between Hank and
Alice (and not between Hank and
Luisa Moreno or Josefina Fierro de
Bright, as posited by Bert Corona
and Broyles-González). This is
evident in a Herald Examiner photograph taken at the Los Angeles
Figure 5. From left: Hank Leyvas’s parents, Hall of Justice immediately after
Lupe and Seferino, Hank gazing upon Alice
the release of the youths who
Greenfield in the middle with Gus Zamora, and
Ruth Amparay at the Los Angeles Hall of Justice. remained at San Quentin. Flanked
Herald-Examiner Collection, Los Angeles Public by his parents Seferino and Lupe
Library.
on one end and by Gus Zamora and
Ruth Amparay on the other, Hank embraced Alice, his gaze filled with both
gratitude and desire (fig. 5).41
After the commotion at the Hall of Justice and time spent with family
and friends, Hank Leyvas, Chepe Ruiz, and Bobby Telles visited the office
of SLDC. They inspected the room, imagining the frenetic work done by
the staff and volunteers. The phone rang while they visited, and Greenfield
talked with a person from a CIO radio station and arranged an interview
with the three that evening on the Our Daily Bread program. While on
radio, the three expressed gratitude for the tremendous work done by all,
particularly by organized labor, for their release.42 They were free.
Conclusion
The release of the young men of Sleepy Lagoon from prison in October
1944 resulted from the selfless participation of hundreds if not thousands
56
The Defense Committees of Sleepy Lagoon
of persons throughout the nation and abroad. At the heart of this people’s
movement stood both seasoned and emerging activists and staff, including
Josefina Fierro de Bright, Alice Greenfield, Maria Lerma, Hank Leyvas’s
sister, Lupe, LaRue McCormick, Carey McWilliams, and Margaret Telles.
Shifting gender prescriptions during the World War II era allowed women
to take a central role, working in and out of the defense committee offices
on behalf of the young men of Sleepy Lagoon. The multiple dimensions
of community, class, and race attracted women to this struggle for legal
justice, and their role pierced existing gender barriers. Surely the intrepid
activism that Fierro de Bright and McCormick initiated encouraged
women such as Greenfield, Leyvas, Telles, and many others to participate
and play key roles in the cause.
Collectively, these individuals ably integrated the support of leaders of
diverse communities and industries through their skillful coordination and
promotion of the activities of the ad hoc committee of the International
Labor Defense, the Citizens’ Committee for the Defense of MexicanAmerican Youth, and, ultimately, the Sleepy Lagoon Defense Committee.
Support for the committees widened as the idea of fascist elements in the
United States, seeking to disunite the nation during wartime by promoting
interracial discord, became a central theme of the public relations campaign. The specter of a fascist fifth column in the Sinarquistas seemed very
real to many people sympathetic to the cause of Sleepy Lagoon, especially
to those who had been targeted for persecution due to their affiliation with
organized labor and/or their ethnicity and race. Ultimately, the SLDC
utilized this a priori argument skillfully.
But the mobilization of support was not sustained only by the idea
of a fifth-column threat. Community organization and the promotion of
benefit dances, private parties, and selling of pamphlets all advanced public
awareness. Groups independent of the SLDC held their own events to
collect monies to pay the administrative costs as well as the legal expenses
of the case. Within a nineteen-month period, over $25,000 was raised—an
amount that, adjusted for inflation, would be equivalent to more than a
quarter-million dollars today. Even this monumental amount just covered
expenditures. It did not fully compensate the lawyers, George Shibley
during the trial and Ben Margolis in the appeal, for thousands of dollars’
worth of legal services.43
While fundraising was crucial, equally important was the strategic
manner in which the committees shifted public opinion in favor of a group
of youths previously considered by many people as hoodlums and thugs
57
Barajas
who deserved what they got, so to speak. This was no small achievement
considering the enormous influence of the Hearst press and the Los Angeles
Times and their harping on the gangster theme. And while strategically
referencing the threat of Sinarquistas and fascist sympathizers, the committees effectively and consistently informed the public about the central issue
in the case of Sleepy Lagoon: the right to fair and equal justice before the
law. In this sense the case was much larger than the young men themselves,
most of whom would never win a citizen of the year award in any event. The
issue was not their character, but whether the constitutional protections
of the United States would prevail over blatant injustice during a time of
war against fascism.
Notes
I wish to thank my dear friend Alice McGrath for encouraging me to research the
origins of the Sleepy Lagoon Defense Committee. I am also indebted to Ralph
Armbruster-Sandoval, associate professor in the Chicana and Chicano Studies
Department at the University of California at Santa Barbara, for his critique of
the manuscript; to manuscript librarian Genie Guerard for her assistance at the
UCLA Library’s Department of Special Collections; as well as to the anonymous
peer reviewers for their constructive and encouraging suggestions.
1. Alice Greenfield to Guy Endore, October 25, 1944, box 83, folder 8, S.
Guy Endore Papers, Department of Special Collections, Young Research Library,
University of California, Los Angeles.
2. See, for example, McWilliams (1990, chaps. 12–13), Mazón (1984), Pagán
(2003), Cosgrove (1984, 77–91), Sánchez (1990, 250–63), Sanchez-Tranquilino
(1987, 34–42), and Sanchez-Tranquilino and Tagg (1991, 97–108).
3. People v. Zammora [sic], Crim. 3719, 66 Cal. App. 2d 166 (Oct. 4, 1944).
Available at http://online.ceb.com/calcases/CA2/66CA2d166.htm.
4. “Names, Ages, Verdicts, Sentences and Where Serving (Ages as of Jan.
1943),” box 4, folder 4, Sleepy Lagoon Defense Committee Records, 1942–1945,
Department of Special Collections, Young Research Library, University of
California, Los Angeles (hereafter cited as SLDC Records).
5. Also, the youths of Sleepy Lagoon often referred to themselves as “the
boys.” Correspondence from the boys to Alice Greenfield, 1943, box 4, folder 2,
SLDC Records.
6. See also “Three Teen-Age Girls Held in Boy-Gang Slaying Inquiry,”
Los Angeles Times, August 5, 1942, A12. I would like to thank Elizabeth Rachel
Escobedo for directing me to this article, which lists the ages of some of the young
women implicated in Diaz’s death. Escobedo also informed me that because of the
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The Defense Committees of Sleepy Lagoon
rules of confidentiality of the Los Angeles Juvenile Court, the ages of the other
young women connected to the case are not part of the public record.
7. Minutes, Conference of Citizens’ Committee for the Defense of MexicanAmerican Youth, March 14, 1943, box 3, folder 2, SLDC Records (hereafter cited
as CCDMAY conference minutes).
8. LaRue McCormick form letter, October 16, 1942, box 2, folder 7, SLDC
Records.
9. George E. Shibley to the Los Angeles Times, September 25, 1978, box 28,
folder 25, Bert N. Corona Papers, Stanford University Library.
10. Four speeches by Josefina Fierro de Bright, n.d., box 1, folder 7, SLDC
Records; CCDMAY conference minutes.
11. “Proposed Immediate Objectives of a Mexican Defense Committee,”
October 21, 1942, box 3, folder 2, SLDC Records.
12. T. A. Chacon to Manuel Ruiz, June 8, 1943, box 1, folder 2, and Johnny
to Manuel and Clanelia, mid-June 1943, box 1, folder 3, Manuel Ruiz Papers,
Stanford University.
13. LaRue McCormick form letter, October 16, 1942, box 2, folder 7, SLDC
Records.
14. Valida Davila to Mr. Cullen, November 1, 1942, box 4, folder 4, SLDC
Records; four speeches by Josefina Fierro de Bright.
15. Josefina Fierro de Bright to Manuel Ruiz, April 30, 1942, box 1, folder 3,
Manuel Ruiz Papers.
16. “Trial of Mexican Youths Used as Axis Propaganda,” Los Angeles Times,
November 24, 1942, 1.
17. Letter from Citizens’ Committee for the Defense of Mexican-American
Youth to all CIO locals, April 29, 1943, box 2, folder 11, SLDC Records.
18. CCDMAY conference minutes. Geary (2003) offers an insightful essay
examining McWilliams’s concept of fascism in the United States.
19. “We Have Just Begun to Fight!” n.d., box 2, folder 3, SLDC Records.
20. The Sleepy Lagoon Case, pamphlet, 1943, box 2, folder 3, SLDC
Records.
21. Joe Marty form letter, July 29, 1943, box 2, folder 7, SLDC Records.
22. Carey McWilliams to trade unions, n.d, box 2, folder 7, SLDC Records.
23. The Sleepy Lagoon Mystery, pamphlet, box 2, folder 3, SLDC Records.
Between the publication of The Sleepy Lagoon Case and The Sleepy Lagoon Mystery,
Alice Greenfield wrote “The Sleepy Lagoon Case—Pageant of Prejudice” (box 2,
folder 3, SLDC Records).
24. Correspondence from the Mexican consulate, box 2, folder 10, SLDC
Records.
25. “El Misterio de la Laguna,” Hoy, August–September 1944, box 4, folder
1, SLDC Records.
26. “Defense Praised: General Cardenas Hails Sleepy Lagoon Committee,”
The People’s World (Los Angeles), August 24, 1944 (?), box 83, folder 1, S. Guy
Endore Papers.
27. Appeal News, October 18, 1943, box 2, folder 2, SLDC Records; order file
for Sleepy Lagoon Mystery, box 2, folder 12, SLDC Records; information regarding
59
Barajas
Henry Leyvas, box 4, folder 4, SLDC Records. When Lupe accompanied her father
to the Los Angeles Police station that held her brother, Hank, she immediately
found herself under arrest and placed in jail, an experience that would surely have
politicized her.
28. John M. Clark to Reginald Garcia, box 2, folder 7, SLDC Records; order
file for Sleepy Lagoon Mystery, box 2, folder 12; ledger, box 13, SLDC Records.
29. News release from Alice Greenfield, CCDMAY, July 27, 1943, box 1,
folder 4, SLDC Records.
30. “Informe Rendido por los Ciudadanos del Comite de Defensa de la
Juventud Mexico-Americana,” n.d., and “Decisión importante contribución al
plan del buen vecino,” Straight Wire sent to the Mexican press, October 4, 1944,
box 1, folder 5, SLDC Records.
31. Ledger, box 13, SLDC Records.
32. Ledger, box 13, SLDC Records.
33. Ledger, box 13, SLDC Records; Valida Davila to Mr. Cullen, November
1, 1942, box 4, folder 4, SLDC Records.
34. Appeal News, April 21, 1943, box 2, folder 2, SLDC Records; SLDC form
letter, November 19, 1943, box 2, folder 7, SLDC Records; Valida Davila to Mr.
Cullen, November 1, 1942, box 4, folder 4, SLDC Records.
35. Reverend Joseph Gutíerrez to Attorney General Kenny, telegram, April
18, 1944, box 2, folder 9, SLDC Records.
36. Carmen Gilbuena to Attorney General Kenny, May 9, 1944, and Rita
Hayworth card, box 2, folder 9, SLDC Records.
37. Alice Greenfield to Attorney General Kenny, May 14, 1944, box 2, folder
9, SLDC Records; letter of Robert Galvan to SLDC, July 10, 1944, box 3, folder
3, SLDC Records.
38. Appeal News, April 21, 1943, May 19, 1943, and September 23, 1943, box
2, folders 1 and 2, SLDC Records.
39. Appeal News, July 6, 1943, box 2, folder 2, SLDC Records.
40. Correspondence from the boys to Alice Greenfield, 1943, box 4, folder
2, SLDC Records.
41. “Two youths as they are released from jail and their relatives and friends,”
Los Angeles Herald Examiner photograph, Los Angeles Public Library.
42. Alice Greenfield to Guy Endore, October 25, 1944, box 83, folder 8, S.
Guy Endore Papers, and box 1, folder 4, SLDC Records.
43. Ledger of expenses and donor contributions, October 1943–December
1944, box 13, SLDC Records.
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