Another Road to Justice

A new perspective on the farmworker movement that recenters Texas and activist Antonio Orendain.Another Road to Justice chronicles an important yet overlooked chapter in US labor history: the farmworker movement in Texas. Eclipsed by the activities of the United Farm Workers in California during the 1960s through '80s, Texas organizers were, nonetheless, diligent radicals, deeply engaged in consciousness raising, social reform, and labor action.In this engrossing account, Timothy Paul Bowman explores the lives and impact of Texas activists, above all Antonio Orendain—a key figure in the struggle of Mexican and Mexican American workers along the international border in the Lower Rio Grande Valley. A formerly undocumented immigrant who became the leading organizer in the region, Orendain went from Cesar Chavez's righthand man in the UFW to one of his biggest rivals by the middle of the 1970s. Through efforts like the Starr County Strike of 1966–1967 and the 1975 melon strike, Orendain and other workers achieved significant gains. At the same time, tensions between organizers splintered the UFW, leading Orendain to form the Texas Farm Workers Union. Bowman shines light on this history and the often-overlooked activists who earnestly fought to overcome oppression, often at great personal cost.