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The Defense Committees of Sleepy Lagoon
A Convergent Struggle against Fascism, 1942-1944
Frank P. Barajas
Aztldn: A Journal of Chicano Studies 31:1 Spring 2006
© University of California Regents
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
34
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, "Donde esta mi
hijo? Donde esta 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-Gonzalez 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 frank.barajas@csuci.edu.
4
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.
36
been the SLDC protagonist in the screenplay rather than Alice Greenfield, a Jewish woman whom Broyles-Gonzalez pointedly labels
a "white savior" (1994, 181-204). Historian Eduardo Obregon Pagan 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-Gonzalez and Pagan, 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
37
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 Jose 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),
7
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
youth-fulness 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 Silva (18)—were arrested as murder
suspects (fig. 3). As juveniles, Barrios and Encinas, along with Juanita "Jenny" Gonzales and Betty Nunez 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; Pagan 2003, 203; Ramirez 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 Party (fig. 4). Since the early 1930s,
McCormick had frequented the courtrooms and jails of Southern
Figure 3. From left: Dora Barrios, Frances Silva, and Lorena Encinas. Herald-Examiner Collection, Los Angeles Public Library.
Figure 4. LaRue McCormick, 1940. Photo from LaRue McCormick (1976), "Activist in the Radical Movement, 1930-1960" (Regional Oral History Office, Bancroft
Library, University of California, Berkeley).
39
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 Espanola (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
40
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 Pagan, 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." Pagan 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 Espanola and other
progressives in Los Angeles, McCormick ably called
41
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 Garcia 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 Garcia 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
42
products of Mexico's Revolution and adherents of the ideals of Mexican anarchist Ricardo Flores Magon. 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-Gonzalez (1994, 201-2) is largely based on his
account. Corona held that Moreno, of the CIO-affiliated 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 2 1 , 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
43
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 (Acuna 2004b, 249; Mario Garcia 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; Gutierrez 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
44
(long-haired bums) who sullied the community's reputation (Acuna 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 Opinion, 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. Spanish-speaking 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).
45
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 Lopez, representing the Office of the Coordinator of Inter-American 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
46
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
47
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
Conspiracion Racial al Descubierto en el Caso de la "Laguna del Sueno."
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
48
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 wide-ranging, grassroots movement, many individuals and groups within the
49
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 Hernandez 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 Hernandez returned for more copies to sell, Greenfield
asked him to whom he sold the first set of 140 pamphlets. Hernandez 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
50
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 Opinion 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 celebre,
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
51
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
52
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 Gutierrez issued a telegram on behalf of the group to California
attorney general Robert Kenny, requesting that he ensure that the appellants received justice. Gutierrez eloquently wrote:
We 300 residents of Palo Verde convened at El Santo Nino 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
53
in the dictionary." The entreaties of people like Gutierrez 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 enmasse, without being allowed to consult with their
lawyers. Judge Charles W.Fricke treated their defense counsel with contempt and disrespect, especially
54
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
55
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 "pro-Hitler 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
25
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-Gonzalez).
This is evident in a Herald Examiner photograph taken at the Los Angeles Hall of Justice immediately after the release of the youths
who remained at San Quentin. Flanked by his parents Seferino and Lupe 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.
Figure 5. From left: Hank Leyvas's parents, Lupe and Seferino, Hank gazing upon Alice Greenfield in the middle with Gus Zamora, and Ruth Amparay at the Los
Angeles Hall of Justice. Herald-Examiner Collection, Los Angeles Public Library.
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
57
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 Mexican-American 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
58
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), Mazon (1984), Pagan (2003), Cosgrove (1984, 77-91), Sanchez (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
59
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 Mexican-American 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
60
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 "Decision importante
contribucion 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 Gutierrez 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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