Brown Berets - Actions

Actions

By September 1968, the Brown Berets became a national organization having opened chapters California, Arizona, Texas, Colorado, New Mexico, Milwaukee, Chicago, Detroit, Minnesota, Ohio, Oregon, and Indiana.

In 1969, Brown Berets Cristo Cebada produced and distributed a newspaper called "La Causa." They also participated in organizing the first free medical clinics and free breakfast programs. Women held an important role in the writing and distribution of "La Causa", but even though this was so, the Brown Berets, as the rest of the Chicano Movement, did not fully take women into strong leadership positions. The jobs assigned to women in the Brown Berets consisted of office type jobs and clerical/secretarial jobs. Sexism within the Brown Berets was evident. Brown Berets saw themselves as liberated men and ignored the women's struggle because they, male Brown Berets, believed that the feminist movement was a white women's movement and that above all, first came the liberation of the La Raza. One female Brown Beret, Grace Reyes, in charge of writing for La Causa, constantly wrote articles about women within the Brown Berets/the Chicano Movement and the sexist attitudes towards them but they were not published and ignored. Most Brown Beret women believed and insisted that a successful revolution "must have full involvement from both Chicanas and Chicanos". Carlos Montes, one of the co-founders, in an interview talks about the lessons learned from the Brown Berets, "Building a mass militant movement to the stop the US war drive, for social change and for revolution is key. Also rebuilding grassroots militant organizations in the community that fight for self-determination, social justice and liberation - not just for reforms. We need an organization that includes the participation of the entire family and that values and promotes the leadership of women."

The Brown Berets also came to be known for their direct action against police brutality. They protested killings and abuses perpetrated by the Los Angeles Sheriff's Department at the station in the barrio. They supported the United Farm Workers movement and the Land Grant Movement in New Mexico. In 1969, they participated in the first Rainbow Coalition (Fred Hampton) which originally included the Young Patriots and the Young Lords under the leadership of Jose Cha Cha Jimenez and in the Poor Peoples Campaign. In 1969, they were invited to be part of the first Chicano Youth Liberation Movement organized by Corky Gonzales in Denver, Colorado.

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

Also in 1970, The Brown Berets de Aztlan and other community activist organizations took over a piece of land in Logan Heights (a community of San Diego) because the city of San Diego wanted to build a California Highway Patrol Sub-Station and the community didn't want that. That little piece of land just under the Coronado Bridge, marked by Chicano graffiti-art on the first bridge pillars, is now called Chicano Park.

In 1972, twenty-six Brown Berets occupied the Santa Catalina Island and claimed it for Mexico. However, by this time, the organization had been weakened by internal conflicts and police and FBI infiltration.