Posted on 05/07/2002 3:01:35 AM PDT by snopercod
SAN LEANDRO -- Abraham Lincoln may have to forfeit his solo holiday to Cesar Chavez on the San Leandro school calendar.
Beginning next year, Lincoln's holiday may be dropped to honor labor leader Cesar Chavez on his birthday, March 31, pending school board approval. Several board members have already expressed support for the idea.
The San Leandro Teachers Association voted last month to make the change; 65 percent were in favor.
"The diversity of our community is growing, and it looks beautiful and we want to honor our Latino families," said Thomas Morse, political action chairman for the union. "And the other reason, which is very important for union members, is that Cesar Chavez was a labor leader."
Because changing school holidays falls under labor contracts, the district's two other unions, the Classified School Employees Association and the Teamsters/Trade union, need to give support before the board can bump Lincoln.
"We can celebrate his memory when we have Presidents' Day," Morse said, referring to the district's day off on Feb. 18 this year, celebrated as Washington's Holiday.
Hayward schools have holidays for both Chavez's and Lincoln's birthdays. The issue has not yet been seriously discussed in Castro Valley or San Lorenzo.
Sina Fattahy, a member of San Leandro High School's Latinos Unidos club, said he would use a Cesar Chavez holiday to participate in rallies or get together with other Latinos.
"It won't change my opinion about that day and how I feel about it," said the 17-year-old senior. "That day is always a special day for me. It's a day that you feel pride for being Latino. It's a feeling of energy and power."
Though the issue is scheduled for action at the school board's regular meeting Tuesday, it likely will be scratched from the agenda, said Mike Martinez, the district's assistant superintendent for human resources.
Martinez said he is recommending it be removed to give the other unions more time to poll their memberships. Because the district wants to get its calendar out soon, a change to the Chavez holiday may have to wait until 2004.
San Leandro resident Paul Vargas, 33, said he is offended by the proposed change.
"They're taking away Lincoln's birthday. I mean, who do these people think they are? They're trying to rewrite history," said Vargas, who attended San Leandro schools from kindergarten to 12th grade.
Board member Louis Heystek said he came up with the idea after looking at the district's demographics. To the issue of rewriting history, he said, "I would hope that our view of history does not remain stagnant."
Heystek said Chavez has been not only a significant figure in Latino-American history, but in American history overall, for spearheading a movement to unionize workers and leading the United Farm Workers labor rights movement.
"That had an impact for minorities and Americans all over," Heystek said.
Comparing the Klan right after the war and what you see today is like comparing the NAACP of the early 20's with Kweisi Enfume an his bunch a idiots.
Forrest is a hero and more a man than you'd a ever faced.
And billbears: why run off like a scared rat when this puff a hot air tries to wave a gutless race flag? The Klan wasnt right, but nothin was right in those first few years after the war. You know that. We may not a been right in all we done but we did what we thought we had to do.
Anyway, union goons already have their own holiday with Labor Day. And Latinos already have Cinco de Mayo, celebrated in enough communities in California, virtually a state holiday in its own right. And any holiday that celebrates a victory over the French is A-OK in my book. :)
Sleep in; do yardwork; but also do something for your countrymen who are dying and being maimed overseas to protect you.
Why not just celebrate Chavez' memory when we have Labor Day and leave Lincoln alone?
Unlike Lincoln, Chavez also did not bring about or attempt to bring about the death of 600,000 Union folks and Confederates in order to force the latter to remain in the Union in violation of Amendment X of the Constitution. Why choose between them? you can have them both. We also have Martin Luther King Day. We might also want to honor Robert E. Lee, Stonewall Jackson, Jefferson davis, et al. Diversity need not be all left.
Actually, as a southerner, I'd like to see Reagan's face replace Lincoln's face on Mt. Rushmore. But that is just my opinion on it.
But seeing how they'll all big fans of secession-on-demand, any step towards "Arzlan" will have their support.
Hey you should look at your OWN politicians, they are the ones directly and indirectly supporting the creation of "Arzlan". I, as a southerner, just find great humor in the irony of the situation.
Because that won't achieve their objective.
As with JFK and RFK, getting assassinated may be painful but it sure can retroactively sanitize one's reputation and work wonders for your place in history.
Again, why eliminate Lincoln's birthday and replace it with a second Cesar Chavez day?
I have been meaning to ask: Why do you regard yourself as a conservative? Issues and specifics, please. And accomplishments.
Was Sherman/Sheridan's total war against women and children in the war crime known as the March to the sea (which even included the purposeful burning of some of the greatest private libraries of the South whose books would have been welcome in the libraries of Northern Unitarians) justified because they later treated the Plains Indians similarly? Inquiring minds want to know.
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