Among poor people, there’s not any question about women being strong—even stronger than men—they work in the fields right along with the men.  When your survival is at stake, you don’t have these questions about yourself like middle class women do.

My mother was a very wonderful woman. When she and my dad divorced, she moved to California and worked two jobs in the cannery at night and as a waitress during the day. But she saved enough money to establish a restaurant.

I think organized labor is a necessary part of democracy. Organized labor is the only way to have fair distribution of wealth.

If you haven’t forgiven yourself something, how can you forgive others.

When you have a conflict, that means that there are truths that have to be addressed on each side of the conflict. And when you have a conflict, then it’s an educational process to try to resolve the conflict. And to resolve that, you have to get people on both sides of the conflict involved so that they can dialogue.

I remember as a little girl going down to the beet fields in the Dakotas and in Nebraska and Wyoming as migrant workers when I was very, very small, like, I was, like, 5 years old, I believe. And I remember going out there, you know, traveling to these states and living in these little tarpaper shacks that they had in Wyoming.

My mother never made me do anything for my brothers, like serve them. I think that’s an important lesson, especially for the Latino culture, because the women are expected to be the ones that serve and cook and whatever. Not in our family. Everybody was equal.

Professional farmworkers who know how to do a number of different jobs, whether it be pruning or picking or grafting, they see themselves as professionals, and they take a lot of pride in that work. They don’t see themselves as doing work that is demeaning.

My mother was a dominant force in our family. And I always saw her as the leader. And that was great for me as a young woman, because I never saw that women had to be dominated by men.

My dad was very intelligent, had a very strong personality. I was amazed with my father.

An Education of the Heart means that the formal education we have the opportunity to receive is to be put to use in service of others, especially those who work with their hands, the people who build the wealth of the nation.  Si se puede!    –Dolores Huerta     4/04/02

Note: Dolores Huerta visited the National Hispanic University to help us celebrate our memorial breakfast for Cesar Chavez.  Afterward, seeing that people went up to speak with her in a friendly manner,  I informed her I was a professor of U.S. History and asked her to write something I could share with my students.  The above is what she wrote—I still have the handwritten copy.   -RR