Adolpho Romo filed suet agency William E Laird and outer trustees of the Tempe elementary school District in Arizona

The action was filed due to Romo’s children and other Mexican-American children being denied admittance into the 10th St school

The Tempe elementary school District had sets aside the inferior 8th St school exclusively for Spanish or Mexican students

Judge Joseph S. Jenckes ruled in favor of Adolpho Romo.

Judge Jenckes found that the teachers employed at the 8th St school were not as qualified and inferior in there ability, compared to the teachers employed at 10th St school.

After the case, Arizona schools continued to segregate students based on whether they spoke Spanish under the ruling of separate but equal.

  In 1925 rural schools served as centers for education, sites of socialization,

and as reflections of the towns' values.   In diverse states, intercultural relations often played out in small town and

country schools.   Segregated schools and classrooms stressed, “Americanization” with

programs that emphasized the use of English and glorification of American values.

  Schools often reflected the fears and racism of the majority population of

Arizona.  Throughout the southwest segregated schools were very common and

children of the Mexican decent attended designated schools which were often inferior facilities.

  At the “Mexican Schools” in Arizona, classes were taught by students from

the nearby teacher’s colleges with the oversight of a college faculty member.

Gonzalo and Felicitas Mendez along with four other Mexican- American families filed a lawsuit in federal court To try end segregation in the United States.

Mendez filed against four Orange County California school districts. El Modena, Garden Grove, Santa Ana, and Westminster

Judge Paul J. MacCormick ruled in favor of Gonzalo Menendez and the four other Mexican families.

After the ruling before school districts appealed but lost their appeal on April 14, 1947.

Only after the school districts failed in their appeal, did they start to desegregate public schools.

8th Street school

Mendez parents

Adult male workers with less than 12 years of education:

Native-Born:1940- 67.3%

Mexican immigrants:1940- 94.6%

Non-Mexican immigrants:

1940- 84.4%

Hispanic dropout rate in the 1940s was estimated at 80 percent.

Adult male workers with less than 12 years of education:

Native-Born: 2000- 8.7%

Mexican immigrants:2000- 63.0%

Non-Mexican immigrants:2000- 17%

In 1997, 25.8 million people were foreign born; this is the highest proportion since the 1930s.

Hispanic people have the highest dropout rate of any ethnic group in the country.

Among 16-24 year olds, Hispanics accounted for 41 percent of all current high school dropouts in 2005. However, they only made up 17 percent of the total youth population.

After the cases:

Mendez vs. Westminster Case -Represented the NAACP when they came along

side the of the Mexican Families after the school district appealed the first ruling on behave of Mendez

-Court again ruled in favor of Mendez a second time

Experienced denied education due to race: -Was not allowed into college at first because he

was blackCivil Rights Lawyer: -Believed all had the rights described in the

Constitution -Won Brown V. Board of EducationFirst African American Supreme Court Justice in 1967Huge impact in the Civil Rights Movement through

defending and upholding Civil Right Issues

On February 19, 1942 President Franklin Delano Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066.

Executive Order 9066 authorized the mass “relocation” – more accurately referred to as the incarceration, the internment and the imprisonment - of over 110,000 Japanese Americans during World War II after the attack on Pearl Harbor the December before.

About 2/3 were American citizens at the time of their internment, and over half that number were children or infants.

The reason for their internment, especially for the larger number of citizens in California, was because there were “suspicions” that some were spies for the Japanese and that some had even helped with the invasion on Pearl Harbor.

The internment of the Japanese was justified by “Military Necessity” which FDR and the FBI swore had nothing to do with any issue of race. 

• Los Angeles had a rise in population in the 1940’s which included: Midwesterners, Mexican refugees, landless white laborers, African Americans from the South.

• Fearful of a West Coast attack up to 50,000 servicemen could be found in L.A. at any given time.

• Jazz was becoming popular with young people, who openly defied segregation by mixing on stage and the on the dance floor. They also defied segregation by the introduction of Zoot suits, because people of color were not suppose to be seen or heard and the suit were load and bold.

• The Mexican Americans came to be associated with crime and gangs by the L.A. authorities.

• Servicemen didn’t like the Mexican Americans mixing with everyone and there were confrontations until a week long fight broke out in June of 1943.

• A sailor grab the arm of a Zoot suit young man which angered the rest of the Mexican Americans, who then attacked the sailor and the rest of the sailors with him.

• As the story grew in size it angered other sailors who then went out and terrorized people in Zoot suits. The harbor patrol picked them up, but the Amory watch commander assumed control and no charges were ever brought about.

• When sailors couldn’t find any Zoot suits they went into Mexican American neighborhoods where the police wouldn’t protect the citizens. The Mexican Americans fought back.

• Many Mexican American’s were arrested and thrown into jail. The servicemen were never arrested for their part in the riots.

• On June 8th military officials declared L.A. off limits to military men and Zoot suits were banned in L.A.

Driscoll, A. (1999). Risk of High School Dropout Among Immigrant and Native Hispanic Youth. International Migration Review, Vol. 33, No. 4 (Winter, 1999), pp. 857-875. Retrieved from JSTOR database.

Jenckes, Joseph S. (2001).Document A:”Findings of Fact and Order”. Retrieved October 6, 2008, from Organization of American Historians, http:/www.oah.org

 

Melcher, M. (1999). “This is not right”: Rural Arizona women challenge segregation and ethnic division, 1925-1950, Retrieved October 14, 2008, from http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qa3687/is_/ai_n8850189

Mendez v. Westminster, 64 F. Supp. 544. Retrieved October 5, 2008, from Learn California, http://www.learncalifornia.org

 

Munoz, L. K. (2001). Spearate But Equal? A Case Study of Romo v. laird and Mexican American Education, Retrieved October 14, 2008, from http://www.oath.org/pubs/magazine/deseg/munoz.html

Schwarz, J. (2002). Mexican Born Teens dropout at higher rates. Retrieved October 14, 2008, from the University of Washington, A newspaper for the faculty and staff of the University of Washington: http://depts.washington.edu/uweek/archives/2002.02.FEB_07/_index.html

Thurgood Marshall, Supreme Court Justice. Retrieved October 14, 2008, from Thurgood Marshall College, http://chnm.gmu.edu/courses/122/hill/marshall.htm 

(2001). People and Events: The Zoot Suit Riots of 1943. PBS October 14, 2008, http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/zoot/eng_peopleevents/e_riots.html

(2002). WWII and Roundup. Retrieved October 15, 2008, from National Asian American Telecommunications Association, http://www.asianamericanmedia.org/jainternment/ww2/eo9066.html

(2004). Westminister School / Seventeenth Street School, Retrieved October 14, 2008, from http://www.nps.gov/history/history/online_books/5views/5views5h99.htm

(2005). The Promise of Brown v. Board of Education. Retrieved October 6, 2008, from Arizona Attorney General Terry Goddard, www.azag.gov

(2006). Thurgood Marshall, Associate Justice, United States Supreme Court. Retrieved October 14, 2008, from Arlington National Cemetery, http://library.thinkquest.org/3337/tmarsh.html

(2007). Mendez v. Westminister Commemorative Stamp, Retrieved October 14, 2008, from http://www.usps.com/communications/newsroom/2007/sr07_038bkgrnd.htm