Excluding farm workers from overtime was wrong then, it is wrong today
United Farm Workers President Arturo S. Rodriguez issued the following statement from the union’s Keene, Calif. headquarters after it was announced that Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has vetoed SB 1121, by state Sen. Dean Florez (D-Shafter), which would have ended the exclusion of farm workers from receiving overtime pay after eight hours a day or 40 hours a week.
Exclusion of farm workers from the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938, which governs overtime, is part of the shameful legacy of racism that initially targeted the 85 percent of southern African Americans who were farm workers in the 1930s. Today most farm workers are Latinos. Excluding farm workers from overtime was wrong in 1938; it is still wrong today.
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has decided not to end this vestige of a caste system of farm labor that treats California farm workers as if they are not important workers or important human beings.
The only California governor who took the first steps at ending this discrimination against farm workers was Jerry Brown, who in 1976 approved overtime for farm workers after 10 hours a day. Now is the time to end a grievous wrong that can no longer be justified or tolerated.
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