Important Figures of the East Los Angeles Chicano Moratorium
Rosalio Muñoz was a prominent Chicano journalist and activist. He was born and raised in Los Angeles and became involved in Chicano activism at a very young age. He was anti-war and anti-police, and advocated for Chicanos to resist the Vietnam War draft whenever possible. While in college at UCLA, Muñoz served as the first ever Chicano Student Body President and advocated for rent controlled housing around campus and support for the United Farm Workers organization.
After college, Rosalio Muñoz became the co-chair of the 1970 Chicano Moratorium Committee. Muñoz helped to orchestrate and lead marches and protests all around Los Angeles, including the infamous East LA march that brought together almost 30,000 people of color. This East LA march was one of the largest Mexican-American anti-war demonstrations of all time. Aside from just Mexican-Americans, the march included members of the Young Lords Party, the Puerto Rican Brown Berets, and members from African American civil rights groups in Los Angeles. It began as a peaceful demonstration that was described as boisterous and cheerful by early onlookers, but quickly became violent when the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department arrived and tried to disrupt the march.
Ruben Salazar was a civil rights activist and a reporter for the LA Times. He was born in Mexico but immigrated to the United States with his family when he was one year old. Salazar spent two years after high school fighting in the United States army, before going to college and becoming a reporter. While working for the LA Times, Salazar wrote many articles about the Vietnam War, and also authored pieces about the Chicano communities in East LA. He was very public in his writing and in his everyday life with his support for the Chicano movement and the Chicano community.
On August 29, 1970, Ruben Salazar attended the East LA protest that Rosalio Muñoz had orchestrated. He was attending both as a supporter of the cause and also so he could write an article for the LA Times about the historic protest. Unfortunately, Salazar was killed during the riots when a police officer released tear gas into a restaurant and one of the tear gas canisters hit Salazar directly in the head. Many believed that Salazar's death was not an accident, but instead an assassination, as his outspoken support of the Chicano Movement had placed him on the FBI's watch list. However, the police officer responsible for Salazar's death was never charged with any crimes. Ruben Salazar's death gave the Chicano Movement new life and encouraged them to speak out against the police brutality against the Chicano communities in Los Angeles. The City of Los Angeles later renamed the park by the rally site after Salazar, and he has had buildings named after him at both Sonoma State University and Cal State LA.
After the East Los Angeles Chicano Moratorium and the tragedy that came with it, the Chicano Moratorium committee was gradually disbanded. However, although the committee itself did not last, the impact of the Chicano Moratorium did. The march in 1970 was a massive display of Chicano solidarity and unity, something that had not yet been seen on that scale. This display made it easier for the Chicano communities to come together in later years and fight for other important Chicano causes. Even today, Chicanos are still fighting for more inclusion and to have their voices heard, and a lot of that would not be occurring if not for the efforts of Rosalio Muñoz, Ruben Salazar, and the entire East LA Chicano community.
