Latinos Vie for Political Strength

“We are taking the position that Latinos can be the balance of power (in the upcoming elections) providing we do a number of things,” said Armando Navarro, executive director of the Institute for Social Justice in San Bernardino.

There is “a new sense that Mexican-Americans are a national group. . . . They are now beginning to share resources and political strategies to maximize their influence,” said Richard Santillan, a professor in ethnic and women’s studies at California State University, Pomona.

“We are no longer a sleeping giant,” noted Irma R. Munoz, administrative assistant to Assemblyman Peter Chacon (D-San Diego).

And so went the voices of Latino leaders from throughout the Southwestern United States who gathered at Claremont McKenna College Friday and Saturday to discuss ways to bring Latino issues to the attention of the presidential candidates in the ongoing campaign.

A Major Objective

The conferees attending “Impacto ‘88”--about 200 leaders from politics, business, the professions and academia--seemed to agree that one major objective was mobilizing enough Latino voters for the June California primary to force the presidential candidates into a televised spring debate focusing on Latino issues.

They went on to consider international relations and discussed a plan to organize Latino voters to pressure the U.S. government to improve relations with Mexico. Some speakers said Latinos could learn from the American Jewish community’s lobbying efforts on behalf of Israel.

The key to the success of both efforts, said conference organizer Navarro, is “registering and turning out enough Latino voters,” whose voting rates are traditionally lower than whites and blacks. The census bureau estimates that in the 1986 congressional elections 36% of eligible Latinos voted, contrasted with 43% of blacks and 47% of whites.

What makes the plan plausible in the face of those figures, Navarro said, is that “the vast majority of the nation’s 18 million Latinos live in nine states, including California, which furnish 193 of the 270 electoral votes necessary to elect a president.

“That is going to be the biggest challenge to Latinos in the history of this country--to develop a grass-roots voter mobilization strategy for the purpose of influencing results in the presidential election.”

To start the mobilization, Navarro and other organizers asked conference members to go home to the groups they represent and start or aid campaigns to register Latinos and to raise money to pay for the drives.

Most of the conferees agreed to do just that, and they sounded like a Who’s Who of Latino politics. They included congressmen Esteban Torres (D-La Puente) and Matthew G. Martinez (D-Monterey Park) as well as state senators Ruben S. Ayala (D-Chino) and Manny Aragon, president pro tem of the New Mexico Senate, Jesus Chuy Higuera of Arizona and Bob Martinez of Colorado.

Prominent Speakers

Roberto Mondragon, former New Mexico lieutenant governor, spoke frequently and emphatically in conference discussions, as did Jose Angel Gutierrez, founder and former national president of La Raza Unida Party.

So did Julian Nava of Northridge, the former U.S. Ambassador to Mexico; Bea Molina, national president of the Mexican American Political Assn. (MAPA) and Munoz, who chairs the San Diego County Democratic Party.

The Mexican government, watching the conference in hopes of boosting contacts between Mexico and Mexican-Americans, sent a representative, Geronimo Martinez, the secretary general of the national council on population.

Could this collection of leaders put together a voter registration drive in the short time left that would get the attention of presidential candidates? Santillan, a political scientist who specializes in Mexican-American politics, listened to the discussions and said he thought they could.

Women Gain Acceptance

Santillan said the Mexican-American groups “are slowly accepting women as participants and leaders, which will make more women inclined to get involved and to vote.” He said the groups “have matured to the point where many of the past personality squabbles have been eliminated in an effort to achieve unity.”

Molina added that substantial organizations such as MAPA, which has 30 chapters nationally, most of them in California, already exist to help organize the vote.

However, at least one participant said despite the developments cited by Santillan, the voter registration drive could not succeed. Gutierrez, founder of La Raza Unida Party, said there was “not enough time” to mobilize enough new voters to make a difference between now and the California primary.

Gutierrez added that even if the vote could be organized, the primary on June 7 might come too late this year to do any good. Super Tuesday is tomorrow, “and I would dare predict that 60% of the ball game will be over by next Wednesday,” he said.

The conference took as its starting point the “National Hispanic Agenda” put together in Washington last October at a national conference chaired by San Antonio Mayor Henry G. Cisneros--proposals which are being modified by regional groups such as this one.

Similar Concerns

The theory behind the modifications, Navarro said, is that “most of the language and concerns will be similar and when presidential candidates begin hearing the same questions from Latinos across the country, they will begin to realize that the Latinos are becoming organized and are agreeing on issues.”

“I want to put us into a position where we become power brokers,” Munoz said late Saturday afternoon. “And I want to break the perception of the Latino community that we don’t vote and that we are not a political power to contend with.”