The farmworkers' movement, led by Cesar Chavez and Dolores Huerta, was a transnational movement that sought to improve the working conditions and wages of farmworkers, primarily in California, but also in other states across the United States. The movement was built on the principles of nonviolence and civil disobedience, and it relied heavily on grassroots organizing, voter registration drives, and boycotts of grapes and other products.
One of the key strategies used by the farmworkers' movement was the use of the boycott as a form of economic protest. The movement's most famous boycott was the Delano grape strike, which began in 1965 and lasted for more than five years. The boycott was successful in pressuring growers to sign collective bargaining agreements with the United Farm Workers (UFW), the union founded by Chavez and Huerta.
The farmworkers' movement also sought to build alliances with other groups, such as the African American community and the Latino community. This helped to build a broader base of support for the movement and to bring attention to the issues facing farmworkers.
The farmworkers' movement in New Mexico, on the other hand, focused primarily on land issues. The movement, led by Reies López Tijerina, sought to reclaim land that had been taken from Hispanic communities in New Mexico during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Unlike the farmworkers' movement, the land movement in New Mexico often employed more militant tactics, such as armed takeovers of government buildings and court houses.
Overall, the farmworkers' movement was a transnational effort to improve the lives of farmworkers through nonviolence, grassroots organizing, and economic protest, while the land movement in New Mexico focused on reclaiming land that had been taken from Hispanic communities through more militant tactics.