All materials written here have been written by Melinda Gonzalez unless cited otherwise. The moderator of this profile can be found here:
www.myspace.com/poetaguerrera
Disclaimer: I have created this site to help expand the knowledge available on the Young Lords Party. The views expressed in the profile are accurate only to the extent of my knowledge. I am in the process of learning much more about the Young Lords and hope to involve some of them in this website. For these reasons, I cannot guarantee that everything here will be 100% accurate due to the mistakes that can occur from misinterpretation. Please enjoy.
-Melinda
Image taken from younglords.info
HISTORY OF THE YOUNG LORDS PARTY/h3
The children of Operation Bootstrap found a way to change their conditions in local socialist, revolutionary groups such as the Young Lords Organization10. The Young Lords Organization was born out of a Chicago gang named the Young Lords. The leader of the Young Lords, Cha Cha Jimenez, was arrested and while in prison, met Fred Hampton of the Black Panthers. This began his political awakening, and upon leaving prison, Cha Cha returned to Chicago with a message of revolution ready to fight against the oppression attacking the Puerto Rican community (Abramson 1971). Simultaneously, various street groups were organizing in New York City’s Lower East Side, the Bronx, and El Barrio. Students from SUNY Old Westbury, like Denise Oliver, were also trying to form a revolutionary group. They combined forces with the New York City groups and began to organize for Latino Rights. While reading a publication by the Black Panther Party, the group learned of the Young Lords Organization. A meeting was arranged between the New Yorkers and the YLO, and the New York group became the New York Chapter of the Young Lords Organization. After a year or so, the New York Chapter felt that the Young Lords Organization in Chicago was not providing enough leadership and was not meeting the demands of the local community. Dissatisfied, they opted to break apart but kept the Young Lords name. They became the Young Lords Party and were separated from the Chicago Young Lords Organization in April 1970. Pablo Guzman said this occurred because the Chicago group remained involved in gang related activities (Torres 1998:157). The Young Lords Party, however, was never a street gang. The group comprised of all types of people such as Vietnam veterans, high school drop outs, college graduates, factory workers, artists, poets, recovering alcoholics and reformed drug addicts who educated the community and helped provide them with medical and economic resources. As the most marginalized members of society, they were fighting for the economically disadvantaged to bring worldwide attention to the plight of the Puerto Rican community. Their primary ideological perspective was that they could create a socialist society through egalitarian social programs. A Young Lord was expected to be active all day, every day. Because many Young Lords were unemployed due to the rampant racism in society, they worked towards the revolution twenty-four hours a day.
For many young Puerto Ricans, the journey into the Young Lords started at different moments of civil disobedience and political awakening. In the case of Pablo Guzman, an ex Young Lord, it was a hot summer day in 1969 when the community got together with youth wearing purple berets to burn garbage in the middle of 110th Street and Third Avenue jamming traffic for blocks (Torres 1998:155). This was termed the Garbage Offensive, and it spoke to one of many atrocities occurring in the poor, minority communities of New York City. That is, the sanitation department was not picking up garbage regularly in East Harlem, and during the summer, much of the garbage began to rot and stink up the neighborhood. Through the Garbage Offensive, the Young Lords Party managed to get the local community involved in political change (Abramson 1971; Torres 1998).
The second major action was termed the People’s Church Offensive. Part of the movement towards bettering the community was to create social programs to help relieve some of the local burdens. The Young Lords Party wanted to use the First Spanish Methodist Church of East Harlem for breakfast programs, clothing drives, and as a place to perform medical check ups. They went to church one Sunday to speak on the horrid conditions in East Harlem, and local policemen dressed in plain clothes assaulted them. Some Young Lords were injured while thirteen others were arrested for speaking out in church and requesting services for the local community. Nine of the thirteen individuals arrested were women. Denise Oliver, the first female member of the Young Lords Party, was one of the women arrested. Because of this event, the Young Lords Party opted to take over the church in hopes of starting social programs and sending a message to the local police force (Abramson 1971; Torres 1998). On December 28, 1969, the Young Lords Party along with over two hundred community members took their place in the church to show resistance to the residing preacher. A press conference was held to inform the city of the Young Lords’ intention to begin community service programs in the church. The takeover ended with 103 people marching out of the church singing ‘Que bonita bandera es la bandera puertorriqueña†[What a beautiful flag is the Puerto Rican flag] (Melendez 2005:129). A hearing followed to see if the Young Lords would be able to hold social programs in the church, but they were not successful in getting the congregation to agree to their demands (Abramson 1971; Torres 1998).
The outrage in the community continued to climax when a local woman, Carmen Rodriguez, died during an abortion procedure at Lincoln Hospital. Lincoln Hospital was the only hospital that serviced the Latino community in the South Bronx, and it had been condemned some years before as unsuitable for the rich, white community (Abramson 1971; Torres 1998). Led by Gloria Gonzales, angered by the horrid conditions at Lincoln Hospital, and partnered with others groups such as HRUM- Health Revolutionary Unity Movement, the “Think Lincoln Committee,†and the doctors in the hospital, the Young Lords Party decided to take over the hospital and demand better conditions for its community. Some demands required better pay, improved facilities, and more doctors and medicine. The Young Lords Party also established the Lincoln Detox Program to help with the high number of people in the community addicted to heroin (Abramson 1971; Torres 1998).
In September of 1970, the New York police arrested Julio Roldan, a Young Lord and Vietnam veteran, during a Garbage Offensive program. The next day, news headings stated that Julio had committed suicide in prison by hanging himself. Unconvinced by this story, the Young Lords Party was inspired to investigate prison conditions particularly in a prison in downtown Manhattan nicknamed “the Tombs†(Abramson 1971; Torres 1998). Investigations led to the knowledge that Julio was one of eight that had died in that manner (Abramson 1971). In order to send a clear message to the police and Mayor Lindsey of New York, who had done very little to improve conditions for the local community, the Young Lords Party decided to take over the Methodist church once again. On October 18, the Young Lords Party took Julio’s coffin and led a procession through the streets into the church. For the first time, the Young Lords Party came to the scene armed, militant, defiant, and carrying weapons. The message was clear: “from here on, we are ready to defend ourselves and the community by whichever manner†(Melendez 2005:183). They demanded that prison conditions be improved and that prisoners be treated with respect. Some of these demands went unmet by the local government, but the second takeover of the Methodist church further solidified the ties between all sectors of the Young Lords and the local community. The Young Lords Party continued to work towards social justice within the group and in society at large until they were dismantled in 1974 by inner turmoil and infiltration by CIA backed programs such as COINTELPRO.
