The Zoot Suit Riots: The History of the Racial Attacks in Los Angeles during World War II

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*Includes pictures *Includes accounts of the fighting *Includes online resources and a bibliography for further reading *Includes a table of contents “Marching through the streets of downtown Los Angeles, a mob of several thousand soldiers, sailors, and civilians, proceeded to beat up every zoot suiter they could find. Pushing its way into the important motion picture theaters, the mob ordered the management to turn on the house lights and then ran up and down the aisles dragging Mexicans out of their seats. Streetcars were halted while Mexicans, and some Filipinos and Negroes, were jerked from their seats, pushed into the streets and beaten with a sadistic frenzy.” – Carey McWilliams, journalist Even enemies will agree that the United States is a unique nation, in that its culture has been developed almost entirely by immigrants, people who have come to the country from other places and carved their way into society. Sometimes called a melting pot, sometimes a tossed salad, the nation has been shaped by all that is good and bad of the people who live here. Sadly, history has taught that where there is immigration, there will always be conflict. Just as any newly married couple will argue over whose family to spend the holidays with, so those coming from different nations and cultures will clash over which traditions can be integrated into the new society and which ones must be left behind. One might think that after some 400 years of dealing with these issues, the nation would have mastered the subject, but instead the opposite seems true. In the early days of 2016, Americans are engaged in a heated presidential campaign fraught with rhetoric and fear over the role of immigrants in the United States. Candidates frequently speak out against certain cultures, insisting they are dangerous to the American economy or even national security. Because the nation is at war against an enemy defined more by religion and ethnicity than traditional national boundaries, there is a heightened sense of fear and that is adding fuel to the debate and no doubt clouding the judgment of many who are speaking out. They are warning the American people that there had never been a crisis like this in the nation’s past, and that swift action must be taken or the country will not survive. The truth is that there has been a crisis much like this and that actions taken in the past, while often swift, was also just as often unjust. Few examples signify that like the Zoot Suit Riots, the national crisis that precipitated them, and the culture of fear and bigotry that nurtured them. If the name of the event sounds silly, its premise was both nearly comical but also deadly serious. It was the product of people of different races, cultures and practices, a story of immigration and clashes between nations on a grand scale and police and young people on an intimate one. The story unfolded in 1942 and 1943 but has been a recurring issue. If indeed, as philosopher George Santayana so famously contended, “those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it,” then the Zoot Suit Riots are one aspect of our nation’s history that proves it. The Zoot Suit Riots: The History of the Racial Attacks in Los Angeles during World War II looks at the riots in L.A. during the war. Along with pictures of important people, places, and events, you will learn about the Zoot Suit Riots like never before, in no time at all.

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