March 18, 2026- “No legacy is above accountability”- Nancy Pelosi. I have read, with disappointment and disgust, of the documented behaviour of the late Cesar Chavez, in the heyday of the United Farm Workers’ campaign to improve the lives of field hands in California, Arizona, Texas and Colorado, in the 1960s and ’70s.

To their credit, the economic justice and civil rights communities have denounced the assaults on Dolores Huerta and several young daughters of Chavez’s own close associates. Ms. Huerta stood as tall as Cesar Chavez, in those days, and now she stands ever taller. They both worked hard to improve the lives of agricultural workers, but he could not, or would not, transcend the deadly subculture of machismo, which measures a man’s worth by the number of sexual conquests he can claim.

“No legacy is above accountability”. We have, as an effect of deep research, come to re-assess the lives of every single heroic or admired figure in the past 500 years of American history. The legacies of everyone from Christopher Columbus to Cesar Chavez have now been examined, some tarnished beyond repair. There will be schools renamed, a state holiday (in Arizona) canceled and the lives of many hopefully given closure and some cleansing.

Some have chosen to waffle, in response to this news, There should be no daylight on this issue. Chavez died 32 years ago, but his reputation was shattered by the cancer of misogyny, the minute he violated the person of his first victim. It was buried in an unmarked grave, when he became emboldened to continue the lustful violence.

I can only say “Gracias, y lo siento profundamente” to every single woman who has carried this torment with her, all these years. “Me, too” must never become shopworn or rendered irrelevant, until every victim is given a path to justice and healing.

“No legacy is above accountability”.