Abstract
<jats:title>Abstract</jats:title> <jats:p>Breaking Down the Walls of Segregation tells the unknown story of how ethnic Mexicans built the unprecedented movement that led to the Mendez, et al. v. Westminster School District of Orange County, et al. (1946) decision. Beginning in the 1880s, David-James Gonzales details the social and economic history of Orange County, explaining the citrus industry’s unrivaled control over the regional economy and local politics. Seeking increased market share and profitability, citrus capitalists established the walls of segregation to manage ethnic Mexican family labor. By the early 1930s, ethnic Mexicans were segregated into over fifty underserved communities, known as colonias and barrios, and fifteen Mexican schools throughout the county. Without help from national civil rights organizations, ethnic Mexicans mobilized against the walls of segregation starting in the late 1920s. During the 1930s and 1940s, ethnic Mexican grassroots organizations proliferated throughout the county, intent on engaging in civic affairs and ending segregation. Their efforts, articulated through a politics of mobility, led to the Mendez, et al. decision, the first school desegregation case won and upheld by the federal courts. This movement, comprising unheralded immigrants, citizens, parents, children, neighbors, laborers, emerging activists, and their non-Mexican allies, continued into the 1950s and 1960s, transforming the social and physical landscape of Southern California. As an essential part of the “long civil rights movement,” the ethnic Mexican struggle against segregation in Orange County illustrates how minoritized groups have historically pushed US social, economic, and political institutions to live up to the nation’s founding ideals.</jats:p>