The Latine Women’s Rights Champions of HERStory
As Latin heritage month continues, we honor these Women’s Rights Champions, old and new, to whom we owe many thanks for life as we know it today. Their inspiration, wisdom, and passion for justice continues to impact us profoundly.
Eva Péron
Los Toldos, Argentina
“There are some oligarchs that make me want to bite them just as one crunches into a carrot or a radish.”
Eva Perón, the first lady of Argentina between 1946 and 1952, was an outspoken leader in her country’s women’s suffrage movement and for socioeconomic justice. She was born into poverty in 1919 before she moved to Buenos Aires and became one of the highest paid radio actresses in the country. Perón played a key role in passing the women’s suffrage law in 1947. In 1949, she founded the Peronista Feminist Party, which helped women demonstrate their legitimacy as politicians and activists and led to a large increase in women running for public office during the Argentinian elections in 1951. Perón unofficially ran the Ministries of Labor and Health, fighting for eight hour workdays, sick pay, and fair wages. She also created the Eva Perón Foundation, which carried out charity work and social welfare, until she died from cancer in 1952.
Learn more about Eva Péron here.
Luisa Capetillo
Arecibo, Puerto rico
“You, monstrous exploiter, measure your steps, because if you don’t, you may fall into the precipice of your own egotism or into the abyss of your own errors!”
Luisa Capetillo was one of the first Puerto Rican feminist writers to combat gender norms, advocate for union laborers, and live a life based on the ideas she posited. She published a newspaper, penned a plethora of distinguished essays, and wrote four books that centered around gender equality, the dangers of marriage as an institution, and the injustices of social class. On one occasion, she was nobly arrested for wearing men’s clothing. Born in 1879, Capetillo’s teen years were lived at the time of a cultural shift in Puerto Rico after its acquisition by the U.S. following the Spanish-American war. American ideas about ownership, authority, and family structure were on the rise. When Capetillo was 32 her most important work, Mi Opinión (1911), was published. In the book, Capetillo writes about the dire need to make serious changes to “all structures of social and economic domination so women could be truly liberated.” Capetillo highlighted the importance of women’s roles in society and in the home, arguing that women don’t have to choose between being homemakers and their civic involvement. Capetillo’s fervent stance on the importance of gender equality and women’s suffrage made its mark almost 20 years before Puerto Rico allowed all women to vote.
Learn more about Luisa Capetillo at TeenVogue.com
Argelia Laya
Río chico, Venezuela
“Sexism reduces women to an inferior condition. It is the legitimate child of exploitation of man by man, the best ally of capitalism. As men and women from the exploited classes, the revolutionary militants who defend sexism and practice it in their families and social relations serve as a tool for their oppressors. It is so because, whether or not they are aware of this, they marginalize women in class struggle.” —Argelia Laya’s book Nuestra Causa, p. 45
Argelia Laya was an activist committed to women’s rights and socialism. She led the women’s suffrage movement in 1940s Venezuela and worked to create sexual education courses and keep pregnant girls in high school. She was born in 1926 to Rosario López, a militant of the Women’s Cultural Assembly [Agrupación Cultural Femenina], and Pedro María Laya, colonel of the montoneras grassroots guerrilla groups. Argelia Laya participated in the Black Women Assembly [Unión de Mujeres Negras], the first organization of Black women in Venezuela. She also created national and international platforms for feminist organizing efforts. One of the main issues she fought against was women’s economic exclusion. In Laya’s first years as a militant, after joining the Democratic Action party [Acción Democrática] and then the Communist Party of Venezuela [Partido Comunista de Venezuela] (PCV), she acted as an important figure in the resistance against dictator Marcos Pérez Jiménez. She coordinated the Women’s Patriotic Board [Junta Patriótica Femenina], which helped to lead the General Strike of 1958 and thus the overthrow of Pérez Jiménez. In these days, Laya was a part of PCV’s clandestine bomb factory, rode a motorcycle while visiting unions and clothing factories, and handed out pamphlets promoting the General Strike. Her struggles were essential to life in modern day Venezuela, as these efforts made the approval of the women’s votes, reform of the Civil Code, and reform of the Suffrage Law a reality.
Learn more about Argelia Laya at CapireMov.org
Sonia Sotomayor
The bronx, new York
Sonia Sotomayor is the first Latina Supreme Court Justice in U.S. history. After her father’s death when she was nine years old, she was raised by her single mother in the Bronx. After graduating valedictorian of her class in 1972, Sotomayor went on to graduate summa cum laude from Princeton, go to Yale Law School, and become a U.S. While serving in the Supreme Court, Sotomayor has worked tirelessly to advocate for women and ethnic minorities in criminal justice reform. Sonia Sotomayor has long been a women’s rights champion, but she has become even more vocal in the wake of the death of Supreme Court Justice, Ruth Bader Ginsburg. In January 2022, she spoke out against Texas’ proposed six-week abortion ban.
“This case is a disaster for the rule of law and a grave disservice to women in Texas, who have a right to control their own bodies,” she asserted. “Today, for the fourth time, this Court declines to protect pregnant Texans from egregious violations of their constitutional rights.”
Other important cases she has heard include Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission and Schuette v. Coalition to Defend Affirmative Action, both of which she dissented to, Obergefell v. Hodges, in which she voted in the majority to legalize same-sex marriage, as well as cases surrounding the Affordable Care Act, which she twice voted to uphold.
Learn more about Sonia Sotomayor here.
Dolores Huerta
Dawson, New Mexico
“Every moment is an organizing opportunity, every person a potential activist, every minute a chance to change the world.”
At 91 years old, civil rights leader Dolores Huerta, is still working tirelessly to fight for the rights of laborers and women. Dolores found her calling as an organizer while serving in the leadership of the Stockton Community Service Organization (CSO). During this time, she founded the Agricultural Workers Association, set up voter registration drives and pressed local governments for barrio improvements. As a result, César and Dolores resigned from the CSO, and launched the National Farm Workers Association in the spring of 1962. Dolores’ organizing skills were essential to the growth of this budding organization. Best known for leading the 1960s farm worker’s rights movement with fellow activist, Cesar Chavez, she’s also a feminist who ensured that female farm worker’s were provided their rights were as well. While directing the first National Boycott of California Table Grapes out of New York she came into contact with Gloria Steinem and the burgeoning feminist movement who rallied behind the cause. Quickly she realized they shared much in common. Having found a supportive voice with other feminists, Dolores consciously began to challenge gender discrimination within the farm workers’ movement. Her famous empowering slogan, “Sí, se puede”, remains a rallying cry for change and perseverance.
Learn more about Dolores Huerta here.
Helen Rodriguez Trías
New york, new york
“No one is going to have quality of life unless we support everyone's quality of life… Not on a basis of do-goodism, but because of a real commitment...it's our collective and personal health that's at stake.”
Dr. Helen Rodriguez-Trías was the first Latina to be elected president of the American Public Health Association. Trías was passionate about protecting the medical rights of poor and underprivileged women and ensuring they received the care they needed and deserved. While working at New York’s Lincoln Hospital, she founded the Committee to End Sterilization Abuse in 1970, Women's Caucus of the American Public Health Association in 1971, and the Committee for Abortion Rights and Against Sterilization Abuse in 1979, all the while helping to write federal regulations regarding sterilization and making sure that consent documents were made available in a multitude of languages.
Learn more about Helen Rodriguez-Trías here.
Felicitas Mendez
Juncos, Puerto Rico
“I'm proud that at least we had the courage to do it, to fight not for our children, but for the other children, and their children and their children.”
Felicitas Mendez was a civil rights pioneer who fought for her children to be allowed in an all-white school during the 1940s. After her daughter Sylvia was shut out for being darker skinned than her cousins, Mendez and her husband filed a lawsuit against the school for segregation. In 1946, with help from Thurgood Marshall and the NAACP, they won their lawsuit, meaning that their children were able to attend an all-white school, as well as put an end to de jure segregation in California. The Mendez v. Westminster case helped plant the seeds for the Brown v. Board of Education lawsuit, which would come eight years later.
Learn more about the Mendez family here.
Virginia "Ginny" Montes
Guanaja, Honduras
Virginia Montes became the first Latina to serve as a national officer for the National Organization for Women (NOW) in 1991. Through her thirteen years of work with NOW, she fought for civil rights in the South and for the redrawing of districts so that people of color could be better represented. In 1993, Montes led NOW’s defense of Lani Guinier, a law professor whose nomination to lead the Clinton Administration’s Justice Department’s civil rights division was renounced after condemnation from conservatives over her papers on how Black people could increase their sway during elections. Montes also led leadership training for organizations like the ACLU, the NAACP, and the Women’s Political Caucus.
Learn more about Virginia Montes here.
Pura Belpré
Cidra, Puerto Rico
“Don't forget the magnificent sweep of the imagination and dreams of youth; when a boy comes only to a man's shoulders, his dreams are tall,” wrote Belpré. “Through all the hardships and heartbreaks, these dreams often become realities.”
Librarian, writer, and puppeteer Pura Belpré became the first Puerto Rican the New York Public Library (NYPL) hired. Her career began in 1921, where she served as the Hispanic assistant at the 135th Street branch in Harlem. The library recruited her as part of its effort to hire young women from ethnically diverse backgrounds – a choice that ended up changing libraries in the city. Belpré – who is credited with bringing “Spanish to the shelves” – led the charge for the library’s outreach within the Puerto Rican and Latino communities.
In 1929, NYPL transferred her to the 115th Street branch because of the increase of Puerto Ricans settling in the area. While there, she implemented bilingual story hours and programs based on Latino-specific holidays, such as Three Kings Day.
As a children’s librarian, storyteller, and author, she enriched the lives of Latino children through her pioneering work of preserving and disseminating Puerto Rican folklore. She received the New York Mayor’s Award for Arts and Culture in 1982. After her death that same year, the Association for Library Service to Children – a division of the American Library Association – created the Pura Belpré Award to celebrate her outstanding legacy. The award is presented to Latino writers and illustrators whose work best portrays our cultural experiences in a work of literature aimed at children or youth.
Words from Remezcla.com
Ileana Ros-Lehtinen
Havana, cuba
“No matter where you are from, no matter what your background is, no matter what your socioeconomic status is, every person can achieve his or her [or their] dreams.”
Ileana Ros-Lehtinin was the first Latina to serve in the Florida House of Representatives, the Florida Senate, and the first Latina to serve in the U.S. House of Representatives. She was the first woman to ever Chair a regular standing committee in the House and the first Republican to support marriage equality in 2012. During her time as a representative, Ros-Lehtinin cosponsored the Violence Against Women Act of 2005 and drafted legislation for as well as lobbied for the Congressional Gold Medal to be awarded to the Women Airforce Service Pilots of World War II.
Denise Oliver, Connie Cruz, and Iris Morales of the Young Lords
New York, New York
Heavily influenced by and often aligned with the Black Panther Party, The Young Lords Organization was formed in the in the 1960s. The group provided community services, such as free breakfast for children in local churches, and protested racism and colonialism.
Denise Oliver, Connie Cruz, and Iris Morales pioneered the Young Lord’s feminist movement as well as the first women’s caucus. The trio exposed sexism within the organization and established a platform for women of color to thrive and grow. Eventually, Denise Oliver was promoted to a spot on the Central Committee where she continued to push for a feminist agenda. In 1970, the Young Lords of New York officially integrated feminism into its national agenda, making it one of the first multiracial groups to do so.
The women of the Young Lords didn’t get the recognition they deserved, which is why Iris Morales wrote Through the Eyes of Rebel Women: The Young Lords, 1969-1976.
Learn more about Oliver, Cruz, Morales, and the Young Lords here.
Ellen Ochoa
Los Angeles, California
“I think of it as a good opportunity to let, in particular, school kids know that this job and other interesting jobs in science and engineering are open to anyone who works hard in school and gets a good education and studies math and science. And that it's not just for a select group of people.”
Ellen Ochoa is the first Latina to go to space and the first Latina director of NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston. She holds a bachelor's degree in physics from San Diego State University and a master's degree and doctorate in electrical engineering from Stanford University. She had applied to be a NASA astronaut thrice before finally being accepted in 1990. Before becoming an astronaut, Ochoa researched at the Energy Department’s Sandia National Lab and the NASA Ames Research Center. She is a co-inventor of three patents and the author of many technical papers.
In total, Ochoa spent approximately 1,000 hours in space aboard four different missions. Among several other awards, she has been recognized with NASA's highest award, the Distinguished Service Medal, and the Presidential Distinguished Rank Award for senior executives in the federal government. There are four schools in three states named after her: two in California, one in Washington, and one in Texas. Now that she’s back on Earth, she supervises 13,000 employees making sure that shuttles are safe.
Learn more about Ellen Ochoa here.
Ilia Calderón
Istmina, Colombia
Ilia Calderón is the first Afro-Latina to co-anchor an evening news show. Throughout her career she has broken many barriers in Spanish-language TV in the United States. In 2017, she won an Emmy award for her interview of the current Ku Klux Klan imperial wizard, during which her life was threatened. As an Emmy award-winning journalist, she uses platform to speak out against racism and discrimination. And in 2020, she published her memoir, My Time to Speak: Reclaiming Ancestry and Confronting Race about embracing her identity, overcoming prejudice and pursuing her dreams.
Learn more about Ilia Calderón here.
Rita Moreno
Humacao, Puerto Rico
“It is through art that we will prevail and we will endure. It lives on after us and defines us as people.”
Rita Moreno is a singer, dancer, actress credited for breaking boundaries for Latin women in the entertainment industry for over 70 years. Moreno is also the first and only Latina to earn all four of the most distinguished American entertainment awards: an Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and a Tony Award. She moved with her family from Puerto Rico to New York City at five years old, where she landed her first acting gig at eleven years old. From a young age, she noticed and brought attention to the show business’ bias towards only allowing Latina actresses to play stereotypical roles and has consistently sought to play roles that diverge from those stereotypes. In addition to her accomplishments in many shows and films, Moreno was invited to perform at President Bill Clinton’s inauguration in 1993, received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President George W. Bush in 2004, and received the National Medal of Arts from President Barack Obama in 2009.
Learn more about Rita Moreno here.
Linda Chavez-Thompson
Lubbock, Texas
A second-generation Mexican-American, Linda Chavez-Thompson served as a union leader elected executive vice president of the American Federation of Labor & Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO) at the 1995 convention and was re-elected for another term in 2005. She was the first person to hold the post of executive vice president, and the first Latina, and person of color to be elected to one of the federation’s three highest offices.
As executive vice president of the federation, Chavez-Thompson represented the labor movement as a member of the board for several national organizations, including the Institute for Women’s Policy Research and the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute. In 2001, she became president of ORIT, the Inter-American Regional Organization of Workers, which is the Western Hemispheric arm of the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions.
Learn more about Linda Chavez Thompson here.
Words from AFL-CIO.org
Maria Salguero
Mexico City, Mexico
Maria Salguero refuses to sit by and let Mexico’s femicide problem continue to be ignored and covered up as some officials are accused of doing. In 2016, she built a map tracking cases of femicide in her country, in her spare time, ultimately creating a geography-specific database that painted a more detailed picture than anything the Mexican government has offered up. Salguero’s database includes names, ages, causes of death and more crucial details, bringing both attention and context to the fatal injustices that are being committed against women in her country every day.
Learn more about Maria Salguero here.
Words from HipLatina.com
Manuela Castañeira
Entre Rios, Parana, Argentina
Manuela Castañeira, running under the Nuevo MAS socialist party, was the only female presidential candidate in Argentina’s 2019 election. Castañeira is also the director of the women’s rights group, Las Rojas. She’s been fighting for women’s rights for years, particularly abortion rights as she was part of La Marea Verde (The Green Wave). She has worked towards the release of women who were imprisoned for having abortions and was an outspoken supporter of Argentina’s Voluntary Interruption of Pregnancy Bill, which passed in 2020. She frequently holds and participates in protests, rallies, and other events aimed towards education and inciting change.
Isabel Allende
Lima, Peru
“Feminism, like the ocean, is fluid, powerful, deep, and encompasses the infinite complexity of life; it moves in waves, currents, tides, and sometimes in storms. Like the ocean, feminism never stays quiet.”
Chilean American author Isabel Allende was born in 1942 to Francisca Llona and Tomás Allende, the Chilean ambassador to Peru, and a cousin of Salvador Allende, the former Chilean president. During the early 1960s, she joined the United Nations and worked alongside their Food and Agriculture Organization. Allende was a feminist long before she knew what the word meant. Observing her mother’s disempowerment after her father abandoned their family, Allende raged against male authority. Her fury was so apparent that her mother took her to a doctor to see if she had colic or a tapeworm. In 1967, Allende co-founded the feminist magazine Paula, so that she “could channel that anger into action,” and wrote a chain of satirical columns about the patriarchy called “Civilize Your Troglodyte”. She eventually started writing novels examining family, history, displacement and the lives of women. After publishing her first book, The House of the Spirits, in 1982 she was widely touted as a new feminist voice in a male-dominated literary scene. She wrote many more bestselling books in the following years, including Daughter of Fortune, Inés of My Soul and City of the Beasts, which have been translated into over 40 different languages. In 2014, Allende received an honorary doctorate from Harvard University, the same year in which Barack Obama awarded her the presidential medal of freedom.
Learn more about Isabel Allende here.
SOURCES:
Nast, Condé. “Revolutionary Luisa Capetillo Fought to Redefine Equality.” Teen Vogue, May 8, 2020. https://www.teenvogue.com/story/who-is-luisa-capetillo-puerto-rican-feminist.
Thompson, Shayne Rodriguez. “12 Latinas Who Have Helped Advance Women’s Rights.” HipLatina (blog), March 9, 2022. https://hiplatina.com/latinas-advanced-womens-rights/.
Remezcla. “8 Pioneering Latinas Who Made Important Contributions to US History.” Accessed October 3, 2022. https://remezcla.com/lists/culture/pioneering-latinas-contributions-to-united-states-history/.
Institute, Cisneros. “A Latinx Guide to Celebrating Women’s History Month!” GW Cisneros Institute (blog), March 31, 2021. https://medium.com/gw-cisneros-institute/a-latinx-guide-to-celebrating-womens-history-month-42c6c00b270e.
Saxon, Wolfgang. “Virginia E. Montes, 50, Women’s Rights Advocate.” The New York Times, October 11, 1994, sec. Obituaries. https://www.nytimes.com/1994/10/11/obituaries/virginia-e-montes-50-women-s-rights-advocate.html.
National Aeronautics and Space Administration. Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center. 2/17/1973-. STS056-29-019 - STS-056 - Candid View of a Crewmember Playing a Flute in the Aft Flight Deck. File Unit: STS-56, 4/12/1981 - 7/21/2011, 1981.
Klemesrud, Judy. “Young Women Find a Place in High Command of Young Lords.” The New York Times, November 11, 1970, sec. Archives. https://www.nytimes.com/1970/11/11/archives/young-women-find-a-place-in-high-command-of-young-lords.html.
Sturges, Fiona. “Isabel Allende: ‘Everyone Called Me Crazy for Divorcing in My 70s. I’ve Never Been Scared of Being Alone.’” The Guardian, February 13, 2021, sec. Books. https://www.theguardian.com/books/2021/feb/13/isabel-allende-everyone-called-me-crazy-for-divorcing-in-my-70s-ive-never-been-scared-of-being-alone.
Nast, Condé. “6 Contemporary Latinx Activists You Should Know.” Teen Vogue, September 25, 2019. https://www.teenvogue.com/story/latinx-activists-to-know.
