“It’s so important that students know that this kind of bigotry has been here forever, and there is no reason why we cannot stand up against it. And there’s no reason why we should let things like this that we see in the media, things that are happening, deter us from continuing our plight to make sure that all our students get an equal education. Mendez v. Westminster was not just about education; it was for civil liberties, for social justice.” – Sylvia Mendez, Teen Vogue, 2018

From September 15 to October 15, we honor Hispanic Heritage Month, celebrating the contributions of Hispanic and Latino communities that have helped shape American history. Every contribution to the building of our nation and culture can be found in the stories of fellow Americans from all backgrounds like civil rights and labor activist Dolores Huerta, physicist and contributor to the development of x-ray technology, Albert Báez, and the first Latina in space, Ellen Ochoa. One lesser knowing name is civil rights activist Sylvia Mendez, whose case, Mendez v. Westminster et al in 1947, ended the segregation of Hispanic children across four school districts in California, setting an historic legal precedent and paving the way for Brown v. Board of Education, which legally ended “separate, but equal” segregation in schools in 1955. 

After World War II, when Sylvia’s parents, Gonzalo and Felicita Mendez, moved into the Westminster school district in southern California, their children were denied enrollment in the local “Whites-only” school based on their skin color. They were told to enroll in the only other local school in the district, with lesser facilities and learning materials, designated for Mexicans and Mexican-Americans. 

In 1946, Sylvia’s parents joined four other families and the League of United Latin American Citizens (LUCAC) to sue four Orange County local school districts, including Westminster, for segregating their children of Mexican descent, eventually representing over 5,000 children. The Mendez v. Westminster et al case was based in California, but went on to be a landmark civil rights case for all Americans. The decision allowed their children to attend the public school of their choice, ending segregation, but only for Mexican and Mexican American students. 

In 1948, Sylvia Mendez and her siblings became some of the first children allowed to attend a “Whites-only” school in California, despite dealing with resistance, hostility and discrimination from other students. She went on to pursue a degree in nursing and used her experience to speak out on the importance of equal educational access for all. She also speaks on the historic contributions and the advocacy of her parents and the case co-plaintiffs, the other families, in support of civil rights and educational equality that led to California becoming the first state in the nation to end segregation in their schools. 

At the Korematsu Institute, we believe in the power of education. We celebrate all of the people who fought against discrimination in the public education system to help shape the nation’s identity in often, forgotten in civil rights history. Mendez v. Westminster et al joins other important civil rights education cases. In Tape v. Hurley (1885), the California Supreme Court found the exclusion of a Chinese American student from a local public school based on her ancestry was unlawful, and in Lau v. Nichols (1974), the United States Supreme Court found school districts must provide language assistance to non-English speaking students, giving them equal access to education. 

In 2007, the U.S. Postal Service issued a stamp commemorating the landmark civil rights decision of her case. In 2011, Sylvia Mendez was awarded the highest civilian honor extended in the U.S., the Presidential Medal of Freedom, by President Barack Obama in honor of her Supreme Court case and her lifelong advocacy for educational equality for all. The ripple effects of Sylvia Mendez’s case can be seen in the amicus brief filed by the NAACP on behalf of Mendez, containing arguments used in the future Brown vs the Board of Education case. Her Mendez v. Westminster et al case started out with one student in one family standing up for what is right but set an important legal precedent for ending segregation for all families in the United States and giving equal access to education to all. This is for and about all of us. 

Links for More Info:

Read more about Sylvia Mendez’ legal case at “Sylvia Mendez and The Struggle For Mexican American Civil Rights” at the National Archives Museum: LINK

Read Sylvia Mendez’ interview in Teen Vogue here: LINK

Learn more about the Tape v. Hurley case at the Library of Congress: LINK

Learn more about the Lau v. Nichols case at Justia here: LINK