New To Las Vegas

Kit Carson

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It’s been a terrible, terrible month for the reputation of Cesar Chavez (1927-1993). On March 18 The New York Times published its five-year investigation uncovering the long-celebrated farmworkers union leader’s long sexual abuse of girls and others. Governmental and private leaders who had venerated him for decades immediately started racing to distance themselves and take his name off stuff. A debate has started about appropriate new names.

For me, it’s an easy fix. Simply rename everything possible for Dolores Huerta, who co-founded what became the United Farm Workers with Chavez and in many circles is equally as famous. She was also his victim, suffering his sexual abuse and bearing him two children–at least one the product of rape–and secretly giving them away lest their labor union movement be damaged. Huerta finally broke her silence earlier this month at age 95 to The Times, whose stories about Chavez undoubtedly will win a Pulitzer Prize.

As a state with relatively little farming and a weak union structure, Nevada doesn’t have a lot of things bearing Chavez’s name. Remedial actions could include renaming the Las Vegas park and the portion of a Las Vegas street unofficially sporting his name, and changing a state law that requires the governor to issue a proclamation every year designating Chavez’s birthday on March 31 as Cesar Chavez Day.

But while we’re at it here, I also think it’s time to consider renaming our remote state capital of Carson City. It’s currently named after Kit Carson (1809-1868). He was a celebrated, even legendary, mountain man and wilderness guide. But in my view he was also a war criminal, and not just once. Carson killed Indians and Latinos almost for sport in service of a U.S. government relentlessly pushing West to steal as much land and wealth as it could in the name of American exceptionalism. Continue reading →