The sentence that best explains what César Chavez meant by "la causa" is:
A. He fought to improve the lives and working conditions of farmworkers through organizing and labor union contracts.
Cesar Chavez
1
Cesar Chavez was a Mexican-American labor leader and civil rights activist who dedicated his life to what he called la causa (the cause). He fought to improve the lives and working conditions of farmworkers through organizing and labor union contracts.
2
Born in Arizona in 1927, Chavez grew up during the Great Depression. Alongside more than 300,000 others, he and his family were forced to move to California to become migrant farmworkers. As a child, Chavez was continually migrating across the southwest, working in fields and vineyards under deplorable conditions. He was one of the thousands of farmworkers—the nation’s poorest and most powerless laborers—who worked to put food on American tables while having little for their own. By 8th grade, Chavez dropped out of school to work full time, but he never gave up on education, and he continued to study on his own.
3
After serving in the Navy for two years, Chavez returned to the fields. Later, he met two influential people, Father Donald McDonnel and Fred Ross. Together, they discussed how to improve the farm workers’ dire situation. Chavez became an organizer for Community Service Organization (CSO), a Latin civil rights group, where he fought to end racial and economic discrimination. In 1962, after facing pushback for his efforts to form a union, Chavez resigned his position and went on to found the National Farm Workers Association. Joined by Dolores Huerta—another labor leader and Chicano rights leader—he turned his organization into the United Farm Workers.
4
While previous attempts to unionize farmworkers had failed, Chavez and Huerta organized a significant strike against California’s grape growers. Chavez led a 340-mile march from Delano to Sacramento, CA, in 1966 and undertook a well-publicized 25-day hunger strike to garner national support. He built a diverse, national coalition of students, middle-class consumers, trade unionists, religious groups, and minorities. The strike ended in success in 1970, increasing workers’ pay and giving them the right to unionize.
5
For more than three decades, Chavez led the union, achieving fair wages, medical coverage, pension benefits, and humane living conditions, as well as other rights and protections for farmworkers.
6
Chavez passed away in 1993, at the age of 66. He was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the nation’s highest civilian award, by President Bill Clinton.
7
Chavez remains an icon for organized labor and leftist groups in the U.S. He is known as a “folk saint” among Mexican Americans and has left an indelible mark on American history.
Which sentence from the text best explains what César Chavez meant by "la causa"?
A.
He fought to improve the lives and working conditions of farmworkers through organizing and labor union contracts.
B.
After serving in the Navy for two years, Chavez returned to the fields.
C.
As a child, Chavez was continually migrating across the southwest, working in fields and vineyards under deplorable conditions.
D.
By 8th grade, Chavez dropped out of school to work full time, but he never gave up on education, and he continued to study on his own.
1 answer