Formation of La Raza Lawyers After moving to San Diego, I met attorney Nick Aguilar who joined us at Legal Aid. We began thinking about how to organize two groups of professionals—engineers and lawyers—to see what we could do help our community. Initially, in 1976, we started meeting at the San Diego Law Library because we didn’t have a place to meet—and it was open to the general public. We became sort of an unincorporated society of attorneys that included a couple of law students as well. I was asked to serve as president. There was about a dozen of us, which included five women. It took us a while to decide on a name. Some people wanted Hispanic, some people wanted Chicanos, some people wanted Spanish for Latinos. We agreed “La Raza Lawyers” included everybody, regardless of which part of the Western Hemisphere they were from. La Raza doesn’t mean race, it just means the people. We created and adopted by-laws, held our first official meeting in 1979, and elected attorney Roy Cazares of Chula Vista as our first official president. Our association was committed to mentoring attorneys, encouraging people to become lawyers, and supporting lawyers to become judges. Today, La Raza Lawyers have over 300 members who are active in a variety of roles and are achieving many of our initial goals: increasing the number of attorneys, law students, and appointed judges. At a breakfast meeting with colleagues in Sacramento, Governor Jerry Brown asked me how long I had been an attorney. I answered six and a half years. He asked, “Do you want to be a judge and, if so, would you go to San Diego?” I said yes. Like others, before any Gubernatorial appointment, the State Bar’s Commission evaluates background and qualifications of all nominees. I became the sixth Latino judge in San Diego, appointed in 1981 to the San Diego Municipal Court and then San Diego County Superior Court in 1998. The first was Judge Carlos Cazares who was appointed in 1972. La Raza Lawyers still had a lot more work to do, so we formed the Latino Judges Association of California, that has over 200 paid members from the state’s Appeals and Superior Courts.
Ridding Barriers I’m originally from Mexico, where we lived in a one-room house with my mother, grandmother, and uncle. I only went to the seventh grade in Mexico and finished one year of secundaria—the equivalent of the seventh grade in the U.S. I didn’t go beyond that because I had to work as a farmworker to help my family. I was 13 when we came and settled in Riverside and where I started school in the second grade, due to my limited use of English. During high school, I constantly asked my counselor to allow me to take college prep courses. He agreed. I did well. Only two of some 102 Latino students from my barrio in Riverside ended up in the College prep program. I graduated high school at 19 years of age. My inspiration was my mother, who was everything to me. She and my grand- mother struggled when we came to this country, worked hard, and kept me and my siblings in line. My experiences taught me that by helping others, you help yourself. That philosophy will continue to grow in me and hopefully benefit the communities in which I find myself.
Teenager Rafael Arreloa with his 1952 Pontiac, 1957 (Photo courtesy © Rafael Arreola)
Rafael Arreola with his mother, June 29, 1991 (Photo courtesy © Rafael Arreola)
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San Diego Latino Legacy – Timeline • Milestones • Stories
Chapter 6 – Perseverance
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