Zoot Suit Riots

The Cotton Club, formerly located at Lenox and 125th Streets in New York City, was the center of the 1930s and 1940s East Coast jazz scene.

At the time, jazz was rebellious, youth-oriented, and specifically minority-associated, but nonetheless wildly popular with audiences of all races. With jazz came fashion, including the zoot suit.

Jazz and swing were youth-oriented and associated with minorities. This gave zoot suits a reputation as ‘thug-’ or ‘gang-related’ clothing, a false characterization that led to grave consequences.

Just off the Los Angeles river was once a reservoir known as Sleepy Lagoon. Denied entry to public pools and swimming areas, Latino youths often hung out at this pond to swim and socialize. They belonged to the zoot-suit wearing Pachuco subculture, which was about to land in the public eye.

On 2 August 1942, young José Díaz was found unconscious near Sleepy Lagoon. He later died of an injury that was consistent with falling or being struck by a car. The previous evening, Díaz had been at a party that had ended with a brawl.

With almost no evidence other than the brief fight at the party, Los Angeles police pursued the idea of a gang war among zoot-suit wearing Pachucos. They arrested 24 young men and charged them with Díaz’ ‘murder.’

The Latino defendants received a grossly unfair trial. They were made to testify in the unwashed zoot suits they’d been arrested in. They were not allowed to sit near their lawyers. The judge allowed openly racist ‘expert’ testimony. Not surprisingly, 17 were convicted.

When World War II broke out, the U.S. army built and expanded enormous new bases, camps, and labs across the country.

Some were in isolated areas, while others were necessarily located near city transportation hubs. The Naval Reserve Armory, near today’s Dodger Stadium, took over land once known as Chavez Ravine, a Latino neighborhood of Los Angeles.

The U.S. government has the right to seize private property to develop for public use in a process known as eminent domain or appropriation. In practice, redevelopment projects using eminent domain have disproportionately harm minority property owners. The demolition of Cesar Canyon created tensions with displaced Latino residents.

Sailors on leave stayed at the Naval Reserve Armory. They often passed through adjacent Latino neighborhoods on their way to downtown LA. Some residents complained that sailors could be loud, drunk, and lewd with local women. Locals, in turn, often harassed passing sailors.

Though Latinos served in the Armed Forces in WWII, there was tension between the military and Latino communities. Many Latino farm and factory workers stayed in the U.S. during the war to produce needed food and goods, and they were looked down on for this.

On May 31st, 1943, a group of sailors bumped into a group of zoot-suit wearing pachucos. Tensions and harassment were expected, but this time, the confrontation escalated to violence that would soon engulf the city.

Somewhere near this spot, an argument between Pachucos and sailors turned violent. A sailor named Joe Dacy Coleman was pushed or punched to the ground, where he broke his jaw. The incident sparked a powder keg.

Following the incident involving Joe Dacy Coleman on May 31, 1943, sailors in and around Los Angeles formed mobs to avenge Coleman and punish the zoot suit wearing Pachucos. During the Zoot Suit Riots, gangs of soldiers sought out first Pachucos, then any Latino, and eventually any minority, for fierce beatings and humiliation.

In one typical incident, Vincente Morales was in the Orpheum Theater when a mob of soldiers grabbed him and dragged him from the venue. On the street, they violently beat him, stripped him naked, and urinated on his zoot suit.

When police arrived at the Orpheum, instead of coming to Morales’s aid, they waited until the sailors had finished with him, and then arrested Morales for ‘disturbing the peace.’ Off-duty police officers formed the second-largest group of rioters, after sailors.

The riots escalated from a specific clash between two cultures to open racial war. One report described an African-American man wearing a uniform from his job at a defense plant being pulled from a streetcar and mutilated.

The riots expanded. Police and civilians joined soldiers in chasing down and beating Pachucos and other minorities. Sailors and soldiers took buses and cabs from other cities to LA to join in.

Though the violence of the Zoot Suit Riots was largely one-sided, pro-military wartime sentiment and prevalent racism helped draw a biased picture of the events. The press, and eventually the laws, came down solidly on the side of the rioters.

Though more cautious than tabloids that openly celebrated the beatings, the Los Angeles Times described zoot suits as a ‘badge of delinquency’ and claimed, ‘Zoot Suiters Learn Lesson.’ Other publications praised the sailors for ‘cleaning up the streets.’

Local authorities did not put an end to the rioting, which continued for over a week. Eventually, the U.S. military banned servicemen from leaving the Armory, and the riots quieted down.

Even after the riot in Los Angeles ended, similar violence flared up in Texas, Arizona, and places as far away as Philadelphia. Luckily, no deaths resulted from any of the rioting—only injuries.

The one gesture the Los Angeles authorities made toward ending the violence was to ban the wearing of zoot suits within city limits. Technically, you could still be arrested for the crime today.