Devotees of Crusader Alice McGrath Gather to Mark Her Birthday

To those who wage endless battles on behalf of the downtrodden, Alice McGrath is an icon. On Sunday, they paid homage to her on her 75th birthday.

More than 100 politicians, activists and plain folks from near and far who have been inspired by McGrath’s campaigns against social injustice packed the Ventura Elks Lodge to toast and reminisce about half a century of social change in America.

Much of McGrath’s work in recent years has centered on attempting to widen support for the Sandinistas in Nicaragua. Before that, her many causes included campaigning against the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II.

But she is probably best remembered for her first political act of courage--a successful campaign half a century ago to free the Latino “zoot-suiters” convicted in the infamous Sleepy Lagoon murder case in Los Angeles.

Indeed, some of the original zoot-suiters--so-called because of their distinctive pegged pants and long coats--attended the party Sunday. They were not shy about their reverence for McGrath.

“You can’t beat that girl,” said John Matuz, 69, of Norwalk. He was one of a dozen young Latinos convicted in 1942 in the death of a youth during a gang fight near a Montebello irrigation ditch known as Sleepy Lagoon.

The 12 defendants spent two years in prison at San Quentin while McGrath led a campaign to overturn their convictions. Historians and legal scholars generally agree that the trial was a travesty of justice.

“That was a classic example of an unfair trial,” said Steven Stone, presiding justice of the Ventura division of the 2nd District Court of Appeal, who was mixing with the crowd Sunday. He said several aspects of the trial raised constitutional issues, such as the trial judge’s order prohibiting the defendants from conferring with their attorneys during the trial.

In 1944, that order was one of the reasons cited by the 2nd District Court when it overturned the convictions. The court also ruled that the trial judge displayed prejudice and hostility toward the defendants.

The slaying--which was never solved--and McGrath’s campaign to overturn the convictions spawned the play “Zoot Suit” by Luis Valdez.

The defendants who attended Sunday’s party recalled McGrath as a frequent visitor while they endured prison life, one who brought them magazines and kept them informed of her fund-raising and speaking efforts on their behalf.

“This is me,” said an excited H.J. Ynostroza, 66, one of the defendants, pointing to a photo on McGrath’s birthday invitation card. The picture showed the 12 zoot-suiters walking out of the Hall of Justice in Los Angeles, free men after the appellate decision.

“She’s always been on my mind,” said Manuel Delgado, 68, another defendant. “I love her.”

McGrath, a widow who is not related to Ventura County’s pioneer McGrath family, moved to Ventura in 1967.

She was reflective when asked about what she perceives to be a dismantling of half a century of civil rights progress.

“This is the worst political climate of my life,” she said.

She recalled when “I had friends of color--Asian, Mexican, black,” and there were places where they could not eat together in Los Angeles--except, as she put it, “in the neighborhoods.”

Then came the blood and tears of the civil rights movement and, she recalled, the nation finally appeared to be on a course that would bury bigotry.

Now, she lamented, “we hear people making very racist remarks again, as if it’s quite all right to be racist. And I find that very sad. I find that very sad.”

Does McGrath have a legacy to leave her followers?

“Nothing, nothing,” she said. “If my example makes other people think they can do something, that’s fine.”

In a few weeks, McGrath will again be traveling to Nicaragua to lay the groundwork for a visiting group of American scholars.

“So I keep busy,” she said. “I keep busy.”