Biography
Chris Mensalvas (also spelled Mensalvos) was a Filipino American labor leader and poet who in 1949 was elected president of Local 7 of the cannery workers' union — which soon became Local 37 of the ILWU, the Seattle-based Filipino cannery workers' union. Shortly after taking office he was arrested on anti-Communist and deportation charges, and he spent the McCarthy years fighting repeated attempts to deport him under the McCarran–Walter Act. He defeated the deportation drive and remained president of Local 37 throughout the 1950s. His case was part of the government's campaign to break militant, foreign-born trade unionists by deporting them for their labor and political activity.
