The Zoot Suit Riots in 1943 and the infamous Sleepy Lagoon murder trial of the preceding year represent a turning point in the cultural identity and historical experience of Mexican Americans in the United States. This engaging study of these regrettable events provides context for understanding the continuing battles in the 21st century over immigration policy and race relations.

• Connects the racially and socioeconomically motivated events of the World War II-era 1940s to the Chicano movement of the 1970s and the current battles over immigration legislation, allowing readers to see the recurring theme in American history

• Exposes the distortions of a yellow journalistic press in its coverage and treatment of the Sleepy Lagoon trial and Zoot Suit Riots, providing documentation of how white America's perception of Mexican Americans has been fashioned over many years by the mainstream media

• Documents how the zoot-suit and Pachuco cultures of Mexican American youths of the 1940s—an expression of their identity and an attempt to establish their place in the larger American culture—were a key reason behind the violent culture clashes

• Includes previously unpublished primary documents from the National Archives and Records Administration and the Franklin Roosevelt Library