Is March 31 still called Cesar Chavez Day?

That depends on the state. As of August 29, 2026, Texas law still uses the name, California's holiday code calls the date Farmworkers Day, Colorado calls it Farm Workers Day through 2027, and Arizona has repealed its observance.

Is Farmworkers Day a different holiday?

No. It is the same March 31 observance renamed by statute in California and Colorado, not an extra day added to the calendar.

Cesar Chavez Day

Next celebratedWednesday, March 31, 2027

California renamed its March 31 holiday Farmworkers Day in one code and left Cesar Chavez Day standing in another - both texts are current law. What the date is called now depends on which state you open the book in.

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Last updated September 6, 2026 · by the Holiday Calendar TeamHave an update or spot an error?

YEARLY DATEMarch 31

OBSERVED INUnited States

CATEGORYCulture

SUBCATEGORYFamous People

ORIGIN

Enacted Law

FOUNDING ENTITY

California State Senator Richard Polanco

FIRST OBSERVED

2000

HOW THE HOLIDAY CAME TO BE

The act that made it paid found schools already closing.

SB 984, carried by state Senator Richard Polanco and signed by Governor Gray Davis on August 18, 2000, made March 31 a paid holiday for California state employees and put Cesar Chavez into the school curriculum. The act's own digest records that California law already allowed schools to close that day before it passed.

Read the 2000 chaptered statutevia California Legislative Information

INTRO

Why California's law books disagree about one date

California renamed its March 31 state holiday and left part of its own code alone. The Government Code now reads Farmworkers Day. The Education Code still reads Cesar Chavez Day.

The rename ran through the Government Code, which carries the list of state holidays. It never touched the Education Code, which governs what schools do on the date. Both texts are current law.

That split is a fair picture of where the day stands. What March 31 is called now depends on which state's code you open, and in one state, on which year it is.

ORIGINS

Cesar Chavez Day history

INTRODUCTION

California's schools got the day before its state employees did. Existing law already let public schools close on March 31, and the act that later built the paid holiday says so in its own digest.

The bill was SB 984, carried by state Senator Richard Polanco. Governor Gray Davis signed it in the summer of 2000. It made March 31 a paid day off for state employees and put Chavez into the school curriculum.

CHAPTER 01

A holiday that closed almost nothing

Other states took the day in a weaker form. Texas added an optional holiday in 1999, the year before California's act. Colorado added its own in 2001.

CHAPTER 02

Eleven proclamations, and no federal holiday

The day is not in the federal holiday statute. Presidents Barack Obama and Joseph R. Biden Jr. issued eleven Cesar Chavez Day proclamations, the last of them in 2024. A proclamation names a single dated year and calls on Americans to observe it.

CHAPTER 03

Reports in March, laws by April

The union spoke before the newspaper did. The United Farm Workers said on March 17, 2026 that it had learned of deeply troubling allegations against Chavez, that it had no firsthand knowledge of them, and that it would not take part in any Cesar Chavez Day activities.

The New York Times published its investigation the next day. CNN, summarizing it, said the Times reported allegations that Chavez abused and molested multiple women over decades, some of them minors. CNN added that it had not independently verified the allegations.

Three legislatures acted next. California renamed its state holiday Farmworkers Day on March 26. Colorado renamed its own five days later, and Arizona repealed its observance the day after that.

Texas changed nothing, and its holiday chapter still carries the name. The record is not finished. Every legal position on this page was read in the primary record on August 29, 2026, and the page is updated as the law moves.

AT A GLANCE

Where March 31 stands, by jurisdiction

California: Farmworkers Day since March 26, 2026 (AB 2156, Ch. 7)
Colorado: Farm Workers Day, 2026 and 2027 only (HB 26-1339, Ch. 31)
Texas: Still Cesar Chavez Day; optional holiday, Gov't Code 662.013, unamended since 1999
Arizona: Observance repealed April 1, 2026 (HB 2072, Ch. 9)
Federal: Not a legal public holiday (5 U.S.C. 6103); no Federal Register proclamation for 2025 or 2026
Statutes read: August 29, 2026; four states checked, not fifty

WHY THIS DAY MATTERS

Why Cesar Chavez Day Matters

LOCAL

In California, cities and counties are exempt unless they opt in.

Government Code 6700(a)(20)(B) exempts cities, counties and districts from the March 31 holiday unless each one adopts it by charter, ordinance or resolution. The same carve-out governs Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day and Lunar New Year.

EDUCATION

California's school duties outlived the rename

The Education Code still directs the State Board of Education to ensure the state curriculum includes instruction on Cesar Chavez and the history of the farm labor movement where appropriate. The Department of Education publishes its Farmworkers Day teaching materials under the new name.

CALENDAR

Colorado's new name has an expiry date

The Colorado act names two dates and then stops. Its own legislative declaration states that the name of future observances will require additional legislative action.

GOOD TO KNOW

Surprising facts about Cesar Chavez Day

Arizona's repeal arrived inside a lactation care bill

House Bill 2072 was introduced in January 2026 under the title 'lactation care providers; certification'. A Senate committee replaced its entire contents with the Cesar Chavez day repeal that March.

Arizona's own statute said it was not a holiday

The repealed section ran to two sentences. The second one read that Dr. Cesar Estrada Chavez day is not a legal holiday.

All 80 Assembly members co-authored the rename

The California Department of Education said AB 2156 was authored by the Assembly Speaker and the Senate President pro Tempore. It was co-authored, the department said, by all 80 lawmakers in the State Assembly.

The two new names are spelled differently

California's statute writes Farmworkers Day as a single word. Colorado's writes Farm Workers Day as two.

Texas orders its agencies to stay open

State agencies must remain open on the day and run at a minimum level. An employee who takes it off gives up another state holiday in exchange.

California's rename passed as an urgency statute

AB 2156 carried an urgency clause and took effect the day it was signed. The bill gave its reason as the proximity of the holiday in the 2026 calendar year.

GET INVOLVED

How to Observe Cesar Chavez Day

Read the statute for your own state

The text is short and settles what the day actually is where you live. Texas and California both publish their holiday chapters in full.

READ

Read the first Farmworkers Day proclamation

California's governor issued it for March 31, 2026, the first under the renamed statute. It says the farmworker movement 'was, and is, a collective movement, bigger than any one person.'

USE

Use the state's own classroom resources

The California Department of Education keeps a Farmworkers Day page of migrant education and ethnic studies materials. It gathers resources for teaching about the California farmworkers movement.

LEARN

Learn what the farm labor movement won

Colorado's 2026 act sets out the movement's achievements in its own legislative declaration, from the first union contracts requiring clean drinking water to the abolition of the short-handled hoe. The list is the General Assembly's own, written into the statute.

COMPARE

Compare the two sections that carry the day

Government Code 19853 entitles state employees to March 31 as a bare date, with no holiday name attached to it. Read it beside the renamed holiday list to see why the paid day off came through the rename untouched.

Answer

No. Federal law lists eleven legal public holidays and none of them is a Cesar Chavez day, so federal offices stay open on March 31.

COLOPHON

Sources

How we know what’s on this page. References, not endorsements.

19sources

18primary records

15independently dated

Primary records

California Legislative Information2026

Government Code Section 6700

The state holiday list, with March 31 now named Farmworkers Day.