HUNDREDS of thousands of Hispanics boycotted work and more than a million joined mass street protests across the US yesterday to demand legal rights and show Middle America how vital they are to the economy.

In one of the biggest protests since the Civil Rights era, Una Dia Sin Immigrantes (A Day Without Immigrants) closed meat-packing plants, restaurants, vineyards and hotels, as Latino immigrants, waving US and Mexican flags and holding aloft banners proclaiming “We are workers, not criminals!” filled more than 60 cities.

Some of the biggest businesses had to close after their largely Hispanic workforce, trying to demonstrate America’s dependence on 11 million illegal workers to carry out its low-wage jobs, stayed away from work. May 1 is not a national holiday in the US, where Labor Day is September 4.

Tyson Foods, the world’s largest meat producer, shut five of its nine beef plants and four of its six pork factories. Perdue Farms, America’s third-largest chicken producer, closed eight of its fourteen plants.

Gallo Wines in Sonoma, California, gave 150 mostly Hispanic employees the day off. McDonald’s said that some of its restaurants were operating with limited crews, were open for shorter hours or with a drive-through service only.

In Union Square, New York, the open-air market operated at a fraction of its typical activity. On Broadway, the pavement shops were mostly shuttered.

An estimated 400,000 people took to the streets of Chicago and more than half a million crowded the streets of Los Angeles, where about a third of small businesses in the city centre were closed.

In California, 14 million of the 33 million people are Hispanic. The United Farm Workers union reported that nearly all agricultural workers in southern California had not turned up for work.

The Port of Long Beach, about 30 miles south of Los Angeles, was quiet. Sammy Rodriguez, a driver, said that 100 lorries normally queued each morning outside the terminal; yesterday only three appeared.

However, not all America’s Hispanics boycotted work. There are divisions over how to proceed in their demands that illegal immigrants be given the chance to obtain citizenship. Some Hispanic leaders feared that a strike would harm their interests.

President Bush, who backs immigration reform, criticised the boycott and rejected a Spanish version of The Star-Spangled Banner: immigrants should learn English so that they could sing the US national anthem as it was written, he said.

The protest, fuelled by huge rallies across the US last month that forced immigration reform to the top of Congress’s agenda, came as the Senate resumed debate on the issue.

Latinos account for 40 million of the estimated US population of 298 million and in 2000 became the largest minority in the US, surpassing blacks.

They have been galvanised by a Bill passed in the House of Representatives in December that would make it a federal crime to live illegally in the US. Conservative Republicans want all illegal immigrants deported and a security wall built along the US-Mexican border.

After rallies that gave voice to anger over America’s immigration policies, Senate Republicans made a compromise proposal that would restrict new arrivals but give seven million workers who have lived in the US for more than five years the right to apply for citizenship provided they pay fines and taxes and learn English. Under the proposal, three million others will be asked to go home before returning on temporary work visas that could qualify them for citizenship.

Thousands of Mexicans at home joined the protests yesterday, gathering outside the US Embassy in Mexico City. A dozen people were arrested in scuffles with police at a border crossing between Tijuana and San Diego.

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