EDITORIAL DISHONORING CESAR CHAVEZ WORKING PEOPLE DON'T BENEFIT FROM ANOTHER STATE HOLIDAY - BUREAUCRATS DO.

HOW'S this for irony: Cesar Chavez spent his life fighting for a fair deal for hard-working, low-paid farm workers, but in honoring him, the state of California has decided to grant an extra benefit to those who are often underworked and overpaid - state employees.

Before Gov. Gray Davis signed the bill giving Chavez his own holiday - a recognition that had broad support across the state - state employees already enjoyed 13 paid holidays a year.

Now, with the Friday or Monday closest to March 31 becoming Cesar Chavez Day, the total goes up to 14. That's almost three full workweeks off.

And that's on top of state employees' two to four weeks of paid vacation.

Between overtime and vacation expenses, the Cesar Chavez holiday will cost California taxpayers $46.5 million a year.

So while the state's bureaucrats get to take yet another day off at the public's expense, the farm workers Cesar Chavez defended - and most of the rest of us - can toil away in the fields to pay for it.

That's not an honor to the memory of Cesar Chavez.

If Davis and the Legislature want the public to underwrite easy living for California's 210,000 employees, why not at least be forthright about it? Drop this nonsense about ``Cesar Chavez Day'' and use a more accurate title, such as ``Taxpayer-Funded Sop to the Public-Employee Unions that Bankroll Our Campaigns Day.''

Or if that's too long, how about ``Farm Workers Labor for Bureaucratic Leisure Day''?

Cesar Chavez, sadly, has very little to do with Cesar Chavez Day. The politicians wrapped their gift to the public-employees union in his name, hoping that because so many Californians hold Chavez in high regard, no one would object.

They even packaged the holiday with a legislative call for teachers to devote the day to teaching their students about Chavez.

But if including Cesar Chavez in the classroom curriculum were the issue, legislators could have passed the education portion of the legislation without including the costly day off.

Here's a better idea for how to celebrate Cesar Chavez and honor the ideals he promoted: give a paid day off to California's farm workers, and send state employees out to the fields to do their work for them.

We suspect that if Chavez were still around, he'd support that plan.

Our politicians care much less about helping the exploited than about exploiting the name of the man who championed them.

That is ironic. It's also pretty sad.