IF THE past isn’t what you want it to be, why not change it?

That seems to be the attitude of California’s Hispanic activists, who have turned UFW leader Cesar Chavez into the patron saint of immigrants’ rights.

Chavez died in 1993 and is helpless to complain about the usurpation of his long and distinguished career fighting to improve the lives of the nation’s farmworkers. Since many of those farmworkers were Mexican-Americans, it’s easy to turn him into an icon of the Reconquista movement.

But the fact is that Chavez, a third-generation American citizen, adamantly opposed illegal immigration and regularly demanded action from Congress and the INS to stop it. In 1969, accompanied by Sen. Walter Mondale and civil rights leader Ralph Abernathy, Chavez led a march on the U.S.-Mexico border demanding federal action to prevent illegal immigrants from crossing.

Chavez’ reasoning was simple: Since wages were (and are) so low in Mexico, immigrants from that nation would obviously be willing to work for far less than native-born Americans. And since the standard of living in many Mexican towns was (and remains) appallingly low, they would also be willing to work in conditions that U.S. citizens would never tolerate. Accordingly, a steady flow of illegal immigrants would undermine Chavez’ goal of higher pay and better working conditions for farmworkers.

If Chavez were alive today, he would be shocked to see how the flow of illegal immigrants has turned into a flood, drastically altering the cultural landscape of California, Arizona, Nevada and many other states, and driving down wages in many industries and professions.

To cite one example that often shows up in the pages of this newspaper: Food writer Margot Petit Nichols regularly profiles chefs in Monterey Peninsula restaurants, detailing their skill and professionalism, and their inventiveness with many types of cooking. And for the vast majority of these chefs, there is another common factor: They are from Mexico. Margot is too polite to inquire whether they entered the country illegally, or even whether they are illegally here now. But it’s a safe bet that most of them did, and some of them are.

Often, during the debate over the pros and cons of illegal immigration from Mexico, the “fact” is often cited that Mexican immigrants play an essential role in our economy because they are willing to take jobs that “regular” Americans refuse to do.

But how did it happen that so many Carmel restaurants have Mexican chefs? Is it because U.S. citizens, of whatever race, no longer want to be chefs? Can it be that running an upscale restaurant and cooking for the affluent is considered beneath someone who was born in San Francisco, Chicago or Boston? Do the great-grandchildren of earlier generations of immigrants from Ireland, Italy, Asia and Africa look down their noses at careers in haute cuisine? Or do Mexicans simply have better cooking skills? Hardly.

The reason that restaurant kitchens in Carmel, Pebble Beach and other local communities have so many Mexican immigrants working in them is that these workers could be hired for less.

Cesar Chavez was right. Massive illegal immigration hurts American workers. And it is happening all around us.