Guest Column
Repatriation of Mexicans: A Dark Period in American History
By Joe Olvera
Sometimes Anglo Americans can be so cruel. When I use the word Anglo, I don’t mean just those Europeans who hail from England. I’m talking about every European-American, including Germans, Irish, French, Spaniards, Brits, and other white-skinned people who originated in Europe. Throughout history, Anglos have conquered, decimated, obliterated, castigated, chopped off feet, enslaved, and, in short, they have created havoc against dark-skinned peoples. Don’t believe me?
Let’s look at one of the cruelest moments in Anglo-American history – Repatriation. The word sounds so innocent and innocuous. It sounds almost angelic, it sounds soft and inviting and, dare I say it – Patriotic? Yes, it does. What it means, however, is much more sinister. Let me explain. During the Depression in the early 1930s, more than one million Mexicans – maybe more – both legal and illegal, were forced to return to Mexico by racist zealots who didn’t like our presence here. Ironically, most Mexicans did go back without a fight.
In short, they accepted the onus that had been placed on their heads. In 1931, all roads in America led to Mexico, and those roads were basically filled with those who were actually without a country. Many of them weren’t Mexican – they were U.S. citizens, but it didn’t matter. Their status as American citizens didn’t protect them from being kicked out of the U.S. In many cases, these American citizens didn’t have any family in Mexico, yet, they were thrust across the border like a sack of rotten potatoes.
I’ve often wondered why those Mexicans didn’t put up a fight. Did Anglos really have that much power? Did they really have the audacity to kick out people who had once owned what became the Southwest United States of America? Yes, Anglos did have that audacity, starting with then-Secretary of Labor William N. Doak, who instigated a scare campaign against Mexicans, reviling them as dangerous and obstructive because they allegedly took jobs away from Anglo Americans.
The Anglo American public, never one to shy away from demonizing minorities, took up the clarion call and considered Mexicans as people who where impoverished, dirty, illiterate, and a drain on the U.S. economy. Never mind that Mexicans had been doing the dirtiest, lowest paid and most dangerous jobs. All of a sudden, they were a drag on society because the Depression had left many Anglo Americans without jobs. Jobs, they felt, which Mexicans were doing at the expense of their own well-being.
Did Anglo Americans care that their Repatriation campaign resulted in innocent people being herded like cattle and pushed across the river? Not in the least. Did they care that what they were doing was a violation of human and civil rights? Not in the least. Mexicans were seen as expandable and they were jailed indiscriminately. Did Anglo Americans care that U.S.-born Mexican children and adults were among those who were being repatriated? Not in the least. Did they care that even very sick people were also taken from their beds and shoved across the river? Not in the least.
After all, everyone knew that Mexicans wouldn’t complain. They were used to being kicked around, used to being abused. Ever since the U.S. had stolen land that had once belonged to Mexico, Mexicans knew that they were allowed in the U.S. only because their strong backs and strong arms were needed to pick the crops and to do the dirtiest of jobs at slave wages. Once they were no longer needed, they meekly accepted their fate. Is it any wonder then why Anglo Americans generally still regard Mexicans in the same light as they were viewed in the 1930s?
Today, in the Year 2005, things haven’t changed that much. Even former Presidential candidate and racist political pundit Pat Buchanan has suggested that Mexicans should be repatriated back to Mexico to get rid of the undocumented immigration situation - a situation seen as a problem by some, but not by us Chicanos.
“Why don’t we do what we did in the 1930s, and kick them out of the U.S. and back to Mexico?” Buchanan uttered words like that when he appeared not too long ago in one of those Anglos-only, so-called news programs on cable t.v. The worst part of it? He was serious. He really wants for the U.S. to kick back to Mexico all those undocumented people. Is he crazy? Does he think that we will stand for a repeat of this shameful period in U.S. history?
That’s what really gets me about Anglo Americans – especially males. They don’t care that they got what they got through hook and by crook. Even after the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo was signed in 1848, Anglo Americans continued to use the courts to steal even more land from those Mexicans who opted to stay here and, in effect, become U.S. citizens. I guess they thought they would be accorded the same rights and privileges as other U.S. citizens. Boy, were they in for a rude awakening.
What gets me, the most, however, is why Anglo Americans think they can still get away with BS tactics like they used to do in the past. Don’t they realize that we Mexicans are now not only the largest minority in the nation, but we are infinitely more educated than we were in the 1930s? We have learned to fight back, Pat Buchanan.
Do you think for one minute, Pat, that we would allow ourselves to be pushed around by the likes of you and your cohorts? Not anymore, buddy. And, I use the word Buddy in the most pejorative manner, because Buchanan is not my buddy. A fact which, I’m sure, will delight him no end, because he doesn’t want me for a buddy either. What I’m wondering is why Buchanan, Bill O’Reilly, Lou Dobbs, et al, don’t talk about this most shameful period in U.S. history? Do they think we’re ever going to forget? Not very likely. How could we ever forget such gross abuse and insult?
The gist is that there might’ve been a time when we Mexicans, Chicanos, and Mexican Americans may have let ourselves be led by the nose and used and abused by Anglo Americans. But no more. Those days are long gone. I sure would love to see Buchanan and other Mexican haters try to repatriate us to Mexico once again. If we move to Mexico, it will be under our own power, and only because we want to, not because Buchanan and his like don’t want us here.
So, might as well get used to us being here, Pat Buchanan. Because, we’re not going anywhere. This is our land too, you know. In fact, it’s more our land than it is yours if you really want to hear the truth. While Anglo Americans might pretend that the entire U.S. belongs to them, it really doesn’t. But, it’s okay. Let them dream if they want to. The U.S. belongs to all of us, whether you Anglo Americans want to accept it or not.
Sin Fin
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