Soc 105 Ch 8

Mexican Revolution

*push factor* (into the US) The Mexican Revolution (1910-1920), which began that year, had a huge impact on the area along the 2,000 miles of U.S.-Mexican border that separated four U.S. and six Mexican states. The Revolution produced hundreds of icons: Fran- cisco Madero, Ricardo Flores Magón, Pancho Villa, Emiliano Zapata, and Las Adelitas—Mexican women who risked their lives along with Mexican soldiers in the violent civil war the revolution struck an irrational fear into many Euro-Americans, who panicked and committed violent acts of racism (ex. in Rock Springs, Texas, in November 1910, a mob killed Antonio Rodríguez, 20, while he awaited trial. Vigilantes dragged Rodríguez out of his cell, tied him to a stake, and burned him alive. Rodríguez's murder so enraged Mexicans south of the Rio Bravo that citizens throughout Mexico revolted against Díaz—days before November 20, 1910, when the Mexican Revolution supposedly began) [pg. 169]

overview

1880s- the railroad had facilitated the expansion of trade in both Mexico and the U.S. (also facilitated the movement of many Mexicans to the U.S.) Commercial agriculture in Mexico created *push factors* that uprooted thousands of Mexican laborers and their families. Initially they migrated to urban centers near their villages; then some went to work on railroads; some sought employment in the mines of northern Mexico; and others fled to the Southwest. They went north because of *pull factors*—simply put, because there were jobs in the north that attracted them. The railroads had integrated and industrialized the U.S. economy and created jobs at the bottom level of the market.2 Mexicans met these needs as they filled low-end jobs in factories, mines, railroads, farms, and ranches. the railroad had shrunk dis- tances between the interior and northern reaches of Mexico, and people from the interior migrated in larger numbers (to the U.S.) Not all Mexicans were uprooted peasants: many political refugees fled the dictatorship of Porfirio Díaz (push factor); some were skilled workers (pull factor); others came for short periods and returned; and still others were "pushed" north because of natural disasters such as droughts. This migration was hastened by the privatization of the land and resources of the country that favored the rich and foreign investors. - Fifteen thousand miles of railroad were built during the Porfiriato; most lines ran north and south, with spur tracks providing better access to local and regional markets. Mines attracted armies of Mexican workers to northern Mexican states as well as to Arizona, New Mexico, and Colorado. The dramatic expansion of commercial agriculture and the cities generated a demand for tens of thousands of laborers. Push factor: population growth; at the end of Porfiriato in 1910, the census counted more than 15 million inhabitants - small family farms could no longer support the larger numbers of people, most of whom eventually moved to cities to find supplemental or permanent employment The railroad system expanded and accelerated the commercialization of the West, where machines replaced animals. The construc- tion of railroads created a demand for iron and steel, a demand for rails and locomotives, a demand for capital, a demand for workers, and a demand for food. The arrival of more immigrants evoked angst among the Euro-American population, which cried for limiting immigration. the Chinese exclusion act and the Gentlemen's Agreements w/ Japan reduced and then eliminated the # of Chinese and Japanese immigrating to the U.S. increasing the *pull* of Mexican workers With the decline in the number of Chinese and Native American workers available, the solution was to hire more Mexicans. (pg. 161) the railroad networks that linked the two countries also increased interaction resulting in industrial development in Mexico & the U.S. = workers from the interior of Mexico went to its northern states - large commercial farming; once harvest was over, many of the workers migrated to other agricultural areas in Mexico and the U.S. (followed the crops) *Mexican labor moved into and out of the U.S.* - developed the Euro-American Southwest (Mexicans began to outnumber Euro-Americans in the U.S.) - maj of Mexicans in the U.S. were born there = racism and xenophobia - many rural migrants continued to use Spanish as their primary language whereas Mexicans in urban areas tended to adopt English more quickly, especially the second generation.

A changing society

1900- most Mexicans worked in agriculture and were the last urbanized immigrant group in the US (by 1920, 47% of the Mexicans who were born in Mexico lived in urban areas) Many second generation Mexicans, along w. political refugees became merchants or took middle- level jobs b/w 1900 and 1920, Mexicans adapted to the Euro-American society in stages (each generation included US born children/ some took immigrant immigrant spouses while others took US born spouses subtle differences b/w the disparate generations as well as within generations depending on the hue of their skin and where they lived *racism was always more severe in Texas* (former Confederate state) - an influx of midwesterners into Texas worsened racial tensions (the white newcomers often resented Mexicans b/c the saw them as the base of the political machines that ran south of Texas = part of the political problem) By the 1910s, Mexicans were caught in the middle of these contending groups; the midwestern faction was winning out and overthrowing old political bosses. In theory, this was a victory for democracy; in reality, the decline of the political machines removed arrangements that had cushioned racism toward Mexicans. - the new political order came w/ new ways of excluding Mexicans, such as the "white man's primary" which was instituted to prevent Mexicans from voting in primaries and to ensure the control of the white farmer

Hysteria across the border

After 1913, Francisco "Pancho" Villa emerged as the most popular leader in Chihuahua and throughout much of Mexico. The Mexican Revolution was a milestone in the lives of Mexicans and pivotal in forming the stereotype of the Mexican as a bandit. the North American press whipped up anti-Mexican sentiments that contributed to intensified discrimination against Mexican immigrants and perpetuated the many negative images of them From the beginning of the conflict, in 1910, U.S. corporations, individuals doing business in Mexico, and the Catholic Church called for military intervention. Many business leaders had supported Porfirio Díaz because he pandered to their interests. The size of the army was larger than the population of either Nevada (81,875) or Wyoming (145,965). This mobilization certainly prepared the people for a war with Mexico and conditioned the soldiers and their families to fear and hate Mexicans. The Villa hysteria (frenzy) found fertile ground in places like Los Angeles, where the Mexican population swelled after 1910. On November 18, 1913, the Los Angeles police assigned several officers to investigate a subversive plot by Mexican "reds" and cholos (half-breeds).

the Mexican Diaspora

Because three-quarters of the Mexican-U.S. border is in Texas, many incoming Mexicans first settled there. (however, changes were occurring) - "As recently as 1900, immigrant Mexicans were seldom found more than one hundred miles from the border. Now they are working as unskilled laborers and as section hands as far east as Chicago and as far north as Iowa, Wyoming, and San Francisco." - Mexican laborers and their families migrated in response to bonanzas, sources of job opp's, other than mining The industrialization of agriculture and the growth of cities demanded huge amounts of labor. The expansion and contraction of these industries constantly attracted and uprooted these armies of workers who were in search of stability and control over their lives. The Mexican diaspora was accelerated by U.S. policies such as the Dingley Tariff of 1897 that raised the tax on imported sugar, dramatically expanding the cultivation of sugar beets in the South- west and Midwest, and in turn increasing the demand for migrant workers. - Mexican labor increased (pg. 166) because of the heavy demand for labor, "South Texas remained basically Mexican"—with Mexicans moving out and other Mexicans moving in Texas growers encouraged this heavy migration of Mexicans, knowing that the development of the area depended on Mexican labor. The continual migration changed long-established Mexican communities within south Texas, such as Corpus Christi, Laredo, and Brownsville, where recently arrived Mexicans out- numbered the older Texas Mexican residents. Cotton was the main cash crop and the *pull factor* that attracted Mexicans until the late 1920s, after which spinach and other vegetables acquired a greater share of the market. Mexicans moved from ranchos to colonias, where contractors recruited them to work as farmhands in California, Colorado, and Michigan. - Agribusiness also increased the number of Mexicans in Arizona and California. (From 1907 to 1920, orange and lemon production in California quadrupled; between 1917 and 1922, cantaloupe production doubled, grapes tri- pled, and lettuce quadrupled. Such unprecedented production intensified the demand for Mexican labor in California agriculture, which became nothing short of a bonanza for them)

Mexican workers under siege

Labor organization was rare in rural areas; it was far more common in urban settings and in the mining camps. Given the discriminatory exclusion of Mexicans from trade unions, throughout the 1910s mutual- istas continued to be their most popular form of association. occasionally, organization such as the IWW were active in organizing casual workers in mining and agriculture. (called the Wobblies) - included p.o.c. within their "one big union" Working and living conditions at the ranch were horrendous, and wages were less than those advertised. Tempers soared and the workers struck. The state actively intervened on the side of the growers to rid the fields of the IWW militants, resulting in the killing of four men and the wounding of a dozen others. dramatic strikes - pg. 172 As dramatic as these events were, the killing fields of Arizona ranked far higher in the annals of labor history; yet little has been written about them. (pg. 172) Western Federation of Miners abetted (encouraged) Ray Consolidated's racial policies by not organizing across racial lines Ray became a hotbed of Mexican activism, and revolutionary organizers constantly visited it, looking for volunteers, arms, and money. The Arizona Alien Labor Law, requiring companies to employ at least 80 percent Euro-American labor, increased tensions between Mexican and Euro-American miners. Violence broke out in the summer of 1914 when Euro-Americans chased Peter Smith, a half-breed Mexican, after he allegedly stole a horse in Ray and took to the hills. Smith and two (or more) of his com- panions ambushed the posse.64 In retaliation, someone stabbed a Mexican boss of an all-Mexican mine crew to death while he was asleep. Several more shootings occurred, and a race war followed. (pg. 173) Meanwhile, the WFM was beginning to reconsider its policy of excluding Mexicans, because of competition from the IWW. By 1914, the copper barons had escalated their campaign of intimidation, subversion, libel, and slander against labor. A core of Mexican union leaders had emerged, with the backing of a minor- ity of Euro-American organizers who wanted to include Mexicans as members. Through this cooperation, in 1915 the union launched a strike at the Clifton-Morenci-Metcalf mining camps, which drew a bevy of inclusionist WFM and Mexican organizers, such as Lazaro Gutiérrez de Lara. The strike lasted five months. - Although it was a bitter one, violence was averted because of the intervention of Arizona Governor George W. P. Hunt and local Sheriff James Cash, who were determined to prevent another Ludlow Massacre. = strikes continued By 1917, the war between the workers and the copper barons came to a head. On June 24, the union struck at Bisbee and Jerome, where a large number of Mexican miners worked. The Cochise County sheriff im- mediately labeled the strike as subversive and announced intentions to deport any members of the IWW. With the aid of a vigilante committee, a posse deported 67 miners from Jerome and some 1,200 from Bisbee. The sheriff seized the telegraph and telephone office, and did not permit news dispatches. (pg. 173) [Local authorities, along with racist nativists, loaded strikers into boxcars and shipped them to the outskirts of Columbus, New Mexico, where state police authorities dumped them in the open desert without food or water. Because President Woodrow Wilson had strong ties to Phelps-Dodge, no one was punished for the gross constitutional violations] - the cooper barons had their way in the end

conclusion: Mexicans in the City, the Backlash

Mexicans came into the US in large numbers: NOT b/c they enjoyed the company of white Americans, but b/c they were uprooted the expansion of the railroads that linked Mexico and the US was a major factor in the modernization of Mexico = thus, the uprooting did NOT cause the building of the railroad; it was the other way around *pull factors*: Where Mexicans moved to is also related to causes and effects. Railroads, farming, construction work, and mining all pulled Mexicans to the United States. (their arrival in large numbers created great resentment among the Euro-Americans)

workers find their voice

On January 19, 1903, the Arizona legislature passed a law prohibiting miners from working more than eight hours per day underground. The eight-hour law was a major victory for union men. However, its true purpose was to eliminate foreign-born Mexicans, who had to work 10-12 hours a day to make ends meet with their lower wage scale. On the morning of June 3, miners responded by walking off the job, shutting down the smelters and mills, and beginning what Jeanne Parks Ringgold, granddaughter of then-sheriff Jim Parks of Clifton, called the "bloodiest battle in the history of mining in Arizona." Around 1,200-1,500 miners participated, of whom 80-90 percent were Mexican, who were frustrated by the mine owners stonewalling them. Consequently the miners armed themselves and took control of the mines, and shut them down. - Abraham Salcido, the president of a mutualista; Frank Colombo, an Italian; Weneslado H. Laustaunau, a Mexican miner; and A. C. Cruz, another Mexican worker, led the strike. Among the demands of the strikers were free hospitalization, paid life insurance for miners, locker rooms, fair prices at the company store, hiring only of men who were mem- bers of the society, and protection against being fired without cause. A distinguishing feature of this strike and other strikes of the decade is that the workers organized them through their mutualistas. These associations varied greatly in their political ideology, ranging from apolitical to reformist to radical. Mutual-aid societies met the immigrants' need for "fellowship, security, and recreation" and were a form of collective and voluntary self-help and self-defense. Their motto—Patria, Unión y Beneficencia (country, unity, and benevolence)—became a common unifying symbol throughout the Southwest and eventually throughout the Midwest as well.

bullets across the border

Some of the heaviest fighting along the U.S.-Mexican border took place in Chihuahua and to a lesser extent in Sonora. These were two highly industrialized states with customhouses, which made them attractive to the rebels and the federales. Sonora had giant copper mining centers in its northeastern region, only 25 miles from Douglas, Arizona, and connected through a railroad system. (Even a decade before the 1910 Revolution, rebels from the various factions of the revolution recruited heavily in Arizona mining camps. Miners as a rule owned rifles and ammunition. Because of living at close quarters and because of the nature of their work, miners were more militant than other workers) - further the frequent economic recessions and depressions made them restless and willing recruits for the various factions Tensions built up as U.S. troops, marshals, and officers of every description massed on the border as fighting broke out close to La Línea. Push factor: Porfiriato - to the move north The commercialization of agriculture and the construction of water projects increased the number of ranchos and attracted workers from within and outside the state. [Chihuahua was more industrialized than other states in Mexico] pg. 169

The Hysteria: Plan of San Diego

The harshness of this repression of Mexicans on the U.S. side of the border produced a variety of reactions. For example, in 1915, Texas authorities used the "Plan of San Diego" as an excuse to step up a reign of terror along the border. The plan, found on the person of rebel leader Basilio Ramos, called for a general uprising of Mexicans and other minorities starting February 20. The supporters were to execute all white males over age 16—blacks, Asians, and Native Americans were to be spared. Southwest was to become a Chicano nation, and blacks and Native Americans were to form independent countries (most Mexicans found the plan to be extreme and as taking the focus away from legitimate grievances) - For example, Flores Magón, in Regen- eración, never acknowledged or supported the plan, except for stating once that Texas authorities wanted "to make it appear as if the Mexican uprising in that section of the United States is part of the Plan of San Diego" in order to justify its reign of terror. Clearly, the most problematic part of the plan was the call for the murder of all white males over 16. The statement, simply put, confused or blurred the legitimate reasons for an uprising. At first, officials did not take the plan seriously, viewing rebels' raids as banditry and rustling. (pg. 174) The Euro-Americans' angst over what they perceived as revolutionary incitement led to the killing of hundreds of Mexicans. In the end, U.S. authorities admitted shooting, hanging, or beating to death 300 "suspected" Mexicans, while the rebels killed 21 Euro-Americans during this period.

shifts in political consensus

WW1 presented a major juncture in the assimilation of Mexicans - the more longer Mexicans remained in the US, the more entitled they felt to constitutional guarantees (became more noticeable in each succeeding generation) many Mexicans were beginning to feel more American and the war accelerated their assimilation/ but it also reinforced existing inequalities Some Tejanos (Mexicans born in Texas) and Mexicans did not know how to read or write English and were supposedly exempt, yet local boards drafted them into the army; Mexicans, or other poor people, were often the only ones called upon to serve. -Mexican casualties were high; unacknowledged act of bravery burned in the memories of many veterans such as J. Luz Saenz . The military also discriminated against Mexican American soldiers in other ways. El Paso veterans, most of whom were Mexican immigrants, complained that they were gassed in France but received no government disability benefits. /Mexican responses to industrial transformation:/ the cost of living had also risen dramatically b/c of WW1, but the workers wages remained the same = Mexican workers went on strike - European immigration had slowed, and Mexican workers began to filter in greater numbers into the Midwest. - white workers stereotyped Mexicans as scabs when in reality they were a minority of the strikebreakers. - Mexicans comprised less than 1 percent of the workforce. /// sugar beet companies relentlessly hunted for Mexican labor = constant increase in production= heavy reliance on Mexican labor/// Urbanization of Mexicans in general opened up significant space for women workers of all colors. Hearings conducted in El Paso in November 1919 by the Texas Industrial Welfare Commission found that Mexican women were "the lowest-paid and most vulnerable workers in the city." El Paso laundries employed large numbers of Mexicanas at unskilled jobs, whereas Euro-American women took the skilled jobs. Mexicanas earned $8 a week compared to $16.55 earned by Euro-American women. The work areas were segregated. (pg. 176) - The pretext for the double standard was that Mexicans had fewer needs than did whites and thus required less money. [In the 1920s, as the country became more nativist, calls for exclusion and deportation of Mexicans heightened, with American labor rewriting history]

World War 1: the shift

WW1 produced a labor shortage, and the US govt. fearing that Mexicans would flee the country, enlisted Catholic bishops to assure Mexicans that they would not be drafted Literacy Law of the Immigration Act of 1917 also cause a labor shortage: severely restricted the number of Europeans allowed into the country and it also slowed down the flow of Mexicans (profit motive trumped racism and soon afterwards to ease the labor crisis, US officials allowed exemptions for illiterate contract workers from Mexico entering the US, but req. that they paid an 8$ head tax, which was later waived owing to pressure from US famers) Despite the United States' entry into World War I, it had markedly relaxed efforts to control im- migration. Evidently profit trumped border security and the military turned the other way as thousands of Mexicans flowed freely across the river. In the four years the exemptions were in force (1917-1921), 72,862 Mexicans entered the United States with documents, and hundreds of thousands more crossed the border without documents. WW1 intensified indrustrilaization and urbanization in CA/ war industries attracted many Mexicans and AA's, and the large #s of Mexicans setting in LA created new social and economic pressures - Mexicans' choices as to where they would settle were determined by such factors as language and availability of transportation. - "Americans" blamed the blight around the Central Plaza on the Mexicans, saying that these foreigners contributed to a rapid disintegration of traditional "American values." - pg. 175

forging a community

Without an education, a people are frozen into the lower castes. Segregated schools were an important vehicle for whites to maintain control of the system. The pretexts for excluding Mexicans from white schools were that Mexicans were ill-clad, unclean, and immoral; interracial contact would lead to other relationships; Mexican children were not intelligent and learned more slowly; and so forth. In 1910, San Angelo (Texas) built new buildings for white children, and the school board assigned the old buildings to Mexicans. - Mexican parents boycotted the school—they wanted their children to share the new buildings with the white children or at least have all the buildings on the same grounds. The board refused to meet their demands. During the boycott, many parents sent their children to the Immaculate Conception Academy, a Catholic school that segregated Mexican students into a "Mexican room"; the Catholic school also refused their request to integrate. [the boycott continued for several yrs. till attrition (weakening) ended it around 1915] Euro-American xenophobia and racial attitudes that were part of American culture plagued each new wave of Mexican immigrants. For example, a 1910 Report of the Immigration Commission stated that Mexicans were the lowest paid of any laborers and that the majority worked as transient and migratory labor, did not settle, and returned to Mexico after only a few months. (the report professed this was due to the fact that "the assimilative qualities of the Mexicans are slight b/c of the backward educational facilities in their native land and a constitutional prejudice on the part of the peons (unskilled farm worker) towards school attendance" According to the report, Mexicans regarded public relief as a "pension"; the only saving grace was that they would return to Mexico within a few months.43 Meanwhile, the Mexican Revolution, which began in the same year the Immigration Report was issued, brought one of the largest shifts of population between the two countries, and the abruptly increased presence of brown-skinned people in the United States en- couraged even more exaggerated stereotypes.

Westward movement of Cotton King

cotton was impt. b/c it attracted huge armies of pickers and their families, determining where Mexicans settled - Between 1918 and 1921, the Arizona Cotton Growers Association imported more than 30,000 Mex- icans at a cost of $300,000. Because of the proximity to the border, Arizona cotton growers had an ample supply of pickers. On November 3, 1919, the Los Angeles Times reported, "Flood of Mexican Aliens a Problem," pointing out that the Mexican pickers came with their families and picked as a unit. In 1919, a projected $20 million Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company factory was announced for Los Angeles. The Goodyear Company had ranches in Arizona, which supplied cotton to the factory; but they bought additional cotton from other ranches as well. the cultivation of cotton and other crops formed a land bridge to LA, from where Mexican workers followed the crops north, south, east, and west Many of the Mexican workers' families remained in Los Angeles. The buildup of the Mexican population was made possible by irrigated farming and the land reclama- tion projects of the early twentieth century, which resulted in the construction of massive dams and the cultiva- tion of hundreds of thousands of acres of land. Similar developments were taking place in Texas, which had become a leading agricultural state. Cotton was important in driving the demand for Mexican labor. San Antonio, like Los Angeles, stood as a distribution center for Mexican labor and a favored destination for Mexican families. The Lone Star State was a reserve labor pool for the Midwest, where Mexican agricultural workers were replacing European immigrants as the 1917 Literacy Act excluded them.

industrial bonanzas

during the colonial era, bonanzas (a situation or event that creates a sudden increase in wealth, good fortune, or profits) drove the northward movement: silver & gold strike that attracted huge numbers of workers who hoped to strike it rich (w/ the hope of bettering their lives) After the U.S. Civil War (1861-1865), transportation costs dropped dramatically, which encouraged the investment of capital to exploit copper. Copper was the best and the least expensive conductor used in long-distance transmission of electricity. Railroads rendered giant copper camps profitable; and the "elec- tric age" created an insatiable market for copper. - . Simul- taneously, Euro-American copper barons exploited the great Mexican copper mines of Cananea, Nacozari, and other parts of Sonora. (Arizona became the global leader in the production of copper)

early Mexican-American Struggles to control the work place

the first wave of Mexicans coming to the United States before the turn of the nineteenth century mostly worked on the railroads, on farms, and in mines. Some also migrated to commercial centers such as Tucson, San Antonio, and then Los Angeles. Although they had greater opportunities than those in the migrant stream, economic and social mobility was limited by a racist ceiling that assumed they were unequal and deserved less pay than white people. = wave of strikes; Mexican workers demanded democracy in the workplace = labor organizations - pg. 167 in 1903 in California, Japanese and Mexican workers in Oxnard protested the practices of the Western Agricultural Contracting Company (WACC), which was withholding some of the workers' salaries until the end of the contract; 500 Japanese and 200 Mexican members of the Japanese-Mexican Labor Association (JMLA) called a strike. On March 23, two Mexican and two Japanese laborers were wounded, and 21-year-old Luis Vásquez was killed. The WACC conceded to most of the laborers' demands.