History and Immigration Reform: The Tea Party Gets It Wrong Again - The US 'annexed' the SouthWest

[pampango]

Not what the Tea Party expected.

As you can see from the graphic above, where most Mexican-Americans -- whom we usually associate with immigration -- live now, live in locations that America annexed. That is a euphemism for the Mexican-American War of 1848. Put another way, most "immigrants" lived in Mexico before our "Manifest Destiny" schooled us to take Mexico.

This is an historical reference that gets passed over in the current debate. But it's important: the anti-immigration zealots in the Tea Party are old(er), white males (by and large). And their concern isn't history -- presuming they're aware of such -- but a irrational xenophobia combined with a falsely-held belief that immigrants are somehow taking American jobs. What is probably worse, the Tea Party tells us that immigrants must be schooled in "American values" (read the values of the white Christian conservatives) to be afforded a path to citizenship.

Yes, kicking the Tea Party may seem like a tired exercise in political discourse. But they have wreaked havoc, in both Washington, D.C. and state capitols, to say nothing of the fact that many of their political priors are pernicious on a political and moral level. Even Rick Perry thinks you don't have a heart if you have issues with the DREAM Act. Perry got booed at the GOP debate when he said this. Lesson: Perry may have a heart; the base of the GOP does not.

Finally, contrary to the Tea Party's revisionist history, America is not built on the ideas of "fiscal responsibility, constitutionally limited government, and free markets." This is not just bad history, it is tendentious political clap-trap. For all their paeans to history and the Founding Fathers, the Tea Party would do well to study the whole of American history, particularly the Mexican-American War. Even the tin man eventually found his heart.

http://blogs.houstonpress.com/hairballs/2014/02/history_and_immigration_reform.php

Funny how most Mexican-Americans live in areas that used to be part of Mexico until the US annexed them. Now many (particularly on the right) view them as unAmerican (who must be schooled in "American values&quot even though their families may have lived where they are for a thousand years.

The author unfortunately is dealing with tea partiers who are not really influenced much by history, facts and science. Emotion and fear - that's what motives the right.

[underthematrix]

1. Thank you for posting this. The TeaParty is a FACT-FREE zone.

Mexican Americans are American citizens sans the paperwork. This is why I would like my fellow Americans to have a pathway to get their PAPERWORK because they are already citizens.

[Romulox]

2. Mexico was a country founded by European (Spanish) colonists. Your revisionism is ahistoric.

Also, the idea that people are immigrating to places where they "are for a thousand years" is nonsense on its face.

Conquest (1519)


Hernán Cortés and La Malinche meet Moctezuma II

The Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire began in February 1519 when Hernán Cortés arrived at the port in Veracruz with ca. 500 conquistadores, and later moved on to the Aztec capital. On his search for gold and other riches, Cortés decided to invade and conquer the Aztec empire.[50]

...

The territory became part of the Spanish Empire under the name of New Spain. Mexico City was systematically rebuilt by Cortés following the Fall of Tenochtitlan in 1521. Much of the identity, traditions and architecture of Mexico were created during the colonial period.[58]
Colonial period (1519–1821)

The capture of Tenochtitlan marked the beginning of a 300-year-long colonial period, during which Mexico was known as "New Spain".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mexico#History

[a la izquierda]

3. Hmm. I don't know about this.

For one thing, people living in the area annexed were given a choice of citizenship. If families have lived in that area for a thousand years, they're indigenous, not necessarily Mexican, because Mexico is a construction of colonial Spain.


The entire process of annexation unfolded because of extreme political turmoil in Mexico in the middle of the 19th century; I'm not suggesting this was right, but it's a fact. And, the entire process unfolded over more than a decade, starting with a hare-brained scheme of colonizing Texas. This was Manifest Destiny, but it did not appear in a vacuum.

I support amnesty and the DREAM act. I've lived in Mexico. I have a PhD in Latin American history, with a specialization in 19th century Mexico.

[demigoddess]

4. something I have been noticing

conservatives do not know ANY history, even their own.