A Bit of History
about the Border Issues
Until the Gadsden Purchase in 1854,
the southern part of what is now Arizona was part of Mexico. Earlier most of
Arizona, New Mexico, Texas and California were settled by the Spanish who
either took over most of the land and/or intermarried with native people of the region. It was not
all “Mexico” per se but essentially much the same. Until the early 1800s very
few Northern Europeans had set foot much past the Mississippi River, if even
that far west.
A bit about me here for other background.
I earned both a BS and MA in History from NAU in 1969 and 1970. Mexico and the
western US were a major focus of my studies under two well respected
professors, Dr Guy Bensusan and Dr Larry McFarlane. I feel they taught me well
and although this was some years ago, the basic historical facts have not changed in any major way. Attitudes may have changed but facts have not. I do not write from lack of knowledge on this subject.
As another aspect, I arrived in
Arizona in January 1946 at about 33 months of age. I was an only child for my
first 9 years and had little interaction with other children so I paid a lot of
attention to the adults that came and went through my home. From about 5 or 6 I
heard adults talking about what were then aspects of the interface between
Mexican people and the “Anglos.” Jerome, where we lived, had a large Mexican
community and at that time they were not permitted to work underground. By the
1960s this changed and many did become hard rock miners in Arizona's many large mines.Two Mexican families
involved in that were next door neighbors in Clarkdale after we moved down
there. It was the smelter town for the Jerome mines at that time.
Jumping ahead, I moved to Bisbee in
1970 after I had started work at Fort Huachuca and the next year married my
newly widowed next door neighbor who by then was a city policeman in Bisbee but
had worked in Yuma law enforcement for several years earlier. His beat was the barrio
and slum area in Yuma and he got to know many Mexican nationals who were working
on farms under the Bracero “green card” program which functioned well for many
years. As with the mostly black
transients, a hold over from the hoboes of the Depression era, he might arrest
one for petty theft or drunk and disorderly occasionally and two or more years
in a row, they would usually have a different social security number and
sometimes name. This is significant as I will explain later. It is unfortunate
that this legal work program got entangled in other issues and ceased because it was
reasonable and worked well. Yes, they sent home Levi's and a few 30-30s in duffle bags and cheap footlockers bu tthey were not criminals nor gang members.
My brother Charlie put in 38 years
with the railroads in Colorado, first with the Rio Grand and then with the
Southern Pacific and finally Union Pacific as mergers occurred. Since about 28 of
those years were in the maintenance field, he worked with a number of Mexicans,
both citizens and non citizens. Again they had to get a social security number to work, butmostly came and went and did not keep just one card.
In short, people have gone back and forth from Mexico to
the southwestern US for at least a couple of centuries. Many families are
spread across the border and generally did not really notice there was a
‘line’. However that is not to say the Border was ever actually OPEN in the last 125
years. There were formal crossing stations and at least mostly a standard barb
wire ranch type fence marked the border.
People were sometimes apprehended if they caused any problems, had no documents or proof of
their citizenship and some were deported. This occurred with renewed vigor as a
‘political’ issue under several administrations, both Republican and
Democratic. That is historically verifiable.
Although the border was not open, it was
never really closed either and probably cannot really become closed.. It is not
feasible to build a ‘wall’ from Texas's Gulf of Mexico shore to the Pacific
coast of California. Much of the country is very rugged, remote desert and wilderness in many
sections. And practicality renders the current fragmented wall of imperfect
value. A good cutting torch or carbide blade can zip through those metal panels
like wet paper and create any size gap desired. There are many cases where this is documented.
Tunnels can be made under it and drones and small unmarked planes can slip over
it as easily as a vulture or hawk. It is NOT impervious, whoever 'pays for' it!
So now here we are today. The
Republicans saw a fine hobby horse they could ride to popularity by telling many people
who had no idea what the real situation was that this was a huge issue that
must be dealt with at once, a critical threat to the nation and all citizens!!
Your jobs were being stolen! Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security were
siphoned off by billions to illegals! Tell me, how many regular citizens do
you personally
know who have lost jobs or cannot get one because an illegal person has
been hired? I’ll wait. How many younger
citizens really want to work 12 hours in the fields for minimum wage at best on
farms or equal time in a dairy farm, ranch or other agricultural
operation? And how many young ladies are lining up to clean motels and hospitals, to do house cleaning or care for children while parents are at work? To wash dishes or other menial chores in eateries? And how come the construction
industry is spending large amounts on trade schools and apprenticeships to try to convince our young
people to become plumbers, carpenters, electricians, roofers etc. since they are
literally begging for employees? We have a housing crisis,or so we are told, and many
are homeless because there are not enough smaller or midsized homes available. Let’s
get real.
Back to the billions stolen from programs
to support and assist everyone. It is illegal and almost impossible for a
non-citizen to access Medicare/Medicaid. They do check IDs. Believe it. The aliens who got those one-time social
security cards will never draw what they and their employers paid in because
they did not keep an account long enough to even get invested, much less to
have a way to access the system. If any have managed to squeak through, they would not number in the thousands and the
funds they got would hardly break anyone’s bank. How about all those FEMA
dollars going to provide all sorts of services to those hoards of invaders? Again,
although in major disaster areas everyone’s ID might not be checked, but
widespread distribution in areas not officially declared a disaster simply does
not happen. A lot of people have been
conned, lied to and mislead in this whole scenario. Many do not know. Mr Musk
surely does not know and I suspect Mr Trump does not either. If they even care to find
out... One reason many cities have been screaming the blues about the 'invaders' is that the efederal government never coughed up many funds funds to help house and care for them whether they were 'welcomned or not. Was it the states' problem or just whose?
Admittedly due to advocacy by unknown
individuals/organizations who went into many regions and encouraged or almost
insisted people to migrate from Mexico, Central and South America and even
Africa and Asia, a considerable tide of people came and where the wall did not
exist or in remote areas they poured in. However, the border was not “Open” or
ignored. Many arrests were made and many people were deported since 2000 or earlier on a
continuous basis. Trying to process this
rush of people did create a large problem and the Border Patrol and immigration
officers were overwhelmed and got inadequate funds from the governments to do
what they were trying to do. But looking back to 2000 or earlier , it was NEVER a
“Democrat” or a “Republican” problem. Administrations of both struggled and
floundered and tried to change with limited or almost no results. It has been ongoing
since at least about 1965 and nobody has made a real serious
effort to fix it. I doubt that they ever will. The Republicans like a source of
‘cheap’ labor where they can ignore various protections and limits for workers mostly
afraid to complain lest they be deported and the Democrats perhaps do want to
be able to collect and quickly citizen-ize a bunch of people who will then be
indebted to them. With so much to gain, why fix it, really??? It is not really broken to them except in fictitious campaign promises.
So today we have this huge effort to collect and deport--and that includes any inconvenient souls who happen to get noticed or
be in the way--or even are needed to fill an ICE quota. It has now come to people
simply vanishing and not only Latino or Islamic origin hoodlums, terrorists and
gang members but in particular women from Canada, Germany and other European countries who
simply vanish without a clue or a trace and cannot be located. Are they
imprisoned? Being trafficked? And of course any 'different' or difficult people such as trans, gays or overly vocal protesters. It is just
a matter of time until we will have an international incident because the wrong
person had been taken away, one who creates a massive problem. This is in the news almost daily, maybe not on Faux
Fox but Associated |Press and elsewhere. It is FACTUAL. I don’t know about everyone else but I am
seeing a hell of a lot wrong with this picture!
And I am sick and tired of the lies and half-truths, twisted facts and
total bullshit. This is NOT making America ‘great’ again. Internationally we are seen as lower than most Banana Republics and third world 'shit hole countries.'
