I have employed as many as 7 Mexican nationals in a given year. This goes back
to way before the amnesty of the mid 80s. I suppose the amnesty had unintended
results, though one might have seen them coming. Once legalized, millions of
expatriot Latin Americans started to work their way up the labor ladder. I
employed, over the years, perhaps 20 in total, and fewer than half of them are
still in agriculture. I dealt with a large hierarchical family, which
organized the border crossings, the hiring of coyotes, the employment, and job
changes, and the jefe looked after the various sons, brothers, cousins,
uncles, compadres who came in to work. My former leadman is now working for
Cargill in Tennessee. My adoptive "grandfather" first came up here to haul
pickles out of Michigan fields in 1944. One young man came in 1985, illegally,
was underaged, learned English from me, quit the lettuce brigade eventually,
married, and now is the general manager of a large nursery/home improvement
store. What's up with that? Why should he shove lettuce in a box forever? He
was under no obligation to remain in the ag field. Others went from the
lettuce brigade into construction, truck driving, restraunt work, light
manufacturing, business ownership. This is not a very simple situation. So,
more were needed in the fields as these folks moved up the ladder. And they
came and are coming. And of course who would not want to have their family
with them? As for compettive wages....these same jobs are done for the
transnationals in Sinaloa as they are done in Salinas. Why cut lettuce for a
buck when you can cut it for five up here?
Now that the NAFTA door has been kicked open, it gets more complicated. It is
impossible, IMPOSSIBLE, to effectively close the border. Our genuflecting
free-marketers want it both ways. I much enjoy the yowling from the retired
military honchos, Birchers, conservo-fascists in San Diego County,upset that
the transnationals want to haul in avos from Michuocan. Why point the finger
at just one example of blurred legality? What about the transnational pirates?
Now they want to bring in the Argentine lemons. That's fine with the
developers in CA-makes that sustainable local ag economy go away faster. Nice
that these patriots don't want to educate those who live here. The classic
case was my own father this past holiday, in full fury ( with Rush Limburger
as background theme noise) ranting about immigrants while out his very window
there were four brown men clipping his hedges and watering his dwarf citrus.
Hello?
This is such a thorny issue, bookended by the reactionary maneuvering in
California against Latino immigration, versus the Texas experience, which is
more accepting historically. Here in Texas, chief elected officials are
Latin/Mexican Americans ( Morales, the former Attorney General, and Gonzalez
the former Secretary of State) and their election and performance is rarely
cast in terms of race. Many switched to the Repubican party, to much
amazement. We understand that generally speaking someone like Morales is going
to take 80% of the vote south of the Nueces River. Its a reality that
politicians deal with, but do not decry so vehemently as they do in other
states. The Texas experience seems remarkably odd and transparently non-racist
on many levels..but by no means entirely. Perhaps it is so because real
warfare has taken place in this region, and because our border is so vaguely
drawn. We shrug off the fact that the lower Rio Grande Valley is essentially
much the same as the Maquilladora Zone in Tamaulipas, Nuevo Leon, C oahuila
and Chihuahua states. Every time the Texas legislature meets they claim that
they will fix the "colonia" issue. 400,000 people living on the border without
dependably potable water and sewer service. Should Texas fix it? Everyone
agrees that we should, because the area lies above the Rio Grande, but really,
Its sort of like Mexico without being Mexico. If it were really in Mexico, the
people would have some actual power, so it is well to continue to call it the
Colonia, because we treat it as a colony. The Colonia is a good metaphor,
because it has no border. Welcome to the Colonia, by the way. The
transnationals own us. If we continue to talk about this as if some
geographical border was the pivot point, we will never comprehend that it
isn't those "brown people" who party on the 16th of September we have to worry
about. ( You go ahead and look up that date, maybe we should all celebrate
it).
Steve Sprinkel
Compostia, Texas
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