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Mexico welcomed fugitive slaves and African-American job-seekers
New perspectives on the immigration debate
by Ron Wilkins, San Francisco Bay View
The Hispanic American Village’s series on Latino-Black relations
continues with this illuminating history of Mexico’s support,
sheltering, even abolitionism of America’s African slaves. Professor
Wilkins couches his history in telling perspective that informs the
debate over the right of Mexico’s undocumented to remain here: “…if
Mexico today still included California and Texas [can we not
remember the great annexation of their land in 1848?], she would
possess more oil than Saudi Arabia…”
There are, of course, many angles from which to view the escalating
immigration debate. Mexican immigrants, who constitute the largest
share of the undocumented, have a unique history with the African
population inside the United States. As the Black community weighs
in on this very contentious issue, it becomes necessary for us -
both black and brown - to review the history that we share.
However, before reviewing our history together, I need to say
unequivocally that the U.S. seizure of more than half of Mexico's
territory in 1848 netted Washington more than 80 percent of Mexico's
fertile land and was a criminal act. And that if Mexico today still
included California and Texas, she would possess more oil than Saudi
Arabia and have sufficient economic infrastructure to employ all of
her people.
When Mexican people say that "the border crossed us, we did not
cross the border," they speak the truth, and more Black people -
most of whom are not strangers to oppression, exploitation,
domination and exclusion - need to appreciate that.
It has been said that for most of the 19th century, Mexican
immigrants were more highly regarded by African Americans than any
other immigrant group. What may account for this, at least in part,
is the enormous if not pivotal role undertaken by Black fighters in
the war to secure Mexican independence from Spain and abolish
slavery. Unfortunately, many of us repeat the falsehoods of our
adversaries and have forgotten our special relationship with Mexican
and Indigenous peoples.
It is time that our memories be restored and that the naysayers and
nativist negroes among us either put up or shut up. What follows is
the little known history of Mexico serving as a refuge for fugitive
slaves and a provider of job opportunities for Blacks emigrating
from the U.S. to Mexico.
Mexico as a haven for fugitive slaves
From the very beginning of his Texas colonization scheme, a
determined and deceitful Stephen Austin sought to have Mexican
officials acquiesce to the settlement of slave-owning whites into
the territory. It was generally acknowledged that the people and
government of Mexico abhorred slavery and were determined to
prohibit its practice within the Mexican republic.
Beginning in 1822, at least 20,000 Anglos, many with their slave
property, settled into Texas. Jared Groce, one of the first of
Stephen Austin's Texas settlers that year, arrived with 90 enslaved
Africans.
The Mexican Federal Law of July 13, 1824, clearly favored and
promoted the emancipation of slaves. Mexico had even stipulated that
it was prepared to compensate North American owners of fugitive
slaves. Determined instead to have things their way, Anglos began to
press for an extradition treaty which would require Mexico to return
fugitive slaves.
From 1825 until the end of the Civil War in 1865, Mexican
authorities continuously thwarted attempts by slave-holding Texas
settlers to conclude fugitive slave extradition treaties between the
two parties. During this period of extremely tense relations between
the two governments, Mexico consistently repudiated and forbade the
institution of slavery in its territory, while U.S. officials and
Texas slave-owners continuously sought ways to circumvent Mexican
law. The Mexican authorities thwarted repeated attempts by
slave-holding Texas settlers to conclude fugitive slave extradition
treaties between the two parties.
In 1826 the Committee of Foreign Relations of the Mexican Chamber of
Deputies refused to compromise on the issue of fugitive slaves and
defended the right of enslaved Africans to liberate themselves.
Mexican government officials cited "the inalienable right which the
Author of nature has conceded to him (meaning enslaved persons)."
Congress member Erasmo Seguin from Texas commented that the Congress
was "resolved to decree the perpetual extinction in the Republic of
commerce and traffic in slaves and that their introduction into our
territory should not be permitted under any pretext".
Again in October 1828, the Mexican Senate rejected 14 articles of a
newly-proposed treaty and harshly criticized Article 33, stating "it
would be most extraordinary that in a treaty between two free
republics slavery should be encouraged by obliging ours to deliver
up fugitive slaves to their merciless and barbarous masters of North
America".
Reporting on the growing number of Anglo settlers in Texas, Mexican
Gen. Teran reported, "Most of them have slaves, and these slaves are
beginning to learn the favorable intent of Mexican law to their
unfortunate condition and are becoming restless under their yokes …"
Gen. Teran went on to describe the cruelty meted out by masters to
restless slaves: "They extract their teeth, set on the dogs to tear
them in pieces, the most lenient being he who but flogs his slaves
until they are flayed."
On Sept. 15, 1829, AfroMexican President Vicente Guerrero signed a
decree banning slavery in the Mexican Republic. Yielding to appeals
from panicked settlers and Mexican collaborators who saw Mexico
benefiting economically from the Anglo presence, Guerrero exempted
Texas from the prohibition on the introduction of slaves into the
republic, on Dec. 2. Several months later, the Mexican government
severely restricted Anglo immigration and banned the introduction of
slaves into the republic.
Undeterred, the Anglos succeeded in negotiating a new treaty with
Mexico in 1831, which included Article 34, which called for pursuit
and reclamation of fugitive slaves. After considerable wrangling
between the Mexican Chamber of Deputies and Senate, Article 34 was
removed from the treaty. Also, by 1831 it became apparent through
debate within the Mexican Senate that the government's welcoming of
fugitive slaves was not completely altruistic.
Some Mexican officials, fearful of U.S. military intervention, had
begun to see it as wise to encourage the development of runaway
slave colonies along the Northern border as a way to lessen the
threat posed by the U.S. As historian Rosalie Schwartz put it, many
Mexican officials "reasoned these fugitives, choosing between
liberty under the Mexican government and bondage in the United
States, would fight to protect their Mexican freedom more vigorously
than any mercenaries." As the interests of Mexican officials and
U.S. abolitionists coincided during the early 1830s, a modest number
of former slaves established themselves in Texas and fared well
during the period.
In 1836, after the fall of the Alamo and its slave-owning or
pro-slavery leaders, such as William Travis, Jim Bowie and Davy
Crockett, Mexican forces were defeated and an independent Texas was
eventually annexed by the United States. However, before the
expulsion of Mexican forces from Texas, Brig. Gen. Jose Urrea
evicted scores of illegally-settled plantation owners, liberated
slaves and, in many instances, granted them on-the-spot titles to
the land they had worked.
Oddly enough, many Black people call for "40 acres and a mule" - a
reference to Union Gen. Sherman's Special Field Order 15 and Gen.
Howard's Circular 13, which made some land available to former
slaves. But what one never hears are references to Mexican Gen. Jose
Urrea and the land titles that he and his men granted to former
Texas slaves following the defeat of the Alamo, a generation before
the Civil War.
Even after the loss of Texas, Mexican officials refused to formally
acknowledge Texas independence on the grounds that it "would be
equivalent to the sanction and recognition of slavery." After Texas
independence, the slave population mushroomed, and the number of
runaways across the South Texas-North Mexico border increased. In
1842, Mexico's Constitutional Congress reasserted the nation's
commitment to fugitive slaves. In 1847, 38,753 slaves and 102,961
whites were listed in the first official Texas census. In 1850, in a
new treaty accord with the United States, Mexico again refused to
provide for the return of fugitive slaves
The slave institution in Texas was continuously undermined by
defiant Tejanos (Mexicans in Texas), who took great risks and
invested enormous resources toward facilitating the escape of
enslaved Africans. The Texas to Mexico routes to freedom constituted
major unacknowledged extensions of the "Underground Railroad."
Tejanos were variously accused of "tampering with slave property,"
"consorting with Blacks" and stirring up among the slave population
"a spirit of insubordination."
Plantation owners in Central Texas adopted various resolutions aimed
at preventing Mexicans from aiding the slave population. Whites in
Guadalupe County prohibited Mexican "peons" from entering the county
and anyone from conducting business or interacting with enslaved
persons without authorization from the owners.
Bexar County whites suggested that "Mexican strangers entering from
San Antonio register at the mayor's office and give an account of
themselves and their business." Delegates to a convention in
Gonzales resolved that "counties should organize vigilance
committees to prosecute persons tampering with slaves" and that all
citizens and slaveholders were to endeavor to prevent Mexicans from
communicating with Blacks.
Whites in Austin decreed that "all transient Mexicans should be
warned to leave within 10 days, that all remaining should be
forcibly expelled unless their good character and good behavior were
substantiated by responsible American citizens" and that "Mexicans
should no longer be employed and their presence in the area should
be discouraged." In Matagorda County, all Mexicans were driven out
under the bogus claim that they were wandering, indigent sub-humans
who "have no fixed domicile but hang around the plantations, taking
the likeliest negro girls for wives … they often steal horses, and
these girls too, and endeavor to run them to Mexico".
By the year 1855, the estimates were that as many as 4,000 to 5,000
formerly enslaved Africans had escaped to Mexico. Slaveholders
became so alarmed at this trend that they requested and received
approximately one fifth of the standing U.S. Army which was deployed
along the Texas-Mexico border in a vain effort to stem the flow of
runaways.
Defiant Mexicans stood their ground, refused to return runaways, and
continued supporting slave uprisings and providing assistance to
escaping slaves. In the words of Felix Haywood, a Texas slave, whose
experience is recalled in "The Slave Narratives of Texas, "Sometimes
someone would come along and try to get us to run up north and be
free. We used to laugh at that. There was no reason to run up north.
All we had to do was walk, but walk south, and we'd be free as soon
as we crossed the Rio Grande".
What a difference a border made
1857 was a year whose profound irony made it one of the most
interesting. 1857 was the year that the U.S. Supreme Court ruled
against Dred Scott, an enslaved African who had sued for his
freedom, on the grounds that his owner had forfeited any claim to
him after taking him into a free state. Ironically, 1857 was the
same year that the Mexican Congress adopted Article 13, declaring
that an enslaved person was free the moment he set foot on Mexican
soil.
Mexico as a provider of job opportunities for African Americans
During the 1890s, hundreds of Black migrants fed up with slave-like
conditions and segregation, left Alabama for Mexico and established
10 large colonies. Shortly thereafter, during the period of the
Mexican Revolution, large numbers of Black people migrated from New
Orleans to Tampico, Mexico, as the oil industry prospered.
These Africans in Mexico established branches of Marcus Garvey's
Universal Negro Improvement Association. One of the Black oil
workers who came to Tampico stated, "There is no race prejudice;
everyone is treated according to his abilities." During the same
period, Black heavyweight champion Jack Johnson asserted that Mexico
was "willing not only to give us the privileges of Mexican
citizenship, but was also willing to champion our cause."
Juan Uribe, a major Mexican official, visiting Los Angeles in 1919,
was quoted as saying, "My only regret is that it is not physically
possible to immediately transport several million African Americans
to my beloved Mexico, where the north yields her riches as nowhere
else and where people are not disturbed by artificial standards of
race or color."
Similarly, African American immigrant Theodore Troy said, "I am
going to a land where freedom and opportunity beckon me as well as
every other man, woman and child of dark skin. In this land, there
are no Jim Crow laws to fetter me; I am not denied opportunity
because of the color of my skin, and wonderful undeveloped resources
of a country smiled upon by God beckon my genius on to their
development."
A Black colony which included 50 families developed fruit orchards
and engaged in cattle raising. It established itself in Baja,
California, in the Santa Clara and Vallecitos Valleys situated
between Ensenada and Tecate, approximately 30 miles south of San
Diego and lasted into the 1960s.
Not to be overlooked is the enormous success of the Negro Baseball
Leagues in Mexico during the 1930s and 1940s. Black ball players
together with 400-500 family members seeking relief from racism in
the U.S. and segregated institutions were hosted in Mexico by
generally respectful competitors and admiring fans. One competitor
in particular, Ray Dandridge, played for 18 years in Mexico before
Jackie Robinson gained admission into U.S. major league baseball.
Also, from the 1930s to the 1960s, major Mexican muralists, such as
Diego Rivera, David Siqueiros and Jose Clemente Orozco invited
prominent African American artists such as Hale Woodruff, John
Biggers, Elizabeth Catlett and Charles White to the Mexican Art
School, where they developed an art style which helped them to
connect images more effectively to ethnic and class struggle.
Of course there are many more historical intersections where Mexican
and African people cooperated with each other. A few examples were
the solidarity between the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee
(SNCC)/ Black Panther Party and Brown Berets, SNCC and the Alianza
Federal de Pueblos Libres and El Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano de
Atzlan (MEChA) and the Black Student Union (BSU).
Mack Lyons, a Black member of the United Farmworkers Union's
National Executive, negotiated its contract with Coca Cola, which
owns Minutemaid and sizeable Florida orange groves. In Los Angeles
during the '90s, Black and Brown students recognizing common history
and mutual interests formed the African and Latino Youth Summit (ALYS).
Admittedly, Vicente Fox is no Vicente Guerrero. The Mexico of today
is profoundly different from the refuge that once welcomed fugitive
slaves or land of opportunity that embraced African American
job-seekers; yet its beautiful history of support for African
Americans in need of allies cannot be erased.
It might prove useful to see the relationship between Black and
Brown people as similar to the bond between a man and woman. It is
beautiful most of the time, but there are moments when it is tested
and may become strained. When this happens, one or both must give
more and work to increase or renew trust.
Pass this material on to others. The Black or Brown reader of this
piece should now know that the best of our history together as Black
and Brown people speaks to the necessity of collaborating during the
worst of times. A wise people are a grateful people and never
content themselves with recalling and celebrating their legendary
alliance with an important neighbor. Instead, they press forward,
fully aware that mutually supportive relationships are still
possible and necessary.
Ron Wilkins is a former member of the Student Nonviolent
Coordinating Committee (SNCC) and is presently a professor in the
Department of Africana Studies at California State University,
Dominguez Hills. Special acknowledgement is extended to historians
Rosalie Schwartz, Gerald Horne, Rodolfo Acuna and Omar Farouk, whose
earlier investigative efforts in the field of African-Mexican
collaboration contributed to making this work possible.
Ron Wilkins can be reached at:
rwilkins@scudh.edu
and
http://www.politicart.net
And the San Francisco Bay View at:
http://www.sfbayview.com
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