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>> 111 5 The Conflicted United States–Mexico Relationship Invitation and Exclusion Although the United States is often described as a “nation of immigrants ,”1 this country’s treatment of Latin American immigrants is largely a tale of inclusion and assistance on one hand, and exclusion and mistreatment on the other. As Kevin Johnson succinctly describes it, U.S. immigration law is famous for its cyclical, turbulent, and ambivalent nature. At times, the nation has embraced some of the most liberal immigration admission laws and policies in the world. . . . At other times in U.S. history, however, the nation has capitulated to the nativist impulse and embraced immigration laws and policies that, in retrospect, make us cringe with shame and regret.2 During earlier periods of exclusion and deportation, popular rhetoric was filled with characterizations of immigrants that resemble the recent venomous incarnations.3 During times of inclusivity, however, the dominant rhetoric of hate did not carry the day. Interestingly, the U.S. Constitution says virtually nothing concerning immigration, except for a brief mention of the importation of slaves and 112 > 113 hostility, immigrants’ vulnerability, due to their limited rights, inevitably made them threatened. After all, the threat of deportation always lingers, irrespective of their documented or undocumented status.13 It is this threat, along with subordinated rights, that makes immigrants among the most vulnerable in our society. The subsequent pages will address a repeated history of welcoming immigrants when economic conditions necessitated it, but rejecting them when economic conditions or national security matters created an environment of fear and hate. During these cycles, domestic narratives concerning immigrants changed, often quickly. The accounts here serve to demonstrate how past negative narratives often shaped antiimmigrant policies, including attempts at closing the border as well as mass exodus campaigns such as the infamous Operation Wetback of the 1950s. Yet these policies, no matter how draconian, did not put an end to undocumented immigration, particularly when certain sectors of the economy, such as agriculture, were demanding or would eventually once again demand immigrant labor. Moreover, the tried and true approach of demonizing and scapegoating immigrants has not affected demands for immigration labor, and thus has not affected immigration. This country needs to learn from its past, and not merely repeat ineffective measures. There are many parallels between the experiences of Mexican immigrants and the experiences of immigrants from Asia. Initial policies inviting Mexican laborers were inevitably followed by efforts to oust them, due to a perceived decline in labor demand, or when unrelated events led to isolationist sentiments in the country. During the late nineteenth century and throughout the twentieth century, there were repeated examples of government-sponsored efforts to attract Mexican labor, only to be followed by efforts to deport the very same groups when economic conditions changed, or perceived crises provoked mass hysteria.14 Asian immigrants have also repeatedly experienced periods of invitation to meet the country’s agricultural demands or build this land’s infrastructure and industries. Subsequently this same group confronted 114 > 115 demographics of the United States as of 1890, a time before the large flow of southern and eastern European immigrants.”17 This national origins system restricted annual immigration from any foreign country to 2 percent of that country’s population living in the United States, as counted in the census of 1890. Since most of the foreign-born counted in the 1890 census were from northern and western European countries, the 1924 Immigration Act reinforced patterns of white immigration and staved off immigration from other areas, including Asia, Latin America, and Africa. Until the 1960s, approximately two-thirds of all legal immigrants to the United States were from Europe and Canada.18 As Kevin Johnson explains, The Supreme Court interpreted the naturalization law, which allowed white immigrants as well as (after the Civil War) persons of African ancestry to naturalize, as barring Asians from naturalizing. In United States v. Thind, the Court held that an immigrant from India was not “white” and was therefore ineligible for naturalization. Similarly, in Ozawa v. United States, the Court held that, as a nonwhite, a Japanese immigrant could not naturalize.19 While the naturalization prerequisite system as well as the immigration quota systems came to an end in the twentieth century, immigration remains a hotly debated issue. The immigration issues of today are all too similar to those of the past, as is this country’s conflicted relationship with its southern neighbors. The United States–Mexico Revolving Door A glance at...

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