Immigrants: The Last Time America Sent Her Own Packing

By Steve Boisson | American History  | 0 comments  |  Print This Post  |  Email This Post

Repatriates often tried to forget the experience, and they did not speak about it to their children. Many saw themselves as victims of local vendettas rather than scapegoats of a national campaign. ‘They really didn’t understand the broad aspects,’ says Rodríguez. ‘They thought it was an individual experience. It wasn’t something pleasant. It wasn’t something they could be proud of.’

The silence, however, did not dissuade a new generation from seeking answers. ‘I knew that my father had spent his childhood in Mexico, despite the fact that he was born in Detroit, and I always had questions about it,’ says Elena Herrada, a union official and activist in Detroit. While at Wayne State University in the ’70s, Herrada and other students began collecting oral histories from elders in the community, a practice she continues today. ‘All we wanted to do was get the story told in our own families, and in our own communities, so that we would have a better understanding of why we don’t vote, why we don’t answer the census, why we don’t protest in the face of extreme injustice. It just explains so many things for us.’

In the summer of 2003, the subject of Mexican repatriation went beyond the confines of family and academic circles and returned to the scrutiny of government. A hearing was held in Sacramento, Calif., presided over by state Senator Joe Dunne, who had been inspired by Decade of Betrayal. The book’s authors spoke at the session, and Rodríguez’s voice faltered as he recalled his own father’s flight to Mexico in 1936. Other scholars spoke, as did local politicians and two repatriates. A class action lawsuit on behalf of those who had been unfairly expelled from California was filed in July, with Castañeda as the lead plaintiff. The suit was eventually withdrawn, as two consecutive governors vetoed bills that would have funded research and expanded statutory limitations.

For a time, however, the civil action and the forgotten history behind it were national news. This, in a way, was the beginning of a more lasting restitution: an acknowledgement of the past. ‘My idea is for it to be in the history books,’ says Emilia Castañeda, ‘for children to learn what happened to American citizens.’

This article was written by Steve Boisson and originally published in the September 2006 issue of American History Magazine.

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Tags: American History, Great Migrations, Politics, Social History

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