What is the bond between Mexicans and the United States?

According to the most recent statistics from 2017, the population of Mexican descent living in the United States was about 34.6 million, or about 10.8% of the total U.S. population in that year. In other words, it is highly likely that Mexicans in the U.S. have now surpassed those of English descent and are in fourth place after Germans, Irish, and Africans (black Americans). It is important to know that they were only 500,000 people in the United States in 1900 when the United States had a total of 76 million people. After 117 years, the U.S. population has quadrupled, and the Mexican population has increased 70-fold, yet this 70-fold increase is based on several mass deportations.

The United States was not as big as it is now. For example, California, Texas, New Mexico, Nevada, Utah, Colorado, Arizona, and Wyoming were all Mexican territories until 1848. The "Mexican-American War" of 1846 to 1848 changed the map and borderline of the two countries.

The war was caused by the influx of Americans into the newly independent Mexican state of Coahuila-Tejas in the Texas region, where they were slaveholding and attempting to gain independence. The Mexican government's intention to ban slaveholding gave the slaveholders there the opportunity to justify independence, and on March 2, 1836, Texas officially declared independence and established the Republic of Texas. While the Mexican government did not recognize Texas' independence, the United States did recognize the independence of the Republic of Texas. The Mexican government announced its intention to recover Texas, and at this time the so-called "Republic of Texas" was supported by the Americans, and in 1845 the United States offered to recognize the Rio Grande as its legal border if the Republic of Texas would join the United States. That same year, Texas agreed to join the United States as the 28th state.

The war broke out on May 18, 1846, and on September 14 of the following year, U.S. troops invaded the capital of Mexico City, at which point Mexico completely abandoned its resistance and returned to the negotiating table, and after the formal signing of the peace agreement on February 2, 1848, the United States gained a total of approximately 2.3 million square kilometers of land, leaving Mexico without a significant portion of its territory. The United States thus became a major power spanning the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean and a veritable hegemon of the Americas. The United States paid Mexico $15 million and forgave $3.25 million in debts owed by Mexico while acquiring a large amount of land.

Mexican Americans are now in the United States and live on almost all of the land that was ceded to them.

Mexican-Americans, today, are located in the United States in California, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Colorado, Nevada, Utah, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, and Illinois.

On the one hand, because the Mexicans on these ceded lands became Americans, on the other hand, these ceded areas, all close to the U.S.-Mexico border, and with the late 19th century and early 20th century Mexicans began to migrate to the United States in large numbers (including smuggling). Naturally, they would choose to settle in communities of Mexican descent that were close by and where their predecessors had taken shape.

At the beginning of the 20th century, most Mexican immigrants had been involved in the construction of railroads or manual work related to the railroad industry during the great construction of railroads in the United States in the 19th century, so there are now many Mexican communities located near the railroads.

Around the time of World War I, the flow of European immigrants came to a halt, leaving a vacancy in U.S. labor demand. And as U.S. railroad construction came to a close, a large number of Mexicans were employed in jobs in agriculture and mining. Because these manual jobs required little linguistic interaction with mainstream America, the descendants of Mexican descent at that time largely grew up in relatively closed Mexican communities and spoke only Spanish. Farmers of Mexican descent often brought their children to work on the farm, and for both objective and subjective reasons, their offspring lagged relatively behind in education.

In the southwestern United States, Mexicans are known for their expertise in farming, working hard for more than ten hours a day in the fields.

Before 1930, more than half of Mexicans lived in the agricultural states of the United States. With the change of time, Mexicans slowly into the city to work, some into factory workers, and the U.S. cities began to gradually increase the number of Mexicans.

To say these early Mexican immigrants, why came to the United States to work the fundamental reason because of poor. Even if their income in the United States is at the bottom, and the United States mainstream society has a big gap, that is also more than their income in Mexico itself several times.

Another reason is that, unlike immigrants from Europe and Asia, these Mexicans were able to cross the border relatively freely, and many of them earned money after they could return to Mexico to live.

In 1924, the United States established the Border Patrol, Mexicans first began to be considered "illegal immigrants," and that era began to meet the legal immigration requirements of Mexicans smuggled into the United States. However, it is important to know that the U.S.-Mexico border is more than 3,200 kilometers long, and most of the area is desert. There was no U.S.-Mexico border wall in those days, and the controls were far less than they are now, so you can imagine how easy it is for Mexicans to sneak into the United States.

At that time, the Mexican illegal immigrants to the United States, there has been a need for labor "underground organizations" to receive. However, a large number of Mexicans came to the United States not to settle, but simply plan to return home after making a fortune. According to statistics, in the 20 years from 1910 to 1930, more than one million Mexicans returned to Mexico.

The early Mexican illegal immigrants, much like the Fujianese smuggled to the United States, usually have fellow countrymen in the United States who will need "cheap labor", and these smugglers need to make money or survive. They usually worked under the control of their "bosses" and did nothing but work, eat, and return to the group homes, where they had little opportunity to learn the language and assimilate into the culture.

With the 1930s, the Great Depression in the United States, the first wave of Mexican immigrants began to come to an end. Whites are beginning to lose their jobs in large numbers, and there are still many jobs for these Mexicans to do, leading the U.S. government to begin to find ways to repatriate them to Mexico.

The total number of Mexicans in the United States, from more than 600,000 in 1930 to more than 400,000 in 1940, the number is even lower than in 1900.

The second wave of immigration, World War II led to a shortage of agricultural labor and the legal importation of Mexican labor

In the early 1940s, the United States was officially involved in World War II, and millions of Americans joined the military, leading to a shortage of agricultural labor. At this time the federal government adopted a program to bring in labor from Mexico.

In 1942, the United States entered into a bilateral agreement with Mexico to establish a short-term contract labor (Bracero) program. This program was designed to bring hundreds of experienced laborers from Mexico to harvest sugar beets in California. Although the program was small at the beginning, at its peak it attracted 400,000 people across the border. The influx of Mexicans into the U.S. slowed wage growth and made it difficult to attract "enough" Americans to work, so the "emergency" program was an extended year after year until the program was terminated in 1964, and the U.S. did not limit the number of legal immigrants from Mexico until 1965. There were no restrictions on the number of legal immigrants from Mexico until 1965.

The short-term contract labor program did not work well in its implementation. Many Mexican workers did not understand the terms of their contracts because they did not speak English. Wage garnishment was also common.

After the short-term contract labor program was abolished, U.S. employers were still able to bring in foreign workers to work in agriculture under the H-2 program, which was established in 1943. At that time, sugar cane growers in Florida received federal permission to hire laborers from the Caribbean to harvest sugar cane. These workers came to the United States on temporary visas.

Before World War II, more Mexican Americans lived in cities than in the countryside, and employment here in the industrial sector accelerated the urbanization of Mexican Americans.

Not only did the wartime economy draw large numbers of laborers from Mexico, but military production also drew Mexican-Americans from their traditional jobs and communities into the larger industrial economy and communities.

During World War II, more than half of rural New Mexico's Mexican-American males left for the cities. During the labor crunch of World War II, U.S. employment restrictions on Mexicans, like those of other races, were eased. Many Mexicans served in the military, and 17 were awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor.

For many Mexican-Americans, military life gave them a first-hand experience of mainstream American culture, and the subsequent U.S. Soldiers Act allowed retired Mexican servicemen to study at universities, accelerating their integration into American society.

Like the first wave of immigrants, the second wave ended in mass repatriation, but the number of deportations after World War II reached a new record.

As many as 500,000 Mexicans were repatriated in 1951, and more than 1 million in 1954. Nearly 4 million Mexicans were sent home after World War II, but this time, unlike the previous one, only those without legal U.S. citizenship were deported.

Despite the massive repatriation of illegal Mexican immigrants after World War II, a similar history will always repeat itself as long as the huge wealth gap between the two countries is not resolved. By 1970, the number of Mexican immigrants to the United States was again broken. In the 1960s, excluding the "smuggling" of the count, legal immigration alone was about 440,000.

With the development of humanitarian values in the United States, there are several organizations in society to help the "de facto" illegal immigrants, in addition to the United States, today can not be divided into large Mexican ethnic groups, resulting in the United States in the control of Mexican immigration issues, and can not be treated in a one-size-fits-all way.

The Mexican government, to a certain extent, tacitly allows people to go to the United States "to learn advanced technology and skills" after serving the motherland. As long as the Americans do not treat their nationals violently at the border, "smuggling" is more of a problem that Americans need to worry about.

The U.S. and Mexican governments have considered developing the Mexican economy in the border area to create jobs to alleviate the "smuggling" problem. But because of the inability to provide enough jobs, and attracted a large number of Mexicans to the U.S.-Mexico border to seek employment opportunities, which led to more Mexican labor lurking in the U.S.-Mexico border.

In short, for Mexicans to enter the United States, can think of the ways, such as: hitting the tunnel, hiding trucks, picking trains, crossing the river, and even through the desert of death.

And over the wall, just one of the most conventional ways.

Trump had proposed during the election campaign, the current "U.S.-Mexico border wall" actual effect is not good, and and and and and should rebuild a higher wall. On the "U.S.-Mexico border wall" effect, he is not wrong.

Because, although there is a wall on the U.S.-Mexico border, there are also patrol border guards. But more than 3,200 kilometers of the border, some places are no man's land.

Located in southwest Arizona between Tucson and Yuma area, there is a largely uninhabited area, including the town of Douglas to the west of the 321 km of the Devil's Road, which is the most dangerous "smuggling" route on the U.S.-Mexico border.

But there are always people who are not afraid to die, walking on the "Devil's Road" look around, can only see the bare rocks, full of thorns cactus, and scorpions, and rattlesnakes often, where the ground temperature is up to 54 degrees Celsius. But it is close to the U.S.-Mexico border and very close to U.S. Interstate 8, so a large number of smugglers choose to smuggle into the United States on foot from here. In the past few years, more than 1,400 people have died on this road because of exposure to the sun and dehydration.

Most Mexicans who cross this wall into the United States are immediately repatriated after being arrested, but for some Mexicans, as long as they are alive, they will keep going .....

Some people say that "Mexicans in the United States, particularly hard-working and capable, dirty work to do everything, work 11 hours a day is not too tired. They are contracted to scrub dishes, wash cars, do backroom chores, mow lawns, a cashier at Walmart, work on construction sites, move things, sell drugs, farm workers, all kinds of jobs ....."

there is indeed a significant portion of illegal Mexican immigrants that work hard for as little as $8 an hour.

But this does not represent the full picture of Mexican Americans today, and the composition of today's large Mexican-American community is very complex. Today's Mexican descendants in the United States in the field of sports and entertainment achievements are still very good.

Although the overall social status of Mexican descendants in the United States is still not high, but in terms of integration into mainstream society, they are doing even better than Asians.