Back in the day (a few years ago) I wanted to be a lawyer. I wanted to study treaty law, and become really good at treaty law and memorize the Treaty of Guadalupe and then once I had become the best treaty lawyer in the world, I would fight to give Aztlan back to its people.
Treaty of Guadalupe (1848)
The Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo was the treaty that ended the Mexican-American War. Under the treaty, Mexico surrendered a vast tract of land (known as the Mexican Cession) to the United States for a sum of USD $15 million.
The cession included parts of the modern-day states of Texas, Colorado, Arizona, New Mexico, and Wyoming, and the whole of California, Nevada, and Utah. The remainder of what are today the states of Arizona and New Mexico was later ceded under the 1853 Gadsden Purchase.
The treaty promised that those who lived in the annexed territories would still be able to claim their land, that is Native Americans/Mexicans and Spaniards. Guess what happened? That’s right people had their land stripped away.
At the time of the treaty, approximately 80,000 Mexicans lived in the ceded territory, which comprised only about 4 percent of Mexico’s population. Only a few people chose to remain Mexican citizens compared to the many that became United States citizens.
…Most of the 80,000 residents continued to live in the Southwest, believing in the guarantee that their property and civil rights would be protected. Sadly, this would not always be the case. By the end of the 19th century, most Mexicans had lost their land, either through force or fraud.
In the late 1960′s Reies López Tijerina fought to enforce the Treaty of Guadalupe. He formed the political organization Alianza. After little result through the mainstream political he and members from the organization raided and seized the courthouse later escaping with the deputy sheriff and reporter. You can read a brief and well explained history of Tijerina at this site.
I am currently reading a book titled Tijerina and The Courthouse Raid. I was really excited to read it. But the book isn’t very good. Fore example in referring to Tijerina the author, Peter Nabokov, writes
When Mentally translating his convoluted rhetoric for the English listener he reveals irritation with the imprecise syllables which have not done his Spanish logic justice
It makes it seem as if Tijerina has a difficult grasp of English which I highly doubt as the man is Chicano, ¿no?
Another thing disturbs me is the constant use of the term “Spanish” and “Spanish-Americans” to describe the group of people in Alianza. The author never defines what he means by “Spanish people”. To me that means people from Spain, but then he writes about the Chicano movement. How does he define Chicano?
I’ve always defined Chicano as a pride term for Mexican-Americans. Spanish-Americans are not necessarily Mexican-Americans. (Here is how I choose to define some terms like Chicano, Mexican-American, Spanish etc.)
Some of you may recall my entry of when I meet Nick Ortiz. We were working in the Bayou (Louisiana) on a democratic campaign. I went up to Nick and asked him if he was Chicano, he responded yes and told me that he liked the way I said “Chicano”. I smiled and said, I am Chicana too. He gave me a big hug and screamed
“RAZA”! We bonded afterwards as the only two Chicanos around. I really enjoyed having him around. Anyway, months later when talking on the phone Nick mentioned something about being Spanish. I was shocked at this. He claimed he wasn’t Mexican but Spanish. I told him that I thought he identified as Chicano. He explained that he was Chicano but a Spanish Chicano. He explained that his family had been in the Southwest for generations but that they were Spanish not Mexican. He could be absolutely right, I am just shocked he would identify as a Spanish Chicano. Have any of you Chicano Blogeros run across this? Also can any of you point me in the direction of a good book on Tijerina?
I’ve heard something similar about some people with deep family roots in the Southwest, especially New Mexico, not wanting to be called “Mexican” or “Mexican-American”. The way I heard it it was because Mexico City never exerted much control over their part of the world and their culture comes from Spain and from local indigenous connections, not by way of Mexico.
I’ve also heard that the Spanish of small-town New Mexico is, or used to be, pretty different from Mexican Spanish. I couldn’t tell you how, though.
Wow, a Spanish Chicano? Hmm, well, the more the merrier, but still, to me, indigenous ancestry very important, even if you don’t know for sure. Its about your personal definition of Chicano/a, for me, is both a politics and a history/ancestry, for some, is just about politics while for others is just about ancestry.