The Lutheran Pioneer St. Louis — 1927, Page 34

Transcription machine transcription, uncorrected

⤓ Download .txt · copy text

34

Reclaiming Christ’s Heritage.

XXYV.
THE MEXICANS IN OUR COUNTRY.

The Mexican proper is the result of the inter-
marriage of Spaniards and Indians. The Spanish
intermarried with the Aztec and Pueblo Indians.
These Aztecs and Pueblos were far advanced in
civilization, as is proved by the ruins of their
dwellings, palaces, and temples.

The Mexicans, then, are not immigrants, for

_they have always been here. Though thousands

have come into the present United States from
Mexico, it would surely be wrong to call them
“foreigners.”

The great majority of Mexicans in

A Surveying Party.

the United States live in California, Arizona, New
Mexico, Colorado, and Texas. Bui all these States,
up to 1844 and even later, were a part of Mexico.

Of course, no accurate figures can be given as
to the number of native Mexicans in our country;
but in 1920 there were living in the United States
478,383 Mexicans that had been born in Mexico.
Jt is probable that the number of native-born Mexi-
cans in our country, that is, descendants of the old
Spaniards and Indians, is not far from one million.

Recent Immigration of Mexicans.

The fact that the 103,393 Mexicans born in
Mexico in 1900 had increased to 219,802 in 1910
and to 478,383 in 1920 gives indication of a
tremendous immigration in the twenty years up
to 1920; but since then many more have crossed
our southern border. This influx of thousands
‘upon thousands of Spanish-speaking aliens every
year creates a ea which places a monumental

THE LUTHERAN PIONEER.

missionary burden on the Church. The movement
of the Mexicans into America has been largely
industrial. Railroads have brought them in by
the thousands to work on new rights of way.
Thousands are employed as beet-workers as far
north as Ohio and Michigan every summer and fall.
Not a few towns in Oklahoma and Texas have their
Mexican colonies, and such colonies are also found
in northern industrial centers, such as Gary and
Indiana Harbor. El Paso has a population of
about 80,000, and of these 45,000 are Mexicans.
San Antonio, where we have a promising mission
among them, also has many thousands. ‘They are
used to doing the commonest and hardest labor.
Texas alone has more than a quarter million of
Mexicans, native and foreign-born.

Racial Characteristics.

Illiteracy, ignorance, poverty,
superstition, and low moral stand-
ards are common among these Mex-
icans. They are amiable in dispo-
sition, hospitable to a fault, and
always courteous. In their homes
they are said to be kind and gentle
to each other. Because of their
good nature they have been exploited
in many ways, and only rarely has
an earnest effort been made, aside
from the missionary activity of the
Church, to understand or reach
them. ‘They have lived and been
treated as a people inferior and
apart. “Greasers” has been the opprobrious name
given them. And yet they are deeply religious
and devout and quite responsive to an appeal by
those who have gained their confidence. The
success of the few men of our Church that have
worked among them is witness to that fact. ‘The
pity only is that up to now so little work could be
done among them. Other denominations, as, for
example, the Methodists and Presbyterians, number
their workers among the Mexicans by the hundreds.

Material Conditions.

While there are thousands of highly educated
men and women among the native Mexicans, law-
yers, judges, doctors, ministers, and the like, the
great majority are poor, very poor. The meager
education they have received, makes them unfit for
any but the most common labor. In the towns they
live in houses of one and two rooms, and some even
live in shacks built of boxes and tin cans. And yet