The Mexican American Border | Manifest Destinies

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entire north american continent to spread its way of life and social structure we associate this term mainly with the time period of the 1840s when starting from new england more and more american settlers pushed westward to settle the mexican-american war took place as well as the american annexations of mexican territory north of the rio grande and the american wars with natives flared up as the u.s government enforced the program of ethnic cleansing however i find this to oversimplify the story of american expansion westward when the story of manifest destiny is told particularly in popular history it is often done in a way that can make people think this was the one big and only expansion of territory by the americans or that american territory didn't expand before or that american expansionism only came from new england and that is simply not true from the first moment of settlers arriving on the coastlines of north america there had been expansions westward the british had even banned further expansion to keep treaties with the cherokee but after the british were gone there was nothing holding the americans back after the founding of the first settlements there were 11 big internal expansions through migrations by settlers into frontier countries in north america one of the first was appalachia when britain exported scots and scottish penal labor into the new world these didn't like sticking around the predominantly english colonies so they ran off into the then hard to reach frontier of the appalachian mountains founding their own settlements towns and social structures that would become the modern day states of west virginia kentucky and tennessee as soon as the british were gone there were three big migrations westward between 1780 and 1840 from new england settlers pushed westward from upstate new york along the great lakes bringing with them their social structures in attempts to expand their way of life and society westward ships carrying these settlers along the great lakes had names like the mayflower of the west and they would chase away the iroquois to found new settlements along northern pennsylvania northern ohio northern indiana and northern illinois northern wisconsin and basically the entire state of michigan you can see when new england is settled in places like the ohio valley by the names given to these towns that often resemble the names of towns in massachusetts connecticut and new york or even old world england itself like bristol danbury fairfield greenwich guildford hartford litchfield new haven new london or new walk fourth the earliest european settlers of appalachia tended to live in small farms and drive the herds of pigs sheep and cattle from field to field until the soil had been depleted then they abandoned that farm moved to the next patch of land and started over again starting in the 1800s these appellations started to quickly expand westward from the mountains into the ohio valley and down the mississippi valley the spread and settled in the south in northern georgia northern alabama and northern mississippi north into southern ohio southern indiana and southern illinois and west into iowa missouri kansas arkansas and by the 1840s into northern texas natives be they cherokee chickasaw or whoever the appalachians encountered were driven off to make way creating a large cultural sphere of states whose inhabitants some today just call redneck fifth from 1810 onward europe was a tinderbox of constantly flaring revolutionary flames one place where these fires kept flaring up over and over again was germany however all revolutions that flared up in germany failed including the big one in 1848 with absolute monarchy ever deeply entrenching itself in germany tens of thousands of disillusioned germans from prussia to poland to the rhineland bavaria czechia and austria packed and left for america starting in the 1820s and they were encouraged to do so by german governments glad to rid themselves of potential troublemakers these germans would usually migrate east of philadelphia throughout western pennsylvania and central ohio indiana michigan illinois minnesota and wisconsin they brought with them their social structure of semi-independent small family-owned farms and family businesses and created the cultural framework for what became the midwest you can see the impact these first three westward migrations had in modern politics to this day the coastlines of the great lakes mainly settled by people from new england tend to vote democratic the southern parts mainly settled by appellations tend to vote republican and the parts settled by germans can vote both ways and are what make these places swing in elections sixth by the 1810s the slave lords of the south ran into a problem they had run out of land to expand their plantations new england politicians had constantly blocked any attempt by southern states to expand slavery westward but by the 1820s they gained the political power to expand west and by 1829 had a president in the white house who was sympathetic to their cause the cherokee creek and choctaw were driven off their lands with the not so subtly named indian removal act to make way for southern slave plantations in georgia alabama florida and mississippi and when these plantation owners expanded into louisiana they encountered and were disgusted by the local colonial french towns where over 50 of all blacks were free where free black frenchmen could rise to a high social status and where interracial marriages had never been illegal and were widely practiced so they forced their way of life upon them from this point onward what we see here with this southern westward expansion is that westward expansion not only meant the removal of native indians but also the removal and forcing yourself upon other colonial european societies with this southern expansion we reach the 1840s when popular history many claimed that the era of manifest destiny began as he clearly saw the push west had happened more than half a century before even under british colonial rule and more importantly i left out the first expansions of settlements one that is often ignored overlooked or forgotten in the story of north america the spanish and later mexican push north the spanish settlers who settled from california to texas and founded a distinctive culture decades before american expansions 1776 is widely remembered as the year the american revolution began but we should not forget that 1776 is also the same year that the spanish founded san francisco here lies probably one of the main reasons why the year 1840 is so significant to what americans call manifest destiny because it collided with someone else's destiny of course previous expansions had collided with the destinies of many peoples cherokee iroquois creek choctaw and many more are people defined as savage and unworthy of the land they lived upon by those who came to take it away from them but west of oklahoma and the sebine river there now was another european nation and culture a nation that had expanded north had itself taken land from the apaches a nation that saw it as its own manifest destiny to go north and to expand build and prosper as a society expanding westward now meant clashing with another european state society and with a different vision of society it would no longer just be a drive to grab and take from peoples considered inferior but a contest with a state over which one was more worthy or strong enough to take these lands in many ways a common theme of imperialism during that era when britain challenged the mughals for rule over india and france challenged the ottomans for rule over north africa at the same time conflict between mexico and america over these lands would mean an imperial war of expansion however there is also an additional reason why 1840 stands out to us and that has to do with the internal politics of both these places at the time in the united states the two predominant political forces at the time were those of the new england north with its midwest ally and the south with its appalachian ally fighting over the one preeminent political issue of the time slavery it was not just new england that expanded west but also the south and they did so for the same reason to form free states and slave states to have more states than the other to dominate over the other to either abolish slavery or reinforce and expand slavery a political confrontation that eventually blew up into a full-blown civil war here in the context of this internal political conflict and encountering mexico is where the 9th and 10th big migration waves came into the picture in the north people from the midwest and new england migrated into oregon and california intending to build a new england of the west coast the native chinook people of oregon when first encountering white people started calling them bostoners because so many settlers came from boston the names of their settlements such as salem named after a town of the same name in massachusetts or portland named after a town of the same name in maine clearly show how these first american settlers in oregon and california were from new england however in california there were unclaimed land and needed a justification for violating the spanish and later mexican claims which the protestant new englanders did by declaring the migrations there as a war against the popish catholic tyranny of spain and to bring the true virtuous protestant faith to these lands early american settlers in california converted to catholicism and adopted mexican citizenship but as the decades rolled on more and more new england settlers brought with them a refusal to adopt any such thing they started building public schools and protestant churches they lived in disobedience of the already weak state authority of the californian state and as the years went by more and more openly claimed that california ought to be part of the united states and at the same time in texas southerners started to arrive with slaves to turn it into a slave [Music] state as the large landowners bankers generals and mine owners kept bickering and scheming over the power and riches of the country in mexico city and the authority of the state increasingly started to decline the two places it lost the most control over were alta california and texas the nortenos increasingly lived their lives by themselves and gave less and less of a dam about what those bickering fools in mexico city told them to do especially after caravans with supplies stopped being sent north from mexico city what was sent north by mexico city was often counterproductive to asserting control such as penal laborers who kept escaping laws that discriminated religious minorities and groups such as the franciscans ordering them expelled from the country which the governor of alta california refused to enforce and which couldn't really be enforced in texas where government authority didn't have much of a reach anymore mexican soldiers who were sent to texas and california to secure it for mexico city often stopped getting paid by mexico city and even stopped receiving basic supplies and rations which resulted in entire companies deserting an entire battalions marauding through the lands sacking and pillaging missions churches ranches and towns to top all that off mexico city passed a law that required a minimum annual income bracket for politicians congressmen had to have an annual income of at least 1 500 pesos to run for office that's an annual income of 160 000 dollars in today's money and governors needed to earn at least 2 000 pesos a year to run for office which is an annual income of 220 000 in today's money this law secured the power of the wealthy elite in mexico city eliminated any public participation in politics and ensured the country would remain an authoritarian oligarchy but in the north this law turned into an outright farce because not a single person living in the lands stretching from the bay of san francisco to the texas coastline earned enough money to be a governor congressman mayor or even just a district deputy in the north nobody obeyed this law people in fact stopped obeying most of mexico city's laws mexico city and mexico by and large started being seen as a nuisance and an obstruction in the lives of the nortenos tejano ranchers illegally drove their herds of cattle and fined bred horses across the border into markets in louisiana californios smuggled and sold their cowhides illegally in markets on the us frontier trading with foreigners was illegal but nobody cared and as the governor of california mariano chico noted necessity makes licit what is not listed by law without it californians would not exist as he had to admit that without breaking mexico's city's ridiculous laws the economy and society of california would collapse into itself texas in particular increasingly slipped out of mexico's control besides the fact that the apaches didn't take kindly to anyone texas became increasingly pulled out of integration with mexico internal integration is the extent to which a state entity can exert control over a region through infrastructure administration law and trade if you are a country the extent to which you control that country is dependent upon how well you can access each part of this country how much you can enforce your laws over these lands and how well trade internally can be facilitated the nortenos of texas increasingly traded with the americans the road networks of the region had already been completely neglected resulting in the roads and paths leading from texas into louisiana being better developed than those leading to mexico city louisiana also had the nice big juicy port of new orleans for which nortenas could not only sell their products into the wider world but could also access american markets through the vast mississippi shipping lanes and he also didn't have to bribe any oligarchs to do business in the united states texas gradually started to slip into an increasingly american economic sphere of influence americans also increasingly moved into texas by 1823 three thousand of them lived there illegally about as much as the not taino population and the government in mexico city saw that as a good thing moses and stephen austin a father and son team had bought large land grants from the mexican government right after independence built a ranch and over decades learned spanish acquired citizenship and encouraged other americans to do as they had mexico city believed that this would be the standard for american migration into texas they encouraged americans to move to texas placed laws in effect that would demand of them to convert to catholicism and expected that these american settlers would help tame the nortenos and the apaches and thereby restore control over texas for mexico city they were however wrong and this is also where myths started to be created when you read popular history about what happened next there are two versions of the story the first is that a group of brave pioneering anglo-americans liberated texas for themselves the other is that devious white anglo-americans stole texas from its mexican inhabitants both narratives are wrong one more wrong than the other one is more self-limiting both oversimplify what happened there are two main groups of american settlers who came to texas appalachian hill and mountain people who settled in northern texas to build small self-sufficient communities within which they wanted to be as far away from new england and the south as well as their governments laws and regulations as possible and southerners who settled along the texas coastline who wanted to expand their slave plantations for profit and create a new slave state to expand their political power in their rivalry with new england however the majority of settlers were southerners these groups encountered and became neighbours of the nortenos but rather than deeper tying the nortenos into mexico the americans and nortenas found increasingly more common ground they both couldn't stand the authoritarianism and attempts by mexico city to control their lives nortenos increasingly wished to liberate themselves from mexico city's tyranny the southerners where by and large failed slave plantation owners running away from creditors and debt collectors from louisiana to south carolina they didn't bother learning spanish certainly didn't convert to catholicism and imported slaves in violation of mexico city's abolition of slavery people like hayden edwards when he was reminded of mexico's ban on slavery declared himself independent in the republic of fredonia where he legalized slavery the mexican army deported him back to louisiana however the tide could not be stopped and so in 1830 mexico banned immigration but americans kept coming and nathanos supported them as it brought the markets with which they were trading closer to them americans started outnumbering nortenas by 10 to 1 but both groups were not in conflict but unified in opposition and open defiance against mexico city the mexican perspective here especially of the tejanos is often overlooked the conflict between the north and south kept boiling and all it would take for it to blow up was a spark which came in 1833 when santa hanna became president of mexico again in 1833 he wanted to ensure that he would not be removed from power again so he suspended the mexican constitution sent all his opponents into exile abroad and ceased complete power of all mexican government institutions almost instantly this led to rebellions all across mexico in guajilla texas new mexico and out of california california went so far as to declare independence threatening to remain such until the mexican constitution had been restored pueblo indians in new mexico rose up in revolt took santa fe killed the governor and declared a mestizo buffalo hunter to be the new governor santa anna spent the first two years of this new presidency marching through northern mexico with an army crushing one rebellion after another with increasing brutality tejanos angered by the move into absolute dictatorship the previous decades of neglect and authoritarianism and by santa ana's increasing brutality had enough they demanded it first for tejas to become a separate state from quahila but to still remain part of mexico but support for that increasingly dissipated and leading nortenos such as juan seguin a friend of stephen austin and lorenzo de zavala joined forces with separatist american settlers to demand complete independence from mexico at the battle of the alamo 12 tejanos were amongst the 200 fighting for an independent texas lorenzo de savala would become the first vice president of texas juan seguin would lead tejano rebels at the battle of san giaquinto the deciding battle that secured texan independence and administered the burial of the dead after it but it was already during the war where a myth started to be created southern newspapers reported on this war as a conflict between white anglo-americans in a war against an inferior mixed hispanic race and their tyranny stephen austin called the war a war of barbarism and despotic principles waged by the mongrel spanish indian and negro race against civilization and the anglo-american race all of it lies through and through tejanos had risen up side by side with american settlers as texans primarily against santa ana's dictatorship and when the revolution was over the northerners who had rebelled against mexico city were betrayed southerners flooded into texas to build new slave plantations along the coast and the nortenos who had lived there were dispossessed and driven off the lands juan seguin who was elected the mayor of san antonio in an independent texas was sent into exile after a rabble of southern newcomers accused him of being a mexican spy he returned years later after being proven innocent to discover in anger how texas had been turned into a racially segregated society with the nortenos restricted to the lands along the rio grande and where none of them could hope to achieve any political representation or power within this new state at every hour of the day and night my countrymen ran to me for protection against the assaults or exaction of those adventurers sometimes by persuasion i prevailed on them to desist sometimes also force had to be resorted to how could i have done otherwise could i leave them defenseless exposed to the assaults by foreigners who were on the pretext that they were mexicans treated them worse than brutes a powerful myth was born from these events which became accepted historical fact for almost a century a tale of brave southern pioneers who settled the land and freed it from latin despotism a tale that removed the story of the norteno completely and perplexingly as we changed the way we tell history in the mid 20th century a new countenif that called itself progressive was born but was just as mythical a tale of devious southern slave owners who stole the lands of mexicans a half-truth but still therefore only half true and half a lie a tale that casts the nortenos as victims but doesn't acknowledge their participation in the rebellion and their dreams and hopes for freedom and therefore falsely frames and omits the story of how those hopes and dreams were betrayed and crushed the nathanos remained in the united states from texas to california juan seguin upon returning to texas would become one of the first community organizers and leaders of the harness within the united states 1855 in the galveston weekly newspaper we find the first written record of a lynching of mexicans 11 tejanos the murder described and justified mockingly with the words the whole race of mexicans here is becoming a useless commodity becoming cheap doggy eleven mexicans it is stated have been found along the nooses in a hanged condition better so than to be left on the ground for the howling lobbos to tear to pieces and then hull them all for the red that burns his inside raw lynchings of tejanos continued up to the early 1900s the land they had owned was grabbed not by small american settlers as in the west but by large southern plantation owners from virginia to south carolina georgia and mississippi in southern texas 1.3 million acres of land were acquired by only 13 southern planters the land had previously been owned by 360 tajanas mostly small farmers and ranchers these were driven off their lands and coerced into signing over their property under the threat of violence the stillman king and kennedy ranches were such properties which were acquired through coercion fraud and threats of violence by americans if you were a wealthy takana rancher you were also driven off your land unless you had a daughter and could find an american settler willing to marry her the mcallen and young ranchers in southern texas were acquired by american settlers that way this disrupted but also weirdly reinforced the nuteno social structure with a patron at the center in a way the fundamental social structure remained the same mexican texas had been a place of loose federal government control in which communities gathered and organized around the wealthiest member of the community the patron and american texas also became a place of loose federal government control in which communities gathered and organized around the wealthiest members of the community b day cattle barons oil barons or today's tech barons in 1941 a certain lyndon b johnson ran for the senate in texas and won 90 of the votes in the southern counties of texas he had won those votes not by campaigning but by calling george parr also known as the duke of duval county and making him promises that in return got him the votes the same counties had given 95 percent of the vote to johnson's rival and the governor's race the year before in 1948 when johnson ran for the senate seat again he again called george parr and received 99 percent of the votes in that county these notorious elections are the result of a development within texas and tajano political culture after american annexations in northern mexico that continued previous hierarchical structures tejanos lived in the united states but they were exempt from political powers and economic institutions they rebelled at first such as in 1859 when juan cuatina led a rebellion against texan authorities but the rebellion was crushed tejanos who demanded equality were declared bandits by the state government hunted down killed or even lynched tejanos therefore retreated into their own communities with their families and churches to be by themselves for themselves under their own norms and traditions usually again under patron right after the 1970s if you ran for political office in texas like lyndon johnson and wanted what became in the american colloquial known as the hispanic vote you didn't campaign for it but had a phone call with the patron however this segregation dispossession and consequent isolation that extended beyond texas to mexican-american communities up to california also had a different effect mexican-americans organized around their communities they took care of each other helped each other built socio-economic institutions of their own took care of each other through family and church and as a community separated and disenfranchised learned to rely upon others within their own community to organize together there is a good reason for when desegregation finally came why mexican-american communities were able to organize efficiently run labor unions organize political action communities and gain and achieve political representation faster than many other historically disenfranchised minority communities within the united states despite all hardships that they endured there was a perseverance and strength that they found within community structures it wasn't until the opening of american society desegregation and the integration of the political process that the nortenos reemerged back into the general public as well as the cultural and political stage it wasn't until recent years that texan historians began to seriously and honestly examine their true history juan seguin the hero of the battle of san jaquinto may not have his name in the wikipedia article of that battle yet but public buildings across texas are increasingly named after him and the state library and archive was named after lorenzo de savala the stories of the texan tennis or tejanos raise interesting questions about the state and history of texas in particular they rebelled to be free from the tyranny and despotism of a mexican dictatorship and were then betrayed by those who wanted to keep slaves so are tejanos maybe even more texan than those who rebelled to keep slaves they have been around longer than the american settlers by four centuries some of them being the descendants of settlers who came a hundred years before the first english settled in virginia the only ones who predate them are the apaches the history of the tejanos californios and the northerners of arizona new mexico colorado and nevada also are in general one of the most interesting chapters in the history of what we call manifest destiny the story of manifest destiny frequently is told in context of americans taking land from native indians which is true but often overlooks the important chapter of the land stolen from mexicans after a betrayal we should not forget that the latinos rebelled against mexico from quahila to texas to sonora to bayer california arizona new mexico and california that many of them wish to overthrow santa anna or even to secede from mexico itself and form something new when mexicans are reminded of the alamo by some rather uneducated americans it is worth pointing out that mexicans were amongst the rebels at the alamo that the cultural narrative often found in popular history of americans and mexicans destined to be enemies is actually untrue and that they may have more in common than you may think at first to tell that story one will have to immerse oneself into the mexican and antenna perspective of the history of these states and ask those questions questions and answers that we might examine closer in a future video what matters for us here is that the nutenos formed a cultural parcel of the united states not completely mexican as they were separated from that are molded over centuries into the american socio-political cultural framework but not fully part of the anglo-majority cultural set in america as they shared a culture with nothingness across the border but they also differ from last century's mexican migrants and culture a lot especially from those that came from southern mexico they show us one thing predominantly that when you boil it down to basics there is rarely such a thing as a cultural border borders are drawn by states by governments by government institutions and not by cultures and when this border was drawn it fell into a time of extreme political friction post texan independence mexico was even a greater shambles inspired by the texas example more rebellions arose all across the norteno lands in declarations of independence the republic of rio grande the republic of bayer california the republic of sonora and even down south in the republic of yucatan after santa ana refused to make peace with texas that had by now bankrupted itself and with new england and the midwest settlers inciting rebellion in california the united states seized the opportunity and after winning a decisive victory annexed large parts of northern mexico moving the border to where it now divides nogales and follows the flow of the rio grande however the united states stopped short from annexing sonora quahila and bayer california even though they could have and even though american mercenaries were involved in the rebellions there because fundamentally this annexation was the result of a compromise this chapter in the history book is one of those what if chapters the americans could have drawn the border further south they could have annexed all the rebelling republics and the modern united states would have extended all the way down the sierra madre mountains maps from that era show how this was in fact even considered instead they didn't and the remaining rebellions were crushed the reason for this lies within the preeminent internal political conflict of the united states at the time the conflict between the slave states south and the free states of new england opposition to the mexican-american war and its annexations came from new england who believes that a score of victories over mexico the annexation of half our provinces will give us more liberty a purer morality a more prosperous industry than we have now murder cannot be hidden from god by a few flimsy rags called banners awake and arrest the work of butchery where it shall be too late to preserve your souls from the guilt of wholesale slaughter ask the prominent massachusetts abolitionist and newspaper owner horace greeley and the massachusetts state senate voted to condemn the mexican-american war as a war against freedom against humanity against justice with the triple objective of extending slavery or obtaining the control of the free states and that was in the end true the president at the time james polk was a southerner whose political loyalties lied with the southern states southern states that had long called for this war mississippi senator john quitman had called for an invasion of mexico when mexico abolished slavery to prevent the establishing of a negro and mongrel empire southern legislators and representatives had long yearned to expand slavery in what they called the golden circle which by 1854 became an organization called the knights of the golden circle a precursor to a certain other organization beginning with the letter k they advocated for an annexation of the entire mexican gulf coast right down to yucatan enslaving its non-white inhabitants and to then go to war with spain to annex cuba and hispaniola all of which should become new slave states filled with slave plantations to expand and create a slave empire along the gulf of mexico a golden circle of slave states stretching all around the gulf of mexico hence the name in 1854 when spain abolished slavery the louisiana state senate passed a motion that condemning the abolition of slavery in spanish cuba and the sacrifices of the white race the seven states made no secret of the fact that they wished to expand so they could expand slavery new england feared this and was terrified by the idea it would double the slave states in the united states and consequently the amount of slave state representatives in senate congress and electoral votes slave state legislators would have dominated the united states government consequently the free states had a staunch opposition to any and all annexation of any mexican lands however this was a little bit hypocritical new england also expanded west and eventually into mexican lands to gain more free states and hence political power over the slave states at the same time california was increasingly settled by people from the midwest in the east and from new england along the coast although those two groups had not much in common they both deplored and despised slavery and california would also provide access to the pacific which the slave states could also benefit from there are two things however that made californian settlement different from texas settlements despite what some californians may tell you there really wasn't much of a californian independence movement or revolution california's separation from mexico was almost completely driven by the united states federal government who immediately annexed it when the opportunity came the other fact is that the new englanders and midwesterners who migrated there didn't manage to fully transplant their sociopolitical framework upon california as southern planters did in texas within years of annexation gold rushes attracted hundreds of thousands of migrants from chile to argentina to germany sweden and ireland japan korea and china turkey jamaica and india the population of california became incredibly diverse where no one cultural group could dominate over all others and the way society was run had to accommodate for all the influx of immigrants also generated capital that fueled industrial development in sectors such as railroads steel manufacturing farming shipping and more in new england political culture the well-being of the community had priority over the well-being of the individual as it had developed out of puritan english culture but in california the influx of migrants and the growth of industry through migrant groups as well as the input of more cultures resulted in individual freedoms taking a more prominent position on the stage as common values community values in california tended to be centered around groups of communities and churches be they mexican american farmer communities japanese farmers argentinian miners irish and american harbour workers or chinese railroad workers california politically aligned itself with new england but sociopolitically developed very differently racial segregation as implemented in texas was attempted but less rigorously enforced and eventually collapsed mexican culture and catholicism persevered to mix and mold with english culture and the various new arrivals into something unique and new while the latinos of texas remained mostly as they were the tejanos were segregated and consequently preserved much of their communal structures and contrasted that the californios participated within the sociopolitical framework of the american society that formed they helped reshaped it throughout the coming century but also themselves became a lot more american california in the end became a mixed patchwork of cultures mixed together in a pioneer society with no dominant cultural group it needed to build a political structure that appealed to all it became the place you went to start a new life not just if you were american but from anywhere in the world a place more tolerant than most other parts of the country which would therefore in its own regard significantly shaped the united states and while the three states worked on bringing california into the union strategically the three states also came to agree to an annexation of texas as a slave state as part of a compromise texas to them seemed worthless a scrap of desert with some parts where weird black liquids that stank of sulfur pierced through the sand so nothing too valuable but as a desert perfect as a protective buffer zone to protect louisiana and its new orleans port which as the mouth of the mississippi river was the achilles heel of the 19th century american economy with annexation an invader would have to take the long difficult march through a hostile desert filled with apaches and angry southerners to get there and unlike mexico the united states had another advantage that contributed to these annexations happening for centuries spaniards and mexicans had struggled with the difficult geography of the chaparral attempts to enforce their state structures upon the region had failed miserably the spanish state had not the means to do so and the mexican state which had inherited much of its political and economic structures from spain was too weak to do so either but for the americans and their state structure that had developed from the 1600s onward which allowed for a more decentralized government structure it was more possible the geography of the capital was and still is to this very day difficult for any society and state to control but the institutions of the states that had developed in the united states made it easier for her to do so than for mexico this together with the expansions driven by manifest destiny and the drive by free states and slave states to expand their political power in the end would form the basis for political compromise between those two rival factions within the us government california would be a next as a future free state and to get access to the pacific and texas as a future slave state that protected louisiana as a strategic buffer the border that today separates mexico from the united states was not drawn by culture language geography religion ethnicity or even just as conquest spoils of war it was drawn as a compromise between two rival political camps in an attempt to prevent a civil war a civil war that in the end happened anyway [Music] throughout the first two chapters of this series we focused on one thing i attempted to show you how the founding structures of the united states and mexico were different and consequently resulted in the evolution of two very different political structures on the north american east coast a gradual but ever increasing attitude of rebellion autonomous community structures financial self-interest and separatism came to shape the political structures of the united states while in the plateau of mexico and most of latin america the spanish empire successfully established a state and social structures of a feudal society that existed in the spanish motherland that europeans sought to replicate european feudalism in the americas and where they succeeded a feudal social structure with all its legacies came to be however those carefully watching might have encountered a flaw within the case i am building that being if feudal structures leave legacies that create broken political institutions then why are the state institutions of europe not as broken as those of mexico the answer to that is exactly why the mexican state is in its current state destruction and decline destruction is not exactly something that we would associate with stability or the establishment of a stable political and social order more with the kind of environment that produces and thereby allows stateless entities to shape and take control however it is chaos war destruction and decline that ultimately shaped the modern political institutions of europe the feudal political order of europe started being challenged in 1789 and 1803 and even though it was re-established in 1815 by the feudal powers it kept getting challenged over and over and over again the existent political powers eventually dragged europe into an apocalyptic catastrophe which caused the collapse of most old european political structures the result of this collapse was a volatile landscape of political instability from which a political force emerged which completely burned down any remnants of old european political power structures the europe of 1945 was a europe that needed to be rebuilt not just physically by rebuilding destroyed infrastructures cities towns and industry but also in governance and state structure the political structures were reinvented and ironically it would be american republican political structures the ones that were birthed out of rejecting european feudal structures which would lead the leading role in rebuilding how europe does politics what was born from this were more stable open accountable just and free political structures states that provided a level playing field for commerce and the development of open political discourse and public sovereignty but there is an exception in europe a state untouched by the apocalyptic events that rendered europe to ashes a state that remained outside of the consequent rethinking and rebuilding of europe a state that gives you an idea of what happened to mexico because its recent political developments have been somewhat similar to mexico spain spain went through all the political turmoil that the rest of europe experienced but it stayed out of the final apocalypse instead opting for its own smaller apocalypse a war won by the forces of old europe who then proceeded to try and create a weird romanticized nostalgic yet modernized vision of an old spain however with none of the charm a disregard for culture brutal totalitarianism and economy dependent on a wealthy class that almost resembled 19th century european aristocrats and deep institutional corruption this disheveled tumor on the spanish history book eventually collapsed into itself but the structures of this spanish state the way governance used to be done within it still partially remain and haunt spain to this very day in corruption lack of public accountability regional instability nepotism and calamitous economic decisions resulting from backdoor deals something that is colloquially known in europe as the ghost of franco the diarrhea that you get if you drink tap water in mexico is colloquially known as montezuma's revenge a somewhat superstitious and funny name invoking the ghost of the long gone aztec emperor returning to haunt those who now inhabit his lands but in a way it is true the failure of the mexican state to provide even basic sanitation systems for large parts of the country's water supply network is the result of a legacy of centuries of corrupt practices and failed states you could call it the ghost of santa anna the ghost of diaz or the ghost of the pri what it however shares with the ghost of franco is that mexico just as spain never underwent a period of restructuring its state and completely abandoning the old corrupt outdated and inefficient ways the first rebellion of the mexican warfare independence was the hidalgo revolt an uprising of disenfranchised peasants led by a priest primarily not against spain but against the tyranny of the colonial elites the colonial elites crushed the revolt only to then fight for independence against spain because spain wanted to cut down on their ability to rule as small tyrants mexico was left in ruins but it was the tyrants who rebuilt the new independent mexico but mexico also had other chances it had more cataclysmic events that left the country in ruins and could have resulted in a rebuilding and rethinking of the mexican state into a less corrupt more democratic and just entity the end of the mexican-american war the reform was the end of the french occupation and the revolution in 1910 but it blew all of these chances every time it ended up being the forces of old who dictated that the future was the past let's return to where we were while the americans were annexing texas and california the europeans were licking their wounds after decades of revolutions and wars they had also lost considerable revenue from the loss of colonies in the americas the new world that they had intended and used as a cash cow was increasingly slipping out of their fingers and when the mexican republic refused to pay debts to the french and spanish it seemed like a perfect opportunity to reassert and rebuild influence over the americas since mexico was also a weak state that had just come out of a costly war it seemed like a perfect target the french invaded mexico and placed an austrian monarch on the throne of a state with a god-awful and complicated flag to draw the french were supported in this endeavor by all major european powers who wished to rebuild a european sphere of influence over the americas again however what the europeans overlooked was that if the mexican state had difficulty running mexico well what made them think that they could somehow do it additionally very few actually wanted the european overlords back there were some supporters of the mexican monarchy especially amongst the mexican elite but other than that only the confederacy and the dying brazilian monarchy supported this french puppet monarchy the republican mexican army fought hard throughout the land and even though the french managed to occupy many major cities they got bogged down in the gorilla war in the countryside and could just as those who preceded them never establish any control over the north whether nothenos had zero interest in being told by the french what to do in fact the capital of mexico during the occupation was there in ciudad juarez the americans were also furious they even considered entering the war on the side of mexico to kick the french out but were preoccupied with their own war which didn't prevent them from providing aid and encouraging american volunteers to go south and fight the french which several thousand did in the end france lost which mexicans commemorate to this day on cinco de mayo the anniversary of the first major defeat of the french five years before the war ended this is a chapter unjustly underrepresented in modern history curriculum it is an important turning point this marked the final end of european geopolitical and colonial ambitions in the americas more than just a mexican victory it can be seen as a victory for the entire family of american nations to have the right to determine their own future and destiny without european interference and making it very clear at the time that the borders of european imperialism ended on the coastlines of the two american continents the first cinco de mayo celebrations by the way were held in california years before the war was over by americans in solidarity with mexico and collecting donations and volunteers to send south to mexican republican forces europe and the end of the war went back home and then proceeded to take its frustrations out on africa and themselves what they had left in mexico was devastation but also a newfound optimism relations with the united states had been eased out and past conflict settled in diplomatic agreement the two nations agreed to friendship and cooperation as american aid was sent to help rebuild the mexican economy it was at this point that history could have gone a different way that the state structures of mexico could have been rebuilt differently but that didn't happen instead what happened was the porfiriato named after porfirio diaz a hero of the war against france who became president in 1884. diaz rebuilt the mexican economy by expropriating vast amounts of land seizing it from mostly poor mestizo peasants in the south and handing it over to large landowners this had a substantial impact on this sector of the mexican economy throughout various often hard to access regions of mexico small family farms had established themselves over the centuries self-sufficient farmers who mainly produced for their own needs sharecroppers who provided for themselves and paid to local authorities taxes and shares of the harvest or tenant farmers who paid to a large landlord for the privilege irrespective of which type of farm and if they had owned their land or not these small family farms were disbanded and the new owners of these lands created plantation economies hennequin plantations that produced fibers for rope sorghum to be used as cattle food coffee for a global demand that exploded during the late 19th century and sugarcane to produce sugar or rum and foodstuffs what all of these crops had in common was that they cannot be produced as a family crop these highly labor-intensive crops require the kind of substantial investment capital and labor that a small family farm cannot bring up these plantations were also part of a global economy and most of its products were to be sold into the foreign markets of an increasingly global and industrialized economy the vast majority of these plantations were created in the south as jungle plantations meaning jungles eroded to use the fertile soils and hot climate for multiple annual harvests however there's a rough lesson to be learned by anyone who invests into these types of jungle plantations and ranches a lesson that west african countries and central american countries learned the hard way and the lesson that brazil should have learned in the 19th century but under its current leadership seems to be determined to learn again jungles are not random depositories of nutrition jungles are fragile self-sustaining ecosystems ecosystems working in a constant cycle of recyclement rotting trees and dead leaves constantly fertilize the wealth in the fauna that itself furthers the continuous rainfall road the jungle and you destroy that cycle when building your ranch or plantation on the remaining fertile soil you are bound to get some years of very rich results but with the cycle broken you will run out of nutritious soil and eventually you will have to spend an enormous amount of the profits made into fertilizer consequently jungle plantations end up becoming a cycle within themselves a self-sustaining poverty institution that keeps entire segments of populations trapped in low-income low-skill yet labor-intensive jobs with little innovation from the gold coast to the jungles of central america the only way you can continuously run the jungle plantation and still rake in massive profits is by continually roading more jungle or by having unpaid labor with the institution of slavery caribbean plantations racked in gigantic profit margins and to ensure enormous profits deers went by similar means this possessed small farmers mostly mestizo ended up working for close to nothing or nothing as indentured servants dead laborers penal laborers or sometimes even just kidnapped and forced to work in a new industrialized but still exploitative plantation industry the low point of this economic practice came when diaz forcibly dispossessed the native yakui people who had lived largely untouched in the northern state of sonora not only did they have their lands taken but almost the entire people around 8 000 of them were deported to the southern state of yucatan and forced to work as slaves on plantations in a supposedly civilizing forced labor system eerily similar to that of the spanish missions built two centuries before this started a gradual change in the prosperity and balance of wealth of the nation the south became dominated by rich plantations which gave the illusion of the average wealth rising throughout the south but in reality the south started becoming poorer and poorer due to the massive population of impoverished farm laborers that worked these plantations it is argued by some that the profiliario made mexico wealthier due to an increase in gdp but as this policy and others clearly show it made mexico poorer as gdp can increase while the wealth and average living standards of average citizens does not or even declines diaz also handed out these plantations as monopolies to his close allies and friends in the mexico city business and political elite additionally he handed out large monopolies in mining and other economic sectors to his political allies the new industrial mexico would mainly produce raw materials for foreign industrial markets it meant that mexico would spend the industrial revolution serving those who actually underwent that economic revolution rather than revolutionizing its own economy licenses for banks were also monopolized and handed out to the political allies and friends of diaz with long lasting and very damaging effects on the mexican economy banks and the capital that they provide are essential for any economy to grow and for innovations to receive the backing required to be sold and produced however because the banks were in the hands of a small elitist group they ended up serving a completely different purpose the owners of the economic monopolies ended up borrowing from the banks that they owned themselves they controlled interest rates ensuring their own wealth while bankrupting those who came up as competition the mexican banking sector became intertwined within the politics of the country as a tool of unelected politicians to secure their own power and wealth and a weapon to destroy those who challenge them and to keep this new status quo going by 1910 there were only 40 banks in mexico many of which were controlled by political allies and friends of diaz ensuring a monopoly and capital that only they had and could grant access to to take part in a global industrialized economy also takes access to foreign markets therefore diaz ended the restrictions on trade with foreign countries and in foreign markets so his new economy could export its raw materials to a booming foreign set of industries however not only were the owners of the monopolies the only ones who really produced anything for this global economy they were also the only ones given exclusive trading licenses to conduct this trade in terms of laws and accountability just as previous presidents diaz had not been elected but seized power through force and fraud he had the ability to change laws that his heart's content to pardon or just outright legalize the cronyisms of his allies and himself in particular through the use of a law called de amparo this law based in the mexican constitution and originating in 1857 means appeal for protection and essentially provides the basis for an individual to argue that certain laws don't apply to them because those laws may violate their constitutional rights even though the constitution might not even explicitly or implicitly protect what they claim to be a right as a right this is confusing and it was introduced in mexico as a supposed protection for individuals against the state and copied throughout many latin american countries but throughout latin america but especially in mexico and colombia this law ended up being used by corrupt politicians and gangsters alike to escape prosecution and investigation through obfuscating the legal process with obscure arguments over obscure rights supposedly violated when their activities and persons were being investigated in short crooked business corruption and criminal activity in mexico by state officials and wealthy elites through this not only ended up being stayed sanctioned but legally protected compare this to the economic developments taking place throughout the united states at the same time the american banking sector was born into scandal and fraud established just like in mexico by politicians in collaboration with the wealthy to enrich themselves however a substantial difference to mexico is that politicians involved in such scandals got voted out engaging in this type of corruption became increasingly risky as an american civil society expanded and developed banking was also not monopolized banks were created by private firms and persons throughout the country without approval by the state in 1818 there were 338 banks in the united states by 1910 there were 27 000 expanding both capital and its availability to average americans if you wanted a loan to start a business in the united states you could get that loan very easily and this availability of capital would do wonders for the american industrial revolution if you had an innovation and needed the capital to build the capacity to produce and sell your product you could do so the reasons for this are found in the patent law system of english law in 1623 the english parliament passed a patent act which stripped the english king of the power to grant royal patents and monopolies grounded in english law was now the ability for people to be granted patents by public representatives laws that also shaped american laws and remained within american laws long after independence unlike in mexico you didn't need to plead with the state to be granted the privilege of doing business you had that right and you could additionally demand from your government to protect your rights from being violated by others if you had an idea you could patent that idea at a low cost and then sell that patent to some other corporation or company to receive more capital to then continue creating more patents for more innovations to then use your capital to build and expand your business in the united states the existing socio-economic and political structures meant that it could fully not just as a state and society but through the efforts of its citizens participate in the industrial revolution and drive it onward into eventually becoming its leading nation the only exception in the united states was a place developing into a similar economic direction as mexico at the time which was the south where despite the abolition of slavery a black population was held in indentured servitude where they despite developing some of their own economic infrastructure by and large remained an underclass in a corrupt elitist society and where innovation and economic development struggled to take hold until very recently in contrast to the united states in mexico the socio-economic and political structures of colonial spain that were adapted into a republic now adapted again to find space within the industrial revolution and to continue however as the elites of mexico city prospered and schemed discontent amongst average mexican citizens started to increasingly boil beneath the surface and would eventually blow up into a full-blown revolution in the next video we will talk about the mexican revolution how the pri created a corrupt state and broken economic structures and how trade and border relations between the united states and mexico developed until today and its implications for the future if you want to see it don't forget to subscribe if you want to support this channel and keep videos like these coming up you can support me via patreon via paypal or via coffee links to them as well to all of my social media will be in the description i would like to thank the artists for contributing artwork to this video proceeds made with the surfshark vpn sponsorship will in their entirety go to them many thanks to the korean artist teabag the turkish artist turkbud who is also open for commissions the mexican artist nomad star who also has a youtube channel the norwegian artist pile of trash the german artist tanet the american artist echo who is also open for commissions the brazilian artist felipe who is also open for commissions the turkish artist outmapper who also runs a youtube channel the chilean artist flying tonk the history youtuber vexi sphere the american artist jacuzzin the malaysian artist mrs humanka pogban and axotolos you will find links to their social media in the description and i highly recommend you check them out especially if you need a piece of art commissioned but also in particular nomad since i will be working with him on a free hour-long video project on the history of quebec which you will be able to find on his youtube channel i would also like to thank a group of youtubers who came forward to read quotes for this video janie bell who makes comedy videos hates vadim who makes political commentary videos jangles science lad who makes science videos and political commentary videos and patter history a very underrated history youtuber from sri lanka whose channel is dedicated to telling the history of sri lanka that's it i hope you liked the video thank you for watching and i hope to see you all soon again for the next video

Channel: Kraut

Views: 995,022

Keywords: Kraut, Countryball, Polandball, Documentary, History, libtube, Mexico, America, Texas, USA, history, documentary, Independence, Alamo, Remember, Santa Anna, War, Revolution, Porfirio, Diaz, Slavery, Manifest, Destiny, Civil, California, Industrialisation, Industrial, France, Franco, Spain, Why Nations Fail, Institutions, Economics, Annexation, liberal, Sinco De Mayo, Mexican, American

Id: qmebxS8uQFk

Length: 68min 0sec (4080 seconds)

Published: Sat Apr 17 2021