They Should Stay There: The Story of Mexican Migration and Repatriation during the Great Depression

Latin America in Translation

by Alanís Enciso, Mark Overmyer-Velázquez (Foreword), Russ Davidson (Translator)

Here, for the first time in English—and from the Mexican perspective—is the story of Mexican migration to the United States and the astonishing forced repatriation of hundreds of thousands of people to Mexico during the worldwide economic crisis of the Great Depression. While Mexicans were hopeful for economic reform following the Mexican revolution, by the 1930s, large numbers of Mexican nationals had already moved north and were living in the United States in one of the twentieth century's most massive movements of migratory workers. Fernando Saul Alanis Enciso provides an illuminating backstory that demonstrates how fluid and controversial the immigration and labor situation between Mexico and the United States was in the twentieth century and continues to be in the twenty-first.

When the Great Depression took hold, the United States stepped up its enforcement of immigration laws and forced more than 350,000 Mexicans, including their U.S.-born children, to return to their home country. While the Mexican government was fearful of the resulting economic implications, President Lazaro Cardenas fostered the repatriation effort for mostly symbolic reasons relating to domestic politics. In clarifying the repatriation episode through the larger history of Mexican domestic and foreign policy, Alanis connects the dots between the aftermath of the Mexican revolution and the relentless political tumult surrounding today's borderlands immigration issues.

Genres: History, Nonfiction

262 pages, Kindle Edition

Published August 10, 2017

Reviews

[Maria · Rating 3 out of 5]

The U.S.-Mexican border has always been porous. People traveling back and forth in search of work. This book studies a time when California and Texas were forcibly deporting Mexicans and American citizens of Mexican descent in large numbers and the Mexican government's response.

Why I started this book: Immigration is a hot topic right now, and I think that historical perspective is always good.

Why I finished it: Very interesting, and depressing to see two governments playing hot-potato with migrants and citizens.

[David Groves · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book focuses on a thin slice of the Mexican-American story, the forced repatriation of half a million Mexicans from the United States back to Mexico from 1929 - 1933. Forced repatriation doesn't do justice to the idea of it. Imagine police officers and border-control agents raiding The Plaza in Los Angeles and arresting anyone who looked Mexican and didn't have papers or a job. Imagine them not even having a court hearing. Imagine thousands of Mexicans being put onto buses. Imagine their children being put onto those buses, too, even those who were American citizens because they had been born here. Imagine them being bused down to the border, where they were handed over to Mexican authorities. Imagine them being sent to land in Mexico that the government wanted farmed. Imagine most of those farms failing, and the refugees finally ending up begging in the streets of Mexico.

It's a compelling story. If you want a page turner about this era, this isn't the book for you. However, if you want an academic book that documents everything, that provides authoritative source material for every point in the story, this is the book for you. The authors recount not just the repatriation process, but also, both governments' attitudes towards the returning Mexicans. The United States wanted to get rid of them because jobs were scarce for whites. And the Mexican government was ambivalent about taking them back. On the one hand, they wanted the manpower to rejuvenate their economy. They wanted Mexicans who had learned useful skills to bring those skills to bear in Mexico. But on the other hand, they were afraid that other Mexicans would see them as taking their jobs. They were worried that they didn't have enough money to transport them, find jobs for them, and reintegrate them into society.

If you want to know about immigration in this era, this book contains a wealth of information on the topic, although not in an easily consumable form. It is not a book of stories, but a book of facts, figures, policies, citations, and references. Know what you're getting when you read this book.

[Bookworm · Rating 3 out of 5]

I was intrigued to read the story of Mexican migration to the US and their forced repatriation from the Mexican perspective. Since the sources I read and perspective I know is US-centric, it seemed like this would be a good book to read. Articles, long reads, etc. often talk about what it's like to be uprooted from what may be someone's home in the US, but it typically ends there or does not have an extensive view of what it's like for someone to be forcibly moved to a country they don't know (and sometimes have no connections to) and the impacts this has.

This book is apparently a translation of a text that looks at the massive forced repatriation of Mexican migrants, including those of their US-born children. It looks at the Mexican population in the US, the government policies that forced them to return/go to Mexico, and the consequences.

The book was not what I thought it would be. It was extremely dry and academic. I had been super-excited to read up on this topic and perhaps my lack of knowledge is part of the problem. But it's a lot of history, stats, discussion of policies, etc. that wasn't particularly compelling reading.

It's a good resource, but it wasn't something that worked for me.

[James Hennessy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really good, a little dense, and damn I didn't know about the
Mexican Repriation till I read this book. Goes to show how entangled progressives and white supermiscts were in the 1910's to 1930's at least.

[Diego Fernandez · Rating 2 out of 5]

for class

super boring. talks too much about possibilities and not much about real life. really repetitive and could use first hand accounts

[Nathaniel · Rating 5 out of 5]

Mexico's predominately farming economy couldn't even leverage knowledge coming back to the country. Their government processes were inadequate and all of the money couldn't be attributed by researchers. It makes me feel bad for those Mexican citizens that went back to the motherland, only to be shortchanged by the government's efforts.