Déjà vu All Over Again: Closing the Border
Concerns that immigrants flooding across the border threaten the nation's basic institutions. Construction of armed posts to defend the border. Passage of new, more restrictive immigration laws. Sound familiar? Welcome to Mexico in 1830.
The story began when Mexico won independence from Spain in 1821. At first the newly independent country welcomed settlers from the United States. The government signed contracts with immigration brokers, called empresarios, who agreed to settle a set number of immigrants on a set piece of property in a set amount of time. In exchange for the right to buy land, settlers agreed to obey Mexican law, become Mexican citizens, and convert to Catholicism. At the same time, the US Congress passed a new land act that made emigration to Mexico even more appealing. Public land in the US cost $1.25/acre*, for a minimum of eighty acres and could no longer be bought on credit. Public land in Mexico cost 12 1/2¢/acre and credit terms were generous. Not a hard choice for anyone who was cash-poor and land hungry.
Some empresarios brought in groups of settlers from France or Germany. More, including Stephen Austin,** brought in settlers from the southern United States. Most new colonists settled in new communities east of modern San Antonia. By the mid-1830s, Anglo settlers outnumbered native Tejanos by as many as 10 to 1 in some parts of Texas. These settlers brought the culture of the American South with them, including slaves and slavery.*** In addition, many Anglo settlers traded (illegally) with Louisiana rather than with Mexico.
Concerned about growing American economic and cultural influence in the region, the Mexican government passed a law banning immigration into Texas from the United States on April 6, 1830. They also assessed heavy customs duties on all US goods, prohibited the importation of slaves, built new forts in the border region and opened customs houses to patrol the border for illegal trade.
The law didn't have the intended affect. Instead of re-gaining control over Texas, Anglo colonists and the Mexican government were in constant conflict. The law was repealed in 1833, too late to staunch the wound. The first shots in what would become the Texas War of Independence were fired on October 2, 1835.
*$31.44 in today's currency. Still a bargain.
** Hence Austin, Texas. (I don't know about you, but I'm always curious as to how a town got its name.)
***Outlawed in Mexico is 1829--so much for obeying the laws.
A History of Britain in Thirty-Six Postage Stamps
I love Big Fat History Books, full of footnotes (no endnotes, please) and academic caution. But I also love small, idiosyncratic books about history: books that look at the past through one person's obsessions and interest.
Chris West combined an uncle's Edwardian stamp collection with his own interest in history to create a quirky and insightful approach to the past in A History of Britain in Thirty-Six Postage Stamps.
Taken together, the stories of individual stamps tell the larger story of British history. West begins with the world's first postage stamp, the Penny Black of 1840, which becomes an emblem of the energy and invention of Victorian Britain. He ends with the 2012 First Class stamp and a thoughtful discussion of whether Britain is still "first class" (the inevitable postage pun is his). In between, he considers a number of recurring themes suggested by the stamps themselves: industry, social change, the role of the royal family, and Britain's post-war decline and subsequent reinvention(s).
West builds a large historical framework on his "thirty-six little pieces of paper", but he always brings the discussion back to the stamps themselves. He uses details about designs and designers to further illuminate changes not only in taste but also in the national spirit. The book ends with philatelic information about each stamp, including hints for beginners, more detailed information for experts and an occasional description of a rare issue for "the philatelist who thinks they have died and gone to heaven". This section is written in the same engaging style as the body of the book: even a reader who doesn’t care about stamps as collectibles may find herself drawn into West's discussion of forgeries, printing errors and rarities.
If you'd like to know more, you can read my interview with Chris West here.
This review appeared previously in Shelf Awareness for Readers.
Road Trip Through History: The Bob Bullock Texas State History Museum
My Own True Love and I recently spent a week in Austin, Texas. The reason for the visit was a family wedding. It was everything a wedding should be, full of love, creativity, and open-hearted hospitality. (Not to mention great food and dancing.) We ate, danced, mingled,* toasted the newlyweds, and danced some more
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I'm sure it doesn't surprise you to hear that we left ourselves plenty of time for history nerd side trips.
Our first stop was the Bob Bullock Texas State History Museum: three beautifully designed floors of Texas history, from the arrival of the Spanish (1528) through the Apollo 11 moon landing (1969), with a few random events on either side of that time line. We planned to spend the morning and stayed most of the day.
The museum won my heart in the first few minutes with a single exhibit heading that upended the normal way we tell colonial history: "Coastal Indians Discover the Spanish". The rest of the museum wasn't quite so radical, though it kept our attention for five hours. The first floor concentrated on European settlement through Mexican independence. The second floor told the story of the Texas war of independence against Mexico and the Republic of Texas's subsequent admission to the United States. The third floor covered the period after the American Civil War. I think it's a fair statement that the history grew less nuanced with each floor. By the third floor, narrative disappeared altogether, replaced with a series of themes in the style I think of as "just one dang thing after another". **
If you already know a lot about Texas history, this probably isn't the museum for you. Personally, I was shocked to discover how little I know about the early history of the American West in general and Texas in particular, though I know more than I did ten days ago. Here are some of the historical bits that caught my imagination at the Texas State History Museum:
- It's no coincidence that New Orleans and San Antonio were founded the same year. The Spanish settled Texas as a buffer zone against those pesky French, who were moving west along the coast from the Mississippi.
- After gaining its independence in 1821, Mexico put systems in place to encourage immigration and settlement in the open plains of "Tejas". Foreigners poured in from Germany, France and the southern United States. (The land deals were so good that some Americans walked away from existing homesteads leaving signs on the door that said simply "GTT": Gone To Texas. Evidently text-speak isn't new.) By 1830, Anglos (loosely defined) outnumbered native Tejanos by as much as 10 to 1 in some parts of the region.
- Independent Mexico built its army with equipment purchased from Great Britain, which had a surplus of gear after the end of the Napoleonic Wars. Great Power supplies small/new country with arms. Hmm, sounds familiar.
- A great motto from the Women's Club of Waco, Texas: "If we rest, we rust." I'm tempted to paint that on the wall of my new office.
I would have liked more about native cultures in the regions prior to the arrival of the Spanish and about the forces that drove Europeans to Texas. But neither of those would have fit into the avowed mission of the museum: Texas state history.
Next stop: the LBJ Presidential Library
* Or at least tried to mingle. I'm better at dancing.
**In all fairness, the closer you get to the current day the harder it is to create a meaningful large scale narrative. There is too much to choose from and it's difficult to identify what items are truly meaningful.