MEXIFORNIA Victor Davis Hanson

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MEXIFORNIA Victor Davis Hanson

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Preface

I

MET

S

ANTIAGO

L

ARA

over twenty years ago. On a late

March morning in 1982 he pulled into the orchard,
jumped out of a broken-down station wagon filled with
seven kids, caught me on the tractor and asked whether

he could thin some plums until he found a new job. I had no idea
who he was or where he came from. He looked exhausted—red-
eyed, unshaven, in dirty clothes. I gave him what work I had, a
temporary job for two days. Two decades later I still see him occa-
sionally, and he still doesn’t look good. Now over sixty, with white
rather than raven-black hair, he continues as an occasional farm
laborer and walks permanently stooped. He neither speaks a word
of English nor has a single child who graduated from high school,
although he has many children and grandchildren, some on various
forms of disability, welfare and unemployment, others successful
and gainfully employed, and a few who have been jailed.

When he left Mexico years ago his government wanted citi-

zens like Santiago gone lest he agitate over his poverty or the bleak
future looming for his children. In turn, he and millions like him
were welcomed by Americans who wanted such immigrants to
work cheaply for them. Liberals and ethnic activists wanted Santi-
ago too, either as a future “progressive” voter or as another statistic
in their loyal ranks of needy constituents. The rest of us didn’t
much care whether he came or stayed—as long as the economy
remained strong and he avoided welfare and ensured that his kids
graduated from high school. In fact Santiago, though he worked
very hard, did neither.

Santiago Lara professes that he will die in Mexico, but there

is something about the United States—or at least the mostly
Mexican United States in which he lives—that makes even a visit
home across the border almost unnecessary. We Americans, for our
part, are unsure whether we want more, fewer, or no such Santia-
gos inside our borders, because we are confused over exactly what