announcer: this is american history tv on c-span3 where each weekend, we feature 48 hours of programs exploring our nation's past. announcer: if you like american history tv, keep up with us during the week on facebook, twitter and youtube. learn about what happened this day in history and see preview clips of upcoming programs. follow us at c-span history. announcer: next on american history tv, historians discuss the role, impact and voting trends of latino americans in u.s. political history. day talk was part of a two perdue university conference called "remaking american political history." jaime: hi my name is jaime

will bez, junior, and i guiding the discussion this afternoon. a theme that is central to the idea of remaking american political history. this is not to say that no one has ever thought of or written about latinos in american history. in fact, the conversation follows in the footsteps of many major works and scholars. instead, it is about rethinking what political historians pay attention to. in an earlier panel, we asked an essential question. there was a real barrier to what organizations and individuals are labeled as political or diplomatic actors. in a similar vein, this panel seeks to shift the conversation. to the development of modern american democracy. forged in the fire of 19th

matury warfare, boosted by -- by migration, latinos have been part and parcel of modern america social fabric with well over 150 years of history in the united states. latinos have made an indelible mark in u.s. politics. be it in the early legislative history of the southwest territories as founders of , long-standing civic and political organizations and the protest movements of the 1960's and 1970's. latinos made u.s. politics their own. in reading the major synthetic works of american political history, or examining a syllabus on the course of a sub -- of the subject, we are hard-pressed to find much representation of latino experiences at all in mainstream legal history. it seems as though this conference is as auspicious an occasion as any to make the case for latino political history. traditional political history narrative, written by an earlier generation of historians, have

largely emphasized elite white men as the movers and shakers of u.s. politics. newer works in political history has complicated political history. in its revival, we have seen a more critical approach to race and formal politics. much has been done to illustrate the essential importance of african-americans in political history, scholarship has done little to move beyond the black-white racial binary that pervades the dominant narrative of the old and new bank -- and new political history. other fields have done much better in their incorporation of latinos, including urban history, immigration, labor history, and studies of the welfare state. in the context of city politics, for example, urban history on cities such as chicago and los angeles are some of the best examples we have for any analysis of latino politics. but what about the national? more importantly, where is political history in this intellectual conversation?

today's panel is a rallying call for political historians to rethink our intellectual engagement or lack thereof. in calling for a new research agenda of nuanced, capacious and comprehensive latino political history, we must ask questions about what research has been done, is currently on the table or yet to be pursued. is there such a thing as latino political history? if so, what does it look like? what does mainstream logical -- political history stand to lose by not including latino actors and institutions? how would incorporating latinos into the discourse change the field and larger narrative? today, we will discuss some of the most pressing issues concerning the role of latinos in the american political past. joining us today in making the case for political history are some of the leading voices in this field.

rosina lozano is an historian of latino history. comparative studies of race and ethnicity. she is the author of an american language, the history of spanish in the united states. which is a political history of the spanish language in the united states from the incorporation of the mexican succession to world war ii. with some discussion of the following decades in present-day concerns. "an american language" was published in 2018 by the university of california press. she is an associate professor at princeton in the department of history. geraldo cadava is an historian of american borderlands. his first book, "standing on common ground" was published in 2013 by harvard university press and focused on the arizona borderlands since world war ii. he is now completing a book about hispanic conservatism to be published in 2020 by ecco

press. an imprint of harpercollins. he is the director of northwestern university's latina and latino studies program. francis-fallon is an historian and teacher. in his forthcoming book "the rise of the latino vote, a history" examines how elected officials and party insiders attempted to forge mexican americans, puerto ricans and cubans into a nationwide political constituency, a process that proved pivotal to institutionalizing latino identity in the united states. it is due out in september of this year by harvard university press. very exciting. he received a phd from georgetown university and assistant professor of history and coordinator of social science education at western carolina university. and finally, my name is jaime sanchez junior i am a ph

candidate at the department of history at princeton. my current project explores the history of the democratic national committee as well as latino political organization. i am also a new host for the latinos podcast. i am the organizer and moderator of today's roundtable discussion. we will try to cover as much ground as possible during our short time here and we will save time at the end for questions. with that said, we should get started in making the case for latino history. i think the first question, i would like to open to the panel, what is latino political history? what is the most interesting issue in this field for you? we can start with professor lozano. prof. lozano: thank you for organizing this. i really see latino put a good -- political history as a broad category that includes many different fields and ties together issues that happen and remain important to the national politics of united states. while many political history see

-- histories are more recent on focused on immigration, in my view, latino political history begins in the 19th century. it includes land ownership and land use and what is the u.s. southwest, but other regions earlier than that in florida or places along what became the midwest even. i think it is crucial to tie what has largely been considered as regional or local stories into the larger formation of the nation. as i've shown in my book, which thank you for plugging, the political history of mexican americans includes how those who came american citizens participated in the u.s. political system. and i explain how these spanish-speaking u.s. citizens began and supported the implementation of the u.s. political system into states like california, colorado and especially new mexico. by participating in politics in spanish, many became devoted and patriotic u.s. citizens.

that includes being recognized and participating in both major political parties. there is a lot more work to be done about their political involvement and the ways those political parties recognize that they were there. they were the ones that were supporting their newspapers in spanish. they were the ones that were giving the money and funding to make sure they were involved in applicable process. -- in the political process. in the 20th century, latino politics revolved around increasing latino political presentation, immigration, and civil rights. it is only in the 20th century that latino political history is an appropriate name. while ethnic mexicans, puerto ricans and cubans may have been cognizant of one another and supportive of one another's efforts, there is little evidence that their struggle is one in the same. it is the potential misnomer that yields one of the most

interesting historical questions at this time. how does a latino political entity come to be? we have had a good start with good books. there is much more to uncover about this process and about where we are today in the ways we look at the latino population. i will plug his future dissertation, hopefully he will answer some of those questions. prof. cadava: hello, everyone. i would largely echo a lot of what rosina said. a couple things in particular. the story of latino politics and political history would stretch back to the 19th century and include a whole range of issues. like land ownership. the, to me, suggests necessity to have a broad vision what it means. and also the need to integrate latino and american political history.

i think including in a much larger story of american politics. i did think the title of the panel, making the case for latino political history, is a little curious because my first response was, why not? why wouldn't you have latino politics and american clinical -- american political history? it was curious to me that there is a need to make a case for it or something. it made me wonder about the longer history of american political history that has maybe excluded it that would necessitate its inclusion or necessitate our panelists making a case for it because there must have been some chasm in the beginning of american political history and latino history that necessitates us bringing those things together now. it evolved as two separate things and maybe there have been

recent evolutions in american political history at large that make the field more hospitable to even thinking about including something like latino history. the main two things i want to highlight, the difference between latino political history and a history of latino politics. latino political history, as i understand it, is in a large degree concerned with partisan political behavior and the involvement of latinos in the democratic party or the republican party or a third party. and the history of latino politics would be a much longer struggle for inclusion and american political life. i don't just mean in terms of

the parties, but recognition, civil rights, access to property and jobs and education. i would think all of those things as part of the history of latino politics. it has been a real part of latino history and american history for a long time. i do think that within the american political history and the history of latinos in the united states, histories of the involvement of latinos in partisan politics over a long period of time is largely lacking. i think there are individual books, the bread-and-butter of the field of latino history has been community studies. i'm thinking of -- we will talk about books in a minute, but studies of texas and california. in those places, historians have looked at someone like edward, for whom it was important to

register latino voters in los angeles in the mid-20th century. that is a story that gets told but it is not part of a much longer history of the involvement of latinos in partisan politics. that is one major direction that the field of latino history will move in soon, i hope. as it does so, the story of latino political history and its involvement in american political history will come together more. prof. francis-fallon: a lot of what i will say reinforces some of that. in thinking about what most interests me in latino political history, i reminded of two am things that albert pina junior said in 1963. as he was speaking to a convention of texas political activists. first, while insisting on these people's americanism, he demanded that mexican americans

would at last proudly organize themselves as a distinct minority block. he says the irish in boston, the italians in new york can do it, could the mexican people of the united states. second, once they adopted an ethnic posture, he said the price of their vote would be two things, recognition and representation. for me, his remarks would be -- reveal that latino politics and political history and project ofs a vast ethnic soul-searching. and communal identification, processes that were for specific reasons, unique to latinos as they unfolded. also as the search for political inclusion that raised questions about jobs, access, patronage. in the first matter, he called to raise questions well beyond texas. it invites us to consider questions like how have latinos

thought to harmonize their diverse local and state histories, national origins and other self understandings to create durable forms of ethnic and pan-ethnic solidarity? organizations capable of wielding power across the vast expanse of the nation's political communities. or to put it another way, how people attempted to mobilize individuals who claim descent from 16th-century spanish explorers from mexico, and salvador and refugees and washington, d.c. in the 1990's. these questions are linked to the second half of his remarks. the quest for recognition and representation. because latino politics emerged in an unequal dialogue with the white elites from both major parties who support was needed to sponsor the project of integrating all of these communities and mobilizing them for particular causes. most often thought as the need

to fulfill some kind of destiny of a group nationwide. the question has to be asked about how these party elites, including u.s. presidents, use their abilities to reward or withhold, to influence the larger construction of the latino political community. it is the dance of validation between latino seeking to reimagine their communities to cope with economic, social and political challenges and pressures, and a necessity of aligning those visions of community with an ever-changing set of candidate ideology that i -- candidates, ideology, that i find so important in latino political history. jaime: there are a lot of interesting themes that we have heard from you three regarding ethnicity and the complications it brings, the earlier 19th century origins of latino s in the united states in their

political -- and their political engagement from the get-go. i think all of us would like to hear about your specific interventions in this historical endeavor. could you tell us about your most recent work in the field of latino political history or the history of latino politics and how it is going? [laughter] jaimefrancis-fallon: as mentioned, i am very excited to say my first book is called the rise of the latino vote. i examined how mexican americans, puerto ricans and cubans came to be seen in to see themselves as a single political constituencies, and in some cases, a people. i explained the latino vote, nor -- vote was not the inevitability of growth and nor was the emergence of an accepted pan ethnicity in the american life of product of a top-down

from washington bureaucrats who created a spanish category. rather the book shows how over a couple of decades, beginning in 1960, a network of political activists from grassroots activists up to u.s. presidents, labored to mold all spanish-speaking americans, as they first called them, into a single u.s. minority constituency. the book shows how the architects of latino politics devised new programs and platforms, built relationships with each other and elaborated ideas of what the people's common needs were that were once reflective of conditions on the ground. but also that constituted new senses of group identity. i chose how they formed new organizations and divides -- devised new ways of distributing power among their populations that were quite

unequal as to size. it shows how they mined the ambiguity, whether they were a coalition building effort or seeking to transcend the national origins and pursue the creation of something new, a new community. it was this creative action until a repudiation of colorblindness that drew both of their parties, liberal and conservative, into this self reinforcing consensus that spanish-speaking americans, later hispanics, later latinos, constituted a statistical population. in so doing, these activists and their elite patrons transcended the nations black-and-white binary and pushed the united states into multicultural politics. in the book, i show that even as they constructed the latino vote summoning into existence, a

national community and identity, the process worked undermine the stability of that latino political identity. as i indicated earlier, the makers of the latino vote were dependent on party elites to support this project. powerful interests often thought more to control rather to empower the constituency. no surprise there. party leaders due to -- dutifully spoke of party if -- party unification. but when it came down to it, they were more often ready to divide. they shifting ideological orientations and electoral strategies of party elites often exposed or exacerbated internal hierarchies that were latent in the latino political community. unless it was i show that why there was a burgeoning latino vote, accepted as fact, independent latino power was a

much more elusive thing. i am finishing a book right now about the history of hispanics in the republican party and republican hispanics and since about the 1960's, it is important to say that we are calling these voters hispanics, at least in my case, this is what republicans called themselves for all kinds of reasons that we can get into. i know that is not exactly, you know, the current fashion within academia to call them hispanics. i wanted to at least say why i'm doing that. for me, the main question is why? why do hispanics vote for republicans? this is the first question i am always asked.

because it is a bit of a curiosity to many people. i wanted to explain why and whenever that question is asked of me, it is always with a very surprised tone that donald trump could have won as much as 30% of the hispanic vote or in the 2018 midterms, ted cruz or rick scott could have won 40% of the hispanic vote. it is always kind of expressed as a prize followed by some extent -- expressed as a surprise followed by an extent - it is always expressed as a surprise. part of my answer is it should not be a surprise because if you look at the republican party and hispanic voters over the past 50

or 60 years, especially since the reelection of richard nixon in 1972, the percentage of hispanics who have voted for the republican party has been around a third consistently. over a 50-year period, the republican party has built a hispanic voting base of about one third of hispanic voters. that fluctuates a little bit. but not a lot. if you compare that with african-american voters, at the same time period, if you graph these things, they are going in opposite directions. at the same time the african-american support of the republican party plummets, and has consistently remained single digit sewer low double digits for the past 50 years. hispanics have shot upward. there is a relationship between those two facts, i think. i wanted to explain the long

development of the hispanic base, republican base. i also want to correct what i have come to see as misunderstandings about republican hispanics. the first is that their conservatism must be motivated by their catholicism and traditional family values. i am not denying that is part of it but if we hang all of hispanic conservatism on that, we are missing a whole bunch. catholicism is more complicated than just conservatism. there is kind of social justice motivated branch of catholicism. i am thinking of the liberation theology adjusts, for example -- theologyists, for example. catholicism is trickier than just conservatism.

the other is, they must be cubans. it allows us to dismiss -- we cannot dismiss florida because it is a critical swing state. we cannot dismiss it but it allows us to ignore lots of other strains of hispanic conservatism that are just as important. it was more complicated than just catholicism among cubans from my grandpa who is a mix of panamanian, colombian, and filipino. he lives in tucson, arizona, which is a predominantly exit can american place and he served in the military -- predominantly mexican-american place and he served in the military and voted for reagan for the first time because he was a silver miner when reagan was running in 1980 and was promising to put more money back in his paycheck so my grandfather voted for republican the first time in 1980.

he is not cuban. he is catholic, but never observed his faith. i do not know the last time he went to church was. i knew from my grand -- my grandpa, at least, that there were others beyond cubans and catholics. when writing my first book, i wrote about a department store owner, a mexican-american department store owner in tucson and he was staunchly catholic. he was not cuban. his political upbringing was more about arizona's territorial politics. he was a businessman. he did not have a union in his store because he thought his employees were all happy and

they did not need a union. he hated cesar chavez. this individual too led me down the path of wondering what the world of hispanic republican's partisan identity was like. wanting to answer the question of why and i think his story sizing that question and looking at how political identity, partisan identity has developed over a long period of time is important because it will help us stop scratching our heads and grasping in the dark for all of these reasons that hispanics would vote for a republican and then wanting to complicate these two main ideas about cuban nationality and catholicism as being the two things that republican identity amongst hispanics are all about. those are the things that let me led me down this path.

prof. lozano: i am at the beginning of my second book project and it came out of my first book project and a larger sense trade when i teach comparative ethnicity, there is a lot of discussion about native americans in the 19 century -- 19th century borderlands and what it is like for them. and then they kind of disappear in a lot of the 20th century literature. part of my desire with this book is to trace that longer history and to do it by looking in terms of the ways that the federal government and state governments had jurisdiction over individuals who were neither native americans or mexican -- who were either native american or mexican american. they have very different timetables as it relates to citizenship. that is where i am going with my second project. if people have more questions, i can answer it.

i am currently finishing an article that examines the language minority extension to the voting rights act in 1975 and it uses a broad range of documents that include congressional records, the papers of mehldau puerto rican , and the commission. -- in the commission on civil rights. this research uncovers the ways that congress was working through the categorization of latinos in the u.s. i am more of a 19th century historian. hooked.f got 20th century historians in this late 20th century is just a delusion of documents. i am enjoying it but it is also very different for me. congress is looking to extend language rights in the 1970's to

increase the voting station of lives -- of latino citizens. at the same time, that more restrictive immigration legislation against mexicans were being pushed through congress and being encouraged. while immigration was dominating the media, the voting rights act extension offers evidence that the federal government also wereatinos as citizens and supportive of extending their voting rights and civil rights as well. by looking into that and there is a separate case that is happening at the same time. it does not come into play until 1978. it is starting to be discussed in 1975. which is to allow interpreters into bilingual courtrooms. allow for courtrooms to become bilingual and have interpreters in there as well. trying to figure out what is it that allows for language minorities to be a categorization that would envelop anyone who is not black but a person of color? native american, asian american

as well as latinos, specifically meaning mexican americans and puerto rican. jaime: my current dissertation is about the institutional history of the d&c and unlike the representation of african-americans, it is not until the 1970's where you even have conversations within the organization to think about hiring some sort of latino outreach representative. it is shocking to think that it was not until the late 1970's where you have conversations about national democratic outreach to latinos. i think if we look at these kind of national institutions, there is a serious lack in the scholarship and the basic facts

of presidential elections. before then, of course, this will be my segue into the next question, the engagement between or presidential elections is very touch and go. interpersonal politics. you see that in viva kennedy, the history of the viva kennedy club that started up mostly in texas but in other places like chicago and california. where you have independent led and because i formal relationships with the national party fundraising for jfk. there is some work and i think that influences my perspective on things in seeing an evolution

of latinos and the national democratic party. so that leads me to my next question. what are some of the key texts that have informed your approach to the history of latinos in u.s. politics? thinking about that, i think this is a good way to discuss ways in which we can diversify our syllabi. prof. cadava: i have lots of different answers to this. in one way, every book written in the field is an important touchstone for me because i think all of them pick up on parts of this story. at the same time, nothing picks up -- i would not point to any single thing as the political history of latinos writ large. i think of the 1987 book --

there are politics throughout that. tom the texas revolution early efforts by the democratic bosses in texas trying to recruit or buy in many cases the votes of mexican workers. there are moments of politics. i think also of, for me, conservatism, although it is not expressed in this way, the book "walls and mirrors." the political divides between mexican immigrants, basically it is about mexican americans views of mexican immigration. that is politics but he does not frame it as a political history. the groups he is writing about groups like- are

the league of united latin american citizens. it is politics but none of these books talk about their actors in political terms as members of the republican party or the democratic party. they are engaged in politics but lulac is a good example. i don't know there has been a historian that has written about the political history of lulac. lulac has been engaged in all kinds of things about among lulac's leadership, some are republicans, some are democrats. they are often taken by historians to be a kind of conservative democratic organization where -- at least it was an early requirement that all their members speak english, that they be american citizens, that they pledge allegiance to the flag.

lulac is a good example of a group whose identity and political terms have been debated as well, there politics -- their politics are conservative or they are moderate democrats. we don't know about the political leanings of their individual members. i look at all of the books out there as examples of histories of latino politics have been written but not of latino political history. for me, when it comes to republican hispanics, i do not know if i could point to a scholarly text until the one coming out in september written by ben. republicanth hispanics a lot. but there are a lot of republican hispanics who have written memoirs that are really interesting, like linda chavez, who was in the reagan administration. she was nominated to be george w. bush's labor secretary but had to withdraw her nomination

when it was discovered that she had employed an undocumented immigrant. she wrote two memoirs, one in 1991. that is a really good place to look for conservative latino positions on language issues, on affirmative action. herarily, that is kind of hobbyhorse, i would say. then she wrote a second memoir after she had to withdraw her nomination called "an unlikely (or how i became the most hated hispanic in america)." a guy named sosa who organized reagan's media campaign for hispanics wrote a book called "the americano dream." the chairman of the cabinet committee on opportunities for spanish-speaking people in the

nixon administration, henry ramirez, a fascinating memoir of his time in the white house called "a chicano in the white house." i spent some time how i am using the term hispanic. i thought it was fascinating that he chose to call his book a chicano in the white house. if you wanted to assign something about conservatism among hispanics, i might look at some of those memoirs rather than a scholarly text. i haverancis-fallon: i have been influenced a lot by the coalition literature. blue texas, a handful of essays describing how multiracial politics worked in los angeles. the work on the poor people's campaign is another.

these works were influential to reasons.o they introduce us to multiracial organization, fascinating in its own right. particularly so because these unique communities were the ones who brought forth people who would become the leaders of latino politics in the united states. people like henry b gonzales of san antonio, hermann badillo of new york city. the first mexican-american elected to the congress from california in the 20th century, in the first puerto rican congressman ever. what is really interesting about these folks is that they are elevated to positions of power by multiracial coalitions. but viewed from the national level, beat -- they become the basis of a lite block. first beginning to crystallize in viva kennedy.

appreciating the deeply embedded coalitional of these leaders, does other work, i suggest the importance of coalition as a concept employed by latinos in their dealings with each other in the making of latino politics during the 1970's and beyond. it is often assumed in some leaders bear some response ability, that the emergence of the latinos as a constituency was a reflection of these groups of african-americans, puerto ricans and cubans recognizing their natural and pre-existing ties. what was more natural, blacks and puerto ricans organizing together or puerto ricans from harlem, organizing and finding allies among rural new mexican spanish americans. dealing with latino politics is coalitional rather than natural helps us appreciate much of its eclecticism. has ates and liberals search for common issues that they can work on. bilingual education, affirmative

action, equal access to the war on poverty. leftists had a different perspective. they viewed it as the basis of achievement such as puerto rican independence and recovery of land grants from the southwest. this is the approach the radical labor organizer called together but not scrambled. latino coalitions were experimental and they varied as to structure. sometimes they were one to one. mexican americans are a group and puerto ricans are a group. so each gets one group. sometimes coalitions distributed more in reflection of their population numbers. yet, even as latinos are pursuing, i think what are coalitions among each other, they are working on alliances with african-americans, indigenous and poor whites. i think it is this doubly coalition nature that is an

exciting proposition to interrogate. there's a solid basis for thinking about what are the next steps. prof. lozano: great. took a lot ofguys mine. that's good. another place to look is within labor history and to remember that immigrants are not coming without the political history of their own. they are active and becoming activists in their home countries and bringing the activism into the united states. there are numerous books that show this. i am blanking on his name right now, but a biography and all of the people that surround florida's smuggling. you get a sense that not only is he asked, talking about revolution in mexico, but he and the others who are writing, there radical newspaper, are making very pointed critiques of what is happening in texas and what is happening to workers all throughout the united states.

is another, other work she's done, shows similarly that individuals are coming and you see them holding up signs during the great depression, knowing the whole alphabet soup we try to get our students to learn. those spanish-speaking immigrants knew what they meant. they were also pushing for those rights and to be included in those federal resources. labor rights are civil rights. that's another example of this sweeping 100-year history that shows political activism of immigrants and mexican americans in the labor sector and the ways that unions set their politicization as well. another new book that is is "city of inmates." it looks into the incarceration and the creation of a cursor

-- partial state. and what that means for mexican americans. it has the origins of immigrant attention that really has been wonderful for my students. they really enjoy reading that particular chapter and getting a sense of what it looked like and why individuals were being held near los angeles. another book that is probably a little bit too long to assign to classes but a great place to get a sense of how long the history is indymac in the political -- is in the political party. it is an 800-page book that only covers the 19th century, but talks about how they created the ways in which they operated in different elections. as chapters. sometimes three chapters on the same elections. you can see the ways they are modeling the u.s. government system.

that political -- there is a reason new mexico is an outlier. there's a reason they have governors and senators who have spanish sir maines -- spanish surnames. another one that is more in the legal field is manifest destiny. she writes in a more historical way. our students think about what it means to have double coral and is asian. you can see her influence in my second book project. over a group they had already colonized. you have native americans who were colonized by the mexican americans who were then colonized by the u.s. jaime: i think the book you were mentioning about the return of comrade -- prof. lozano: yes. back to want to go something that gerry brought up

which is the contentious nature of naming protocols and self-identity. what is the politics of names? and what do latinos call themselves? or maybe they didn't consider themselves latinos. you mentioned the chicano in the white house. do you have a sense of the evolution of self identification in politics and i think this brings up one of the biggest conflicts in political history, that concept of latino politics even make sense. benjamin was talking about it. you have this balkanized set of communities. puerto ricans and mexicans. very separate groups that are united conveniently in coalitions but maybe not as unified as we assume as

historians or in public memory. prof. lozano: do you mind if i start? jaime: it is open. prof. lozano: i want to go back to the 19th century. being a historian, i would like to go first. this is something that is not new. in the 19th century, you would see it within each of the communities that were in the -- that became the southwest. that is who they were. if they talked about themselves as a larger group, if they were part of the whole spanish-speaking americas, it did not mean hispanic americans in the united states. they were not part of the united states at that that is one of point. the things you see again and again in the documents. not only do you have to figure out how -- you have to figure out how mexicans became mexican americans.

there was a larger process that happened in the 19th century where they began to see themselves as united and that was a process that continued into the 20th century as well. personally have a very -- i don't even know what the right word is. it is not agnostic, maybe i will just say open-minded or something. view of names. maybe i am thinking about this a little bit now because right now northwestern latino studies program is thinking of changing its name to the latinx studies program. what is gained and what is lost? something that undergrads pushing for that name change and i think that is part of my open-mindedness. call it whatever you want. call it latinx, that's fine. they would be mad at me if i cast aside the importance of the

decision so easily. as an historian, undergrads do not necessarily know this, or who have not studied it as much as we have, name changes happen all the time. i do not want to get hung up on any particular name. some groups choose mexican-american political association or mexican-american legal defense and educational fund. part of that has to do with where they are located. if they are founded in california, the southwest. maybe they will go as one name. a spinoff of a group that modeled itself in many ways off of the naacp. that is where they are located. nixon, we know, introduced the term hispanic on the 1970

census. the term on the census in 1930 was mexican. it was the first time it was a separate category of american, i guess. spanish-speaking was an an important term. the 1960's, latin. there are so many names. they have some kind of meaning and the meaning can have political valences but i also don't know that any of these names is tied closely or exclusively with a particular partisan identity. i don't know. chicano is thought of as being frome activist identity the 1960's and but then you have 1970's. henry ramirez calling himself a chicano. i don't know that any of these names are closely tied it to a partisan identity.

i just gave you a whole bunch of nonsense. i don't place a whole bunch of emphasis on the different names. prof. cadava: it is just always shifting. it is just always shifting. i think in the early part of the 1960's, naming is one of the stumbling blocks for organizations from different parts of even the southwest that are composed of ethnic mexicans getting together. itis a reason why they call viva kennedy. it had john kennedy. that was a very valuable thing. once we put -- then we had to we?de, who are mexican-american activists really floundered because a lot of the different regional names did at least for some correspond to political orientations or socialization's. mexican americans adopted that

name in california. that was too much for a lot of techs activists. texan activists. at certain times, names are not really talking about real political differences and tactical differences and ideas about aggressiveness and how ethnic to be. i think the names also speak to who is really trying to be the leader of this vast population so in the case of the mexican-american political association, the people who established it in california, had to explain too many puerto ricans who are politically active why their name was not going to be reflected in this organization. and that it was vital for them to overcome the stigmatization attached to the idea of mexican.

the names, at different times, may be really important at establishing something but over becomes a convergence. bureaucratic names and political names start to align. go ahead. are you sure? ok. mentioned spanish-speaking as a bureaucratic name and that was thought to be inclusive and avoided the pitfalls and nationality. it raised questions, if you do not speak spanish and you are mexican americans, are you still spanish-speaking? they could look at a list of names and say you belong to this group. i was a proxy for latino ethnicity. -- that was a proxy for latino

ethnicity. there are a whole set of competing terms operating until the middle 1970's and moves to be a standardization around hispanic/latino. they tended to reject latino. prof. cadava: i'm not going to own them. [laughter] prof. francis-fallon: they tended to reject latino generally. which is interesting because in 1964, barry goldwater had a supportive campaign. latino was a conservative moniker at different points and then became a liberal moniker by the 1970's. prof. cadava: the only thing i was going to add without, -- add with that, part of why i want to add this, the challenge this naming issue poses to writing

latino political history. the first is that, there is a difference between explaining these name changes as an historian and inhabiting them as an identity. i have friends who say, i am a chicano with an x at the beginning instead of a ch. statement ofear their political leanings. that's the position they inhabit. or students today who call themselves latinx. i think there's a difference between inhabiting that identity and trying to explain it as a historian. trying to explain it as an historian, there are all kinds of complications and that is why i do not hang too much meaning on any one of those terms. i try to see them holistically. maybe i am just confused about my own ethnic or political identity. i'm half white, half mexican, or

half latino. my uncle called me green bean when i was growing up. anduse i was half gringo have beaner. maybe i am wrestling with these things on my own. i do not think these kinds of name considerations are unique to latinos or hispanics. african-american, black, all kinds of self identification that black people have used over time. there is also anglo and white and caucasian. those terms present their own challenges. i do think this question of naming and identity is often posed as one of the challenges to writing latino political history or the political history of hispanics in one of the questions i often get, is there such a thing as the latino vote? the hispanic vote?

i do not know that there is a thing called the latino vote or the hispanic vote. yet there are millions of voters, whatever you want to call them, there are millions of them who do vote. to the extent they do, their political behavior is worth explaining regardless of what you call them. it is often posed as a challenge to your project. there is no such thing as an hispanic vote and part of me wants to answer that by where does that get us? if you -- if that is where you want to begin and end the conversation, that doesn't help us understand, really. jaime: i'm looking at the clock. there's so much to talk about. i want to keep open the question about what challenges face the writing of political history and i also want to expand and ask a

different question, which is, what do we stand to lose in mainstream political history by ignoring or not paying attention to latino actors and institutions? here?s at stake prof. cadava: could i go without one first? i feel like i've been talking a lot but i will try to go quickly. fundamentally, you run the risk of misunderstanding electoral outcomes if you ignore latino politics. i will .24 elections. point 24 elections. the 1976 presidential election, 1996 presidential election, the 2000 presidential election, the 2012 presidential election the 1976 election, many analysts put a lot of weight on texas. which carter won by not many votes. it was in the 10 thousands.

the argument afterwards, if ford if one out of 10 mexican americans had shifted their vote from carter to ford, ford would have won. why did ford lose texas? maybe it was because he bit into -- and mexican americans did not like him after that. maybe it was because ronald reagan was much more popular, but certainly, that is a part of the story of the texas -- how texas voted in 1976. in 1996, this was, you know, a couple of years after 187, --ion 187, billsition 187, but the was seen largely as a product of the republican house, and, you

dole latinos -- robert ended up winning about 19% of the vote, the lowest of any republican candidate since ford, and ford also had other things going on, with watergate, the aftermath of that, etc. 2000, you can look at the gonzalez case, which is part of what was going on in florida. , a famous kind of airport case, and i cannot remember what it is called. elian gonzalez, we will stick with that. in virginia,ning

that was a big part of it. it is in a porton part of the story. i do not know if you are a political historian that you would not one to include that part of the story that helps explain even electoral politics. andi am guessing rosina others have other issues. >> to a degree, it supports the traditional practice of paying attention to residential administrations. from latino politics, the campaign is a ritual. it is the moment when there is this massive effort of party sponsors, latino organizations, and others in the campaign to someone a latino vote to integrate and point in some direction the disparate communities, a time to develop a common language and a set of policies germane to the

community. is whether or not the administration will recognize the importance with cabinet posts, supreme court appointments, and a commitment to resolving issues. at the same time, latino history is driven a lot by congressional activity. it then actually helps us to do this in the 20th century of u.s. politics, and i have found that it allows us to see important continuities between the heydays and the more conservative, more multicultural period that follows. the liberal architects of latino politics came of age in the depression, in the shadow of the new deal, and it is true that by the 1970's, they were practicing a so-called identity politics, founding a congressional hispanic caucus, advocating for by legal education programs, and demanding formal recognition of

their people, but they did that just as much to preserve and update the new deal as class politics and policy universalism. what many of them took as their task was to synthesize the democratic party commitment to economic security with a new security.n cultural leaders talked about language and culture and the uniqueness of the latino family life as a means to an end, and that and was also pursuing and expended state with welfare policies, so rather than suggesting a short break with the new deal order, the latino history points to the traditional liberal policymaking, different but in ethnic forms. prof. lozano: and i agree with that. i want to start with -- we had a

great conversation in the last panel about reaching the public, and what does that mean to reach your students or the public in that way? what i have noticed when i have been presenting about my book to different audiences is that invariably, someone will come up at the end and say, "i did not realize that there were people that were speaking spanish that were involved in politics in the 1840's. i did not realize i had a longer history in this country because of the rhetoric around the border and immigration is all that we hear, that we are new h ere." ofthe perpetual foreignness mexican americans, and also for american indians, the fact that they are still here, and i think that those are some of the reasons to include kind of more comparative histories but also a larger sense of the multiracial coalitions, politics in general. i think it gives us a really

good place to talk about foreign policy and why things have operated the way that they have. keyk america has been a point of interest for the united states for over a century, with funding going there, kind of influencing the politics in that region, and that can also help to understand that those individuals that are here now and the sorts of politics that they bring and the way they view the united states itself. >> i think i would add that by simply talking about latinos as a side note or even a footnote, we make a lot of assumptions --ut large political blocks, blocs, and that it is natural and pre-existing. work --ry's prof. lozano: your article.

talk about your article. yes, there is this one beautiful narrative that dominates, which is black people registered in record numbers and voted more than ever before, and it was this rainbow coalition, where mexican americans and puerto ricans also joined to a lecture caught is first black mayor. a deeper dive into latino politics show that more often than not, division and tensions dominate the political conversation in a lot of ways. i think that is my personal take and cynical view of latino politics, but when we do not do the deep dive into the processing, which latinos are courted by politicians or parties, we lose the ways in which latinos are actually more complicated and divided than we

i ame, and so that is what working on, is showing it was not as beautiful a coalition as thought, and, in general, you know, we look at presidential lot,ions today, 30% is a right, whereas over 90% of african-americans vote together, and so there is a lot more there to unpack, and it is not a new development. it is rooted in the history of fraud coalitions that are not but interested. and with that, i think we can keep talking and also open it up to questions from the audience. back, soave two in the -- >> we are here in the midwest. a question about latino politics and residential politics and how people think about what is

typically american. thinking about maybe some of at the historyts conferences, saying people do not think that i view latino history because i study living in the midwest. talking about regionalism and how it plays in this discussion, iknow that conversation -- think with your students, it is a really interesting component of it. prof. lozano: i mean, it is a long history in the midwest, right? the first book i can think of was on michigan, but any time i see -- i think there was a recent book on wisconsin, with the earliest settlers coming in at the 20th century. lots of activism. emily, whatever chapters in her dissertation, really looks at

that history. there is a lot of parallels with the southwest, and it is such an important place for the study to be and also to let those students who do come -- i had a student from oklahoma, and she was, people just do not think we were in oklahoma, and she is like fourth-generation, right? so i do think that is another component of it. the hard part for the politics of that is they are usually a smaller population, so having ight to haveal we that political discussion, it will usually come around coalitions rather than the which we have talked about before. >> i would like to think about what to add to that. it really does depend on where you look. i mean, in chicago, whether there has been longer tradition,

garcia, and -- chuy little villages kind of a densely populated, puerto rican area primarily, and it is incredibly diverse. its diversity means different things for the coalition politics we are talking about. so it is there. and the kind of political influence, i am also thinking about the rodriguez book about the connections between pistol city, texas, and migrant mexican farmworkers in wisconsin and they're kind of political activism and labor organizing in wisconsin influencing label pot -- labor politics both in wisconsin and texas, so there are examples. i think if this were a midwestern history class, and maybe there are some midwestern politics questions -- i do think you would be having a version of the same conversation.

latino historians for a long time have been arguing for the inclusion of midwestern latino communities in the field of latino history, which has historically been dominated by california or new york or florida, but i do not know how that argument is, that historians have been doing that for maybe 20 years. so i don't know. if you wanted a bibliography, i am sure we could give you a long list. prof. lozano: yes, there is a new latino midwest reader. yes, others. >> i had a question. for someone who writes about national political history and thought, what groups are appropriate to compare latinos with if you are writing about politics? and there is kind of a tendency to group them with people of color.

with aalking distinguished political scientist at stanford about other ways of thinking, and i asked, are they the new italian americans? and this very distinguished political scientist at stanford is an italian ancestor, and he was they absolutely are. that struck me. as someone who teaches, those are very different comparisons. they are like african-americans. they are like italian americans. the italian americans, they were a group thought of as once not quite white and then thought of as very much white, which would lead in a different direction and would help explain the folks semigerry studies, question for you is, is that a fruitful comparison? should latinos be compared with italian americans more often than they are in the literature on the subject, especially related to politics? >> i missed the one word that you said, and he said

absolutely. >> they absolutely are. the new italian americans. so is that a fruitful way of thinking about latinos politically? >> to try to answer that? >> i am generally interested on where you would come out on this. >> i would say one of the great things about latino studies and latino history is that in defining the constituency, we can draw from a lot of other disciplines, such as sociology and political science. i think he should have given you a source for that statement. i would make a comparison with african-americans, because that follows the trend of actual political science that focuses on latinos. in african-american politics, it is michael dobson's concept that says african-americans see their life chances as deeply integral

and connected to the life chances of other people in their race, right? so there is this political unity, because it happens to my neighbor or my cousin can happen to me. clinicalnt work by a scientist, gary segura at ucla, he argues that linked fate can also apply to latino politics, where increasingly, people of the same pan ethnic label come attack on to see an one group as an attack on us. it is not statistically as strong, but he makes the argument that latinos as a collective, diverse, multiracial, and pan ethnic group see themselves more connected with each other, and so that would be the political science answer that he should have said. [laughter]

sure if i agree with that, gary segura. i have not read that, but i will. my quick answer to you would be i think you could compare latinos to any group you want to compare them to, but you would just get -- i think the basis for comparing them would differ depending on what group you are comparing them to and the time period. i think that just to take a couple of quick examples, i think when latinos are compared with italian americans, it often is a conversation about rates of assimilation and kind of the upward mobility of second generation or third generation, like will mexicans be the next italians in terms of the simulation -- assimilation, whatever. it is usually brought up against other applicable scientists, like samuel huntington who said we separate ourselves in language and never fully integrate. we stay among our own, etc. so i think that is the italian american comparison. if you want to compare with

african-americans, maybe you would look at someone like who was anumburg, afro descended puerto rican who late to new york in the 19th, early 20th century, and once he moved to new york, he started to identify as an african-american and started the schaumburg collection, the greatest collection of african-american history and culture. yes. and you would also look there at like latino self identification liked issues of whiteness, humans in florida in the late 19th century who distanced themselves from african-americans because florida is a jim crow state. i think you can compare them to anyone, and why not? compare them to anyone. i think the issues will change. you can compare them to anyone.

>> here is important to be aware of political origin. the position of the team knows in, say, the late 1960's and 1970's, it really mattered where we were talking about. if you are talking about mexicans in the southwest, a sought after constituency from -- for law and order republicans. to, look and are appealed and republicans want to convince ethnics,s are like family oriented, hard-working, against welfare dependency, fervent patriotic members of the silent majority. the very same republicans view puerto ricans as a racially disenchanted, disillusioned, pro-welfare dependent constituency, one that

is at its with the white ethnics of new york city, whom they wish to court, so place matters, and national origin very much matters, and definitely so with cubans. i guess the way i would think about it, how are people understood in relationship to each other at particular times? >> you have not said a lot about gender. is one of the reasons tending to think of latino voters as patriarchal more so than the average american, whatever that means today, and so the issue of male versus female roles and relations in the latino community, and my question for you, is that an accurate perception? >> i would say the opposite. opposite in the fact that latino males basically vote how their wives vote.

>> i asked because i was asked latino statehe troopers of ohio. they are highway patrol then. all men, very few women. all latino. i think up to 70% of them voted for donald trump, and they were as patriarchal group as you could imagine, so again, i wonder if place also matters. the midwest is more patriarchal than california or new york. and so i do not want to complicate this story too much, but there is regrettably billy an issue -- regrettably an issue on gender. i wish you were up there talking about this together. thank you, by the way, for doing this. do not be discouraged that there are not more people. >> and not to give you buyers remorse, but this one is going to be on c-span, so you can watch it later. so, anyway.

you get the real, live experience here. that is right. yes, i have heard the opposite. one of my characters, ben hernandez, the first hispanic to run for president as a republican, said he learned fiscal conservatism at the knees of his mother, so a mother's influence in the family is just as important. i do not know. prof. lozano: yes, i have stories from the 1850's who the men who were marrying were english and coming and marrying mexican-american women, and their children did not know english, right? and so they were learning spanish. that is why the spanish remained in the system for so long, so definitely, i think it is time and place, but that is the other thing. people who usually hear my story in terms of language, they are always comparing with a german, right, because it was so

powerful politically. >> the state troopers is really interesting. i think another challenge in addition to the pan ethnicity and individual groups versus collective, one of the things i have often wondered and do not know the answer to empirically is how much latino voters resemble voters, like other voters, in a particular place or in a particular field. what did other state troopers who are non-latino vote? maybe they voted for donald trump or the county where they lived in all went for trump 70%. i do not know. i guess this is an argument for what ben is saying, paying attention to latinos in relationship to a particular place. yes. >> yes. i just want to thank you guys. i work on asian american political history in the 1970's. comparison,ifferent

which is asian americans. in the historical time, it is either parallel, or what i have learned from talking to folks who work in the federal government, one person in particular was telling me, you know, whatever the latino said, we followed a step behind them, which is really interesting, like the cabinet committee on asian americans. they try to create a cabinet, and it failed. that said, the latino politics -- so anyway, i am just really excited. i actually wanted to ask, may be an offshoot question. in researching this history, and looking at papers of members of congress who are asian american, what i have found -- i would be curious of your finding similar things, that asian americans, no matter where they live, like california or living all over, and they are writing to members of congress, people in relative positions of power in the

federal government, asking for help as a fellow asian american, whatever. so this is a very curious thing to me, and i am wondering if this is something you have seen in your research, all of this expectation based on certain people who look like them or from their similar communities and what they might offer to hispanics or latinos. >> absolutely. i mean, this goes back. the first thing that came to mind was the leftist congressman from spanish harlem, basically a congressman from puerto rico that everybody would write to him from the island about whatever their problems were, but yes, i think the parallels in the period are similar. there is an effort to put people positions, latinos and asian americans to a lesser degree, invisible positions within cabinet agencies, within the war

on poverty, within the vastly expanded federal government, and those people are seen to be both representative, the representation of the larger group of american society but also a conduit for assistance. because there was still so much of an expectation at the beginning that the federal programs were so geared around african-americans, and that made it very important for people to believe that they had one of their own, so to speak, who could advocate for them. and president certainly use those? es of the ramirez world. they ultimately developed a latino point person, interest group liaison, who was -- will these programs affect you? that is their job. >> i would say that you also see that in local politics or state

politics where there were some latino politicians, where they travel the country with areas of latinos but no local congressmen or mayor or any latino figure of so when the governor of mexico campaign for carol washington. why? because chicago had no 1983, andicials, in so they do a lot of legwork because -- and i am sure the cases could be similar, like for patsy, the first woman of color in congress, and she becomes a national figurehead for a lot of asian americans who wanted to see more representation, and the other thing i would say is i have a friend of mine who is coming to princeton in political science. he works on asian american

pan-ethnic politics. americans and asian face in the contemporary period a lot of the same changes, where a lot of different countries and different languages -- that is a different ground for spanish politics, but the issue of pan ethnicity and what pulls us together is similar i think in both groups. >> really quickly, there is some interesting connections between asian americans latinos in the 1970's, in particular, and these are people i am sure you have heard of. bill, the head of nixon's brown representative of chicanos, and it talks about growing up in los angeles. he is an interesting example. samuel is also super interesting in california. and then finally, there is a

graduate student at stanford named vivian who is working on asian american conservatism, and i would -- i am sure she would love to know more about your work. prof. lozano: that is a great comparison. in the 19th century, i feel it is the opposite. the chinese lead to the term -- they were considered the first undocumented in many ways, and then there is this flip. an interesting point. the other person i would mention is in 1940's, traveling to arizona, a senator, a representative for the entire group. >> yes, in making the regional story become the national story theselowing the tales of few but important figures that people look to. prof. lozano: do you see them iing internationally? >>

think in the 1940's, 1950's, in 1960's. i am still looking at the 1970's, 1980's, but i am certain there is a lot there. with that,a: i think we can close the panel, but we can thank everyone for the questions and for coming. [applause] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2020] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] >> this is american history tv, exploring our nation's past every weekend on c-span three on in 1933erica," founded during the great depression, the tennessee valley program was to address economic development issues in a region suffering from soil erosion, floods, poverty, and unemployment. but what a national program in the tennessee valley" is a film to promote their efforts and to

show the construction of two massive constructions, including wheeler dam in alabama. both are still operational and on the national register of historic places. at 6:00 p.m. eastern, the author -- the author of african-americans in the world war i area talks about how many of them returned to pursue more rights and better social standing at home. and later, we hear from president lyndon b. johnson, who spoke at baltimore's johns tokins university in 1965 talk about vietnam. that is what is coming up here on american history tv. ♪