Mexican-American Stereotypes

The animosity between Mexicans and Americans had an extensive history, based on various stereotypes and a lack of cultural understanding. Americans in the Southwest believed that Mexicans were, “lazy, shiftless, jealous, cowardly, bigoted, superstitious, backward, and immoral.” The Mexicans, however, thought Americans were “arrogant, overbearing, aggressive, conniving, rude, unreliable, and dishonest.” Tensions peaked during the 1846-1848 Mexican-American War, in which the United States rapidly and cruelly dispatched their Mexican foes, committing horrendous atrocities that General Winfield Scott claimed would “make Heaven weep and every American of Christian morals blush for his country.” To many Americans, the war affirmed their beliefs

As Mexican-Americans struggled to adjust to being governed by new laws and a new judicial system, Americans quickly took advantage of their ignorance. They stole Mexican cattle and sold the herds to American beef companies, and acquired “’large bodies of land that now have enormous value…sometimes legally and sometimes illegally, for almost nothing.” An example of Mexican-American struggles with corruption comes from Maria Ruiz de Burton’s The Squatter and the Don, an 1885 novel that told the story of a Mexican landowner in California, Don Mariano, and a newly wealthy American squatter, Clarence Darrell. In the chapter “The Don’s View of the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo,” Don Mariano reflects upon how poorly the Treaty has been executed. Although the agreement supposedly protected the lands held by Mexicans (now Mexican-Americans), these landowners soon encountered issues with squatters stealing their land and killing their cattle. The Americans did not feel the Mexicans deserved so much land and made efforts to “take-back” what they thought was rightfully theirs. When asked if there are laws protecting property in California, Don Mariano responds, “‘yes, some sort of laws, which in my case seem more intended to help the law-breakers than to protect the law-abiding.’” Published only 39 years after the beginning of the Mexican-American War, the novel reflected many of the author’s personal experiences growing up and demonstrated a truth many Mexican-Americans came to know regarding officially sanctioned