The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 85, July 1981 - April, 1982 Page: 48
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Southwestern Historical Quarterly
dumped at the border. It was to this that the Mexicans objected.o
The labor demands of World War II further diminished the avail-
ability of farm labor in Texas. Industry and military service attracted
a large number of individuals who ordinarily would have formed a
part of the farm-labor supply, while the increased demand and higher
wages for seasonal laborers in other regions drew growing numbers
of Mexican Texans. Many Texas farmers were fearful of losing the
cheap labor surpluses to which they had become accustomed and
which they had worked to maintain. Some farmers had manipulated
supply in order to assure low wages: as the time of need for workers
approached, they would advertise for excess numbers of workers,
thereby flooding the local labor market and creating a surplus in
order to pay wages accordingly. After the war broke out and the exodus
of workers increased, many farmers sought the importation of Mexi-
cans as a panacea. One group, the Texas Dirt Farmers Congress, met
at San Antonio on July 22, 1941, to express their alarm. San Antonio
attorney Manuel C. Gonzales, general counsel for the Mexican con-
sulate, assured the farmers that the Mexican government would be
willing to cooperate in the migration of workers if the Texans would
"treat the workers as human beings. .. .." Encouraged, the farmers
passed a resolution that called upon federal authorities to legalize the
importation of Mexicans immediately. One week later, the farmers
reconvened and appointed a delegation to carry their plea to Wash-
ington.
While they and other farmer groups lobbied the Congress and ad-
ministration for the importation of some 32,ooo braceros, the Mexican
consulate at Brownsville, Texas, published the results of its recent
labor survey in Texas. Presenting evidence of a labor surplus, the
consulate asserted that many potential workers chose not to work in
agriculture because of prevalent low wages and poor conditions. It
(TSES, Origins and Problems, 89; The Light (San Antonio), Apr. 11, 1941; and Scruggs,
"Texas, Good Neighbor?" 120-123. Full accounts of these issues, especially the position
and actions of the Mexican government regarding emigration, appear in Arthur F. Cor-
win, "Causes of Mexican Emigration to the United States: A Summary View," Perspec-
tives in American History, VII (197), 60oo-609og; Arthur F. Corwin, "Mexican Policy and
Ambivalence toward Labor Emigration to the United States," Corwin (ed.), Immigmants-
and Immigrants, 176-224; John R. Martinez, "Mexican Emigration to the United States,
1910-1930" (Ph.D. diss., University of California, Berkeley, 1957); Reisler, By the Sweat
of Their Brow, 77-95, 227-257; Abraham Hoffman, Unwanted Mexican Americans in the
Great Depression: Repatriation Pressures, 1929-1939 (Tucson, 1974).
7TSES, Supplement to Origins and Problems: Texas Migratory Fatin Labor (Austin,
1941), 35-43, 44 (quotation), 45-47.
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Texas State Historical Association. The Southwestern Historical Quarterly, Volume 85, July 1981 - April, 1982, periodical, 1981/1982; Austin, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth101208/m1/68/: accessed April 18, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Texas State Historical Association.