• Home
  • Illinois News
  • Illinois Politics
  • US Politics
  • US NEWS
  • America First
  • Opinion
  • World News
  • Second Amendment
Wednesday, August 27, 2025
Illinois Review
  • Login
  • Register
  • Home
  • Illinois News
  • Illinois Politics
  • US Politics
  • US NEWS
  • America First
  • Opinion
  • World News
  • Second Amendment
No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • Illinois News
  • Illinois Politics
  • US Politics
  • US NEWS
  • America First
  • Opinion
  • World News
  • Second Amendment
No Result
View All Result
Illinois Review
No Result
View All Result
Home Illinois News

The Invention of Hispanics: What It Says About the Politics of Race

Illinois Review by Illinois Review
December 23, 2019
in Illinois News
Reading Time: 2 mins read
A A
2
26
SHARES
436
VIEWS
Share on FacebookShare on Twitter

GettyImages-525579866

You might also like

Chicago Mayor Claims ‘Affordable Housing’ is the Key to Reducing Crime in Awkward MSNBC Interview

Pritzker Threatens Backers of National Guard in Chicago During Press Conference: ‘We’re Taking Names’

Sources: GOP Mega-Donor Dick Uihlein Sitting Out Illinois Governor Primary

Activists created ethnic categories to fuel identity politics. Mike Gonzalez writes:

America’s surging politics of victimhood and identitarian division did not emerge organically or inevitably, as many believe. Nor are these practices the result of irrepressible demands by minorities for recognition, or for redress of past wrongs, as we are constantly told. Those explanations are myths, spread by the activists, intellectuals, and philanthropists who set out deliberately, beginning at mid-century, to redefine our country. Their goal was mass mobilization for political ends, and one of their earliest targets was the Mexican-American community. These activists strived purposefully to turn Americans of this community (who mostly resided in the Southwestern states) against their countrymen, teaching them first to see themselves as a racial minority and then to think of themselves as the core of a pan-ethnic victim group of “Hispanics”—a fabricated term with no basis in ethnicity, culture, or race.

This transformation took effort—because many Mexican Americans had traditionally seen themselves as white. When the 1930 Census classified “Mexican American” as a race, leaders of the community protested vehemently and had the classification changed back to white in the very next census. The most prominent Mexican-American organization at the time—the patriotic, pro-assimilationist League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC)—complained that declassifying Mexicans as white had been an attempt to “discriminate between the Mexicans themselves and other members of the white race, when in truth and fact we are not only a part and parcel but as well the sum and substance of the white race.” Tracing their ancestry in part to the Spanish who conquered South and Central America, they regarded themselves as offshoots of white Europeans.

Such views may surprise readers today, but this was the way many Mexican Americans saw their race until mid-century. They had the law on their side: a federal district court ruled in In Re Ricardo Rodríguez (1896) that Mexican Americans were to be considered white for the purposes of citizenship concerns. And so as late as 1947, the judge in another federal case (Mendez v. Westminster) ruled that segregating Mexican-American students in remedial schools in Orange County was unconstitutional because it represented social disadvantage, not racial discrimination. At that time Mexican Americans were as white before the law as they were in their own estimation.

[Mike Gonzalez, "The Invention of Hispanics: What It Says About the Politics of Race," The HeritageFoundation, December 16]

Related

Share10Tweet7
Previous Post

China Violates Disclosure Law to Publish Propaganda in NY Times, WaPo

Next Post

The Business of Climate Change

Illinois Review

Illinois Review

Recommended For You

Chicago Mayor Claims ‘Affordable Housing’ is the Key to Reducing Crime in Awkward MSNBC Interview

by Illinois Review
August 26, 2025
0
Chicago Mayor Claims ‘Affordable Housing’ is the Key to Reducing Crime in Awkward MSNBC Interview

By Illinois ReviewDuring a Tuesday appearance on MSNBC’s Morning Joe, Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson sidestepped questions about the city’s police shortage, instead insisting that “affordable housing” is the...

Read moreDetails

Pritzker Threatens Backers of National Guard in Chicago During Press Conference: ‘We’re Taking Names’

by Illinois Review
August 25, 2025
0
Pritzker Threatens Backers of National Guard in Chicago During Press Conference: ‘We’re Taking Names’

By Illinois ReviewAt a dramatic Monday afternoon press conference in downtown Chicago – flanked by nearly every major Democrat in the region – Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker delivered...

Read moreDetails

Sources: GOP Mega-Donor Dick Uihlein Sitting Out Illinois Governor Primary

by Illinois Review
August 25, 2025
0
Sources: GOP Mega-Donor Dick Uihlein Sitting Out Illinois Governor Primary

By Illinois ReviewAs the Republican primary for Illinois governor takes shape, billionaire mega-donor Richard Uihlein’s name is once again circulating in political circles.In recent weeks, advisers connected to...

Read moreDetails

From Murder Capital to Migrant Crisis: Why Trump Must Deploy the National Guard to Chicago

by Mark Vargas
August 24, 2025
0
From Murder Capital to Migrant Crisis: Why Trump Must Deploy the National Guard to Chicago

By Rod Blagojevich and Mark Vargas OpinionWhile Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker and Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson tout drops in homicides, robberies and shootings, the fact is Chicago remains...

Read moreDetails

Wirepoints Faces 74% Revenue Drop Since 2020 as Spending Spikes 57% as Leader Eyes Governor Run on Fiscal Issues

by Illinois Review
August 22, 2025
0
Wirepoints Faces 74% Revenue Drop Since 2020 as Spending Spikes 57% as Leader Eyes Governor Run on Fiscal Issues

By Illinois ReviewAn Illinois-based nonprofit that provides original research and commentary on the state’s economy and government finances is facing a financial crisis of its own as its...

Read moreDetails
Next Post

The Business of Climate Change

Please login to join discussion

Best Dental Group

Related News

IL Freedom Caucus calls on Lurie Children’s Hospital to cease gender services for kids

October 27, 2022

Beckman: Is the Brigham Young University racial slur controversy another hoax?

October 27, 2022

Salvi polling shows closer race

October 27, 2022

Browse by Category

  • America First
  • Education
  • Faith & Family
  • Foreign Policy
  • Health Care
  • Illinois News
  • Illinois Politics
  • Opinion
  • Science
  • Second Amendment
  • TRENDING
  • US NEWS
  • US Politics
  • World News
Illinois Review

llinois Review LLC Editor-in-Chief Mark Vargas General Counsel Scott Kaspar Copyright © 2025 IR Media Corp., all rights reserved.

Navigate Site

  • Checkout
  • Home
  • Home – mobile
  • Login/Register
  • Login/Register
  • My account
  • My Account-
  • My Account- – mobile

Follow Us

Welcome Back!

Login to your account below

Forgotten Password? Sign Up

Create New Account!

Fill the forms below to register

All fields are required. Log In

Retrieve your password

Please enter your username or email address to reset your password.

Log In
No Result
View All Result
  • Home
  • Illinois News
  • Illinois Politics
  • US Politics
  • Health Care
  • US NEWS
  • America First
  • Opinion
  • TRENDING
  • Education
  • Foreign Policy
  • Second Amendment
  • Faith & Family
  • Science
  • World News

llinois Review LLC Editor-in-Chief Mark Vargas General Counsel Scott Kaspar Copyright © 2025 IR Media Corp., all rights reserved.

Are you sure want to unlock this post?
Unlock left : 0
Are you sure want to cancel subscription?