The Presumed Alliance: The Unspoken Conflict Between Latinos and Blacks and What It Means for America

by Nicolas C. Vaca

Book Overview

"A hard and unnerving look at how changing demographics will forever alter our country's dialogue on race." -- San Jose Mercury News

As Latino and African Americans increasingly live side by side in large urban centers, as well as in suburban clusters, the idealized concept of a Rainbow Coalition would suggest that these two disenfranchised groups are natural political allies. Indeed, as the number of Latinos has increased...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0060522054
• ISBN13: 9780060522056
• Release Date: August 2004
• Publisher: Harper Perennial
• Length: 238 Pages
• Weight: 0.50 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 5.3" x 7.9"

Customer Reviews

Trust me this book writes about what is really happening!

I will read this book completely and hold out judgement there, but it does appear to highlight particular occurences I have seen. Aren't I so cordial because I am a chicano teacher that works in Compton, Ca?

More Conflict than Alliance

This is the story behind the "other" civil rights struggle in modern America. The title comes from the presumption that many people have that blacks and latinos share much of the same history of segregation and civil rights suppression and that, therefore, they are "presumed" to be allies in the struggle for full citizenship. To the contrary, there are many differences in their historical struggles and currently blacks and hispanics see themselves engaged in a zero-sum conflict where any gains one group makes must be at a cost to the other. In fact, the message is loud and clear enough that it makes me wonder how much of the current immigration reform is being instigated by African-Americans. Of course, hispanic occupation in this country existed before America even existed. For a couple hundred years whites were the aliens on the west coast, not the hispanics. There is a reason so much of California is named in Spanish terms. The hispanic people did not suddenly move south of the border after the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo was signed February 2, 1848, ending the Mexican-American War. In fact hispanic residents of what is now western United States were given automatic American citizenship if they so desired. Later, labor for farms and the building of railroads was welcomed, encouraged, even recruited from Mexico. Although many workers returned home after the harvest or the completion of the railroad, even more stayed. They continue to cross the border in search of a job and a better life. Farmers and construction contractors plead with the U.S. government to turn a blind eye to the immigration problem as cheap labor is needed to stay competitive. Many Americans would rather take welfare than the jobs offered to the Chicanos. About every 10 years lately, we've offered amnesty to those already in the country and attempted to stem the flow. All it seems to do is encourage more illegal immigration by those who hope that 10 or 20 years down the road another amnesty will be approved. Vaca describes the segregation that occured in the American Southwest in the early 1900's, segregation as bad as anything in the South against blacks, and the legal battles that set the stage for tearing down the "separate but equal" doctrine in segregated education. He also describes racial tension with blacks where the black population seems to be saying, "We fought long and hard for a place in society and we're not about to give it up." For example, although blacks make up about 10% of the Los Angeles population, they account for 37% of city and county employees. The numbers are almost exactly reversed for hispanics. And Vaca asks how we can balance this without there being some loss to the black community. He also points out that the hispanic population are not yet politically connected. Many, of course, are not citizens and can therefore not vote. Of those who could vote, registration and actual voting rates are even lower than whites. Vaca claims they do not gener

Important if not always focused...

Mr. Vaca's book is best when it focuses directly on tensions between the Black and Latino communities. For example, focusing on the overwhelming support Latinos showed for a Latino Republican candidate in Houston when a Black Democrat also who ran who had ostensbily done more for the Latino community is a topic worth even further examination. Also, raising the question of a Latino monolith is extremely important, especially when one looks at past instances of Latino cooperation, such as that noted by Felix Padilla in "Latino Ethnic Consciousness." All of the research then plays into questions of how 'minorities' (a contentious term to say the least) will approach political power in the coming decades as the 'non-minority' population decreases as a percentage. It is an important question, one that is discussed at length in "The Miner's Canary," and will likely increase in importance in the coming decades. Mr. Vaca does overstate the case for Mexican-Americans somewhat in relation to African-Americans, particularly in claiming parity for the racial oppresion experienced by each group. Without a doubt, Mexican-Americans did experience a great deal of oppression at the hands of White Americans. However, I, as well as others, are willing to concede that it does not quite equivocate with the centuries of slavery endured by the ancestors of African-Americans. This, however, does not mean that Mexican-Americans (and other Latinos, though Vaca focuses primarily on Mexican-Americans) are somehow exempted from achieving equal rights in the face of what was systematic discrimination. Just because one group did not suffer as much as another group doesn't mean that the group is suddenly part of the establishment or somehow undeserving. Mr. Vaca also spends a bit too much time focusing on the Latino question explicitly, and, while I completely acknowledge the importance of the question of Latino numerical supremacy, I think the far more interesting questions come from the examinations of political alliance between Latinos and Blacks (or lack thereof). In a sense, Mr. Vaca is attempting to answer questions raised in "Bridge Over the Racial Divide," and "The Miner's Canary," while at the same time trying to examine the growth in the Latino population (which does absolutely lend weight to his argument, but doesn't need to consume as much of the book as it does). The two topics should be (and really are) two separate books that can then by synthesized in a third. Ultimately, though, despite its shortcomings, I find the book to be of importance. The question of Black-Latino (and even Asian) political alliance is extremely important as we head closer and closer to a population in which 'White' is no longer the dominant category (and, believe me, I understand the race v. ethnicity argument, but we have to face the fact that for many Latinos, the very terms associated with them have become racialized). 'Minority Politics' has too often seeemed to be

Lots of ethnic activists don't want you to read this book

California lawyer Nicolas C. Vaca got his start as an ethnic activist by listening to Malcolm X lecture at Berkeley in 1963. But by the end of the 1960s, Vaca had discovered that, in the civil rights struggle, all minorities are equal, but one minority is more equal than others:"Before arriving in Washington I expected to encounter other Mexican Americans at the [U.S. Commission on Civil Rights], but I discovered that I, a summer intern, was the highest ranking Mexican American there." Eventually, more Latinos elbowed their way into the lucrative business of being professional minorities. But they found that the dominant blacks weren't willing to allow them places at the table in proportion to their burgeoning numbers. Vaca became fascinated by how the black-Latino political conflicts that he saw all around him were swept under the rug in the media: "For years I discussed these issues with close friends and fellow attorneys-Anglo, Latino, and Black-as I waited for a book to appear that would address the conflict or at least go beyond pat analyses like 'Interethnic conflict can exist, but it is believed that there is more of a basis for cooperation than there is for conflict'-and then drop the subject." He eventually realized he would have to write the book himself. So he has: The Presumed Alliance: The Unspoken Conflict Between Latinos and Blacks and What It Means for America.Vaca recounts some fairly well-known tales: for example, how in Los Angeles in 2001, South Central blacks teamed up with San Fernando Valley white conservatives to defeat Antonio Villaraigosa's bid to become the first Mexican mayor since LA was a dusty pueblo. He also gives the once-over to the convoluted story of how Fernando Ferrer's attempt to win the 2001 Democratic mayoral primary in New York City with a Latino-black coalition foundered upon his protracted and frustrating courtship of Al Sharpton. More interesting are the fresher stories-about how baldly Hispanics in Miami disdain blacks; and how dismissively the black ruling class in Compton, just outside of L.A., treats that suburb's Chicano majority.As the refuge for Batista Cuba's upper and middle class, Miami has the best-organized, wealthiest (and whitest) Latino community in the U.S. In contrast, it may have the most degraded African-Americans. In both 1982 and 1989, Latin American immigrant policemen shot African-American citizens under suspicious circumstances, triggering major black riots. Florida blacks with anything on the ball quickly wise up and head for Atlanta, where the white business class is a lot easier to shake down. (Vaca, however, points out that even in Georgia there are expected to be more Hispanics than blacks by 2010.) As white as Miami's Cuban powerbrokers are, they feel no white guilt whatsoever. After all, they hadn't oppressed American blacks (which is certainly true-before 1959 they had been busy back home oppressing Cuban blacks). Compton, the spiritual home of West Coast gangsta rap, is

Finally

As a fourth-generation Mexican-American who grew up with the news media and politicians either ignoring Hispanic issues or characterizing them as 'blackandhispanic' or 'blackandlatino' issues, it's nice to read a book that says what I've felt my whole life--that we have a right to enter the political arena and pursue our own issues on our own terms just like other Americans. The author writes about three groups: Mexican-Americans in the Southwest, Cubans in Miami, and Puerto Ricans in New York City. He provides a brief political history of each group and analyzes why many political coalitions with African-Americans have been unsuccessful in the past. He challenges the notion that our issues don't matter because we haven't suffered as much as some others have. He also includes overlooked contributions to the Civil Rights Movement. A little known case called Mendez v Westminster (1946) ended segregation in California schools based on national origin and set the stage for Brown v Board of Education eight years later. The author ends on a positive note and outlines how coalitions can work in the future. Definitely an interesting book.