Bracero Program

Contextual Essay

Border Patrol trainees taking fingerprints of Braceros at Rio Vista Reception Center, El Paso, Texas, 1952.​*​

The Bracero program is one of the most important programs in history but it is often skipped over or presented in such a short amount of time in our classes that we never go in depth. In our history classes, we learned that the bracero program was initially started in 1942 through a series of diplomatic accords between the United States and Mexico. This program was created as a way to allow millions of Mexican men to work legally in the United States on short term labor contracts. The program was also used as a way to redress the previous depression-era deportations and repatriations that were unjustly targeting Mexican Americans who were U.S. citizens. While already having some prior knowledge about this program because of my own background, interests, and classes I have taken before, I still felt I was missing a big part of information relating to this program especially relating to both economies. One of the main questions I had when beginning to look into more information about the Bracero Program was, how have both the Mexican and United States economies been affected? This can be answered in terms of finances, relationships between both countries and their citizens, or simply little changes such as having access to certain products.

When beginning to research the Bracero Program I felt that it was an important topic to talk about because there are times in history where stories aren’t shared and perspectives are lost. The Bracero Program focuses on the Mexican population, specifically men, that came to the United States in search of work and new opportunities. These men would come to the United States in search for better opportunities while having to leave their homes and their families to achieve their goals of having better pay and benefits. Although the Mexican population does play a big role in the program, we also have to recognize that the American population is also being affected. Both the American and Mexican population were risking their people and their resources in order to move forward in terms of building relationships between both countries and they were also using their resources to support one another. My question is historically significant when it comes to this program because it will allow me to learn more about the ways in which both economies have been affected and it will allow me to see if there has been anything in particular that stands out in history relating to this program that is still present in today’s society. I want to be able to learn more about the effects this program has had not only on America’s economy but also on Americans and their views towards Mexican migrants. This will also help others have access to primary sources relating to the bracero program which will allow readers to understand how this program changed history, it created changes within the relationship of the U.S. and Mexico but also created changes in the way that this country creates laws related to immigration.

The main question I had in mind when beginning to research the Bracero program was how have both economies been affected by the program and can we still see the effects of the program in today’s society? I wanted to focus on this question because we only hear one side of history depending on where you are, if you are an American you often only hear about the ways in which this program affected the United States and never about the Mexican experience and vice versa. I decided to look through a variety of primary sources, I included pictures of braceros on the trains on their way to the United States, podcasts which had braceros speak on their experiences, videos where braceros spoke about their experience and the effects of the program on their life, interviews of braceros done by college students, and a variety of paperwork such as work contracts and registration forms. I decided to pick these primary sources because they are different, some are videos, some are interviews, some are podcasts, and some are documents. This allows me and the readers to receive a variety of perspectives about the program and the ways that it affected the Mexican and American population. I made sure to pick primary sources that would provide some insight about the program. I chose to use youtube videos because they included braceros in the video and gave them the space to speak about their experiences and what they remember living through. I was using the UCLA Labor Center, specifically looking into their bracero program archive in order to find sources that would be beneficial to this project and that provided new information about the program. While on UCLA Labor Center, I was looking through the website and I was able to find sources that included interviews with braceros themselves, they spoke about their experiences, they mentioned ways in which they had to navigate being in a new country and different things like their wages or the way that this program would help them with other parts of their relocation like housing, food, clothing, etc. I believe that both countries were trying to create a meaningful and long term relationship and this program gave workers the opportunity to be that building block to create that relationship. When I was done looking through the UCLA website, I decided to look into the Bracero History Archive because this was a platform that contained more than three thousand files related to the topic. This archive had a variety of files which contained audio recordings from interviews, work contracts, identification cards, pay stubs, and the list continues. I think this was one of the most beneficial platforms for this project because it gave me access to the many documents which were handled from the 1940s to the 1960s. I decided to use a variety of documents from this platform because they were documents directly used by braceros. These documents are such important parts of history that often get overlooked in the American school system when learning about this topic. We briefly hear about this program in our history classes but we never go in depth and see the ways in which this program has made a difference in the relationship with both countries. These documents provide us with a little bit of insight into the bracero experience and it provides us with a new perspective about the program and the ways in which the braceros were treated.

Throughout my project, my main focus was being able to find sources which would provide my readers with new information. I wanted to be able to find sources that would provide readers with an idea of what many braceros had to experience, this could be anything from the language barriers, the lack of being financially stable, being gone from home for long periods of time. I wanted to be able to portray what many of the braceros experienced first hand while also providing the reader with an understanding of how this affected both economies. In one of the youtube videos I watched, named, The Braceros at 80, they are speaking to different men who came in search of new opportunities. Fidel Villarroel was one of the men who were interviewed and he said, “ I was poor in Mexico, I lived in poverty. I couldn’t even manage to pay for a cup of coffee. The poverty was so bad that I lost three children in one year and I feel lucky they died because I had no money for medical care to save them. If you’ve got money then you get medical care, everything, but if you don’t, you’re in the hole , you die” this part of his interview shines light on his life back in Mexico and the way in which he didn’t have the resources to provide his family with the safety they needed, in this case, it was the healthcare, which has been one of the most expensive parts the economy. Later in his interview he mentioned that he cursed the Mexican government because he didn’t have the money to save any of his children. Villaroel goes on to speak about the guest-worker program and says, “he warns about some of the corrupt profiteers who were attracted by a guest-worker program. What I am telling you is true, the bracero program was a business. For each work permit, the Mexican lawyers, middlemen, and government would charge three-hundred to four-hundred pesos, they were robbing us. You had to pay or they would not give you a contract. They got rich on us, there were a lot of people making money” when I had heard this part of his interview I thought about my main focus of this project. I wanted to see the ways in which this program had caused some changes to both the Mexican and United States economy. After hearing this section, I can see that the Mexican men needed as much help getting out of poverty and they were looking for work opportunities elsewhere to have some sort of financial stability. Villaroel mentions new information about the process of being accepted into the bracero program which ultimately affected the United States economy in a positive way. The U.S. government, lawyers, and middlemen were asking these men to pay in order to receive their permits to work in the United States and it can be seen as beneficial to the U.S. because it was money that was ultimately helping rebuild the economy, especially after world war two. 

Throughout the process of searching for new sources and new perspectives on the program, I learned more about the ways in which braceros were able to grow some financial stability but also how the U.S. was able to create some kind of profit from this program to help rebuild their economy over time. If we take into account the number of braceros who came to the U.S. throughout the program, we can say that the United States made large amounts of profit because of the amount of money each person had to pay to receive a contract in the first place.

Sources:

  1. ​*​
    https://www.uscis.gov/about-us/our-history/history-office-and-library/featured-stories-from-the-uscis-history-office-and-library/bracero-program-images
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