In The White Scourge, Neil Foley addresses how the construct of whiteness in Texas in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries affected the structure of society. Neil Foley is the Robert H. and Nancy Dedman Chair in History at Southern Methodist University. His research concerns race and civil rights in Mexico and the American Southwest. Foley structures his book chronologically, beginning with the Texas Revolution in the first chapter and ending with the 1930s and 1940s. He focuses his study on Central Texas to examine the effects of the idea of whiteness because of the unique convergence of whites, blacks, Mexicans, and many other ethnic groups in this region. Foley proposes that the suffering of the South was caused by the idea of whiteness.
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Black sharecroppers migrated to the cities in search of work, which increased dependence on Mexican workers. Others feared Mexicans as a threat to whiteness. Many Mexican-Americans attempted to label themselves as white, and Mexicans were allowed to intermarry with whites, giving nativists the fear that Mexicans would taint the white race. Nativist groups called for increased restrictions on Mexican immigration, but in the end, big business’ need for farm labor trumped these fears, and immigration laws exempted …show more content…
Tom Hickey, a socialist, attempted to organize the tenants against landlords, first with the Renter’s Union in 1911, followed by the more militant Land League in 1914. He wanted to break down class barriers between the landowners and the landless. The unions’ downfall came during the First Red Scare, when Hickey was imprisoned and any discussion of class warfare was viewed as unpatriotic. He used the concept of whiteness to encourage men to join his union. Whiteness was gendered, where the less manly one was, the less white they were. Hickey insinuated that if you did not join, you were not manly, and thus less white. These groups were never as successful as the unions in East Texas, however, because of the lack of support from blacks and
Black sharecroppers migrated to the cities in search of work, which increased dependence on Mexican workers. Others feared Mexicans as a threat to whiteness. Many Mexican-Americans attempted to label themselves as white, and Mexicans were allowed to intermarry with whites, giving nativists the fear that Mexicans would taint the white race. Nativist groups called for increased restrictions on Mexican immigration, but in the end, big business’ need for farm labor trumped these fears, and immigration laws exempted …show more content…
Tom Hickey, a socialist, attempted to organize the tenants against landlords, first with the Renter’s Union in 1911, followed by the more militant Land League in 1914. He wanted to break down class barriers between the landowners and the landless. The unions’ downfall came during the First Red Scare, when Hickey was imprisoned and any discussion of class warfare was viewed as unpatriotic. He used the concept of whiteness to encourage men to join his union. Whiteness was gendered, where the less manly one was, the less white they were. Hickey insinuated that if you did not join, you were not manly, and thus less white. These groups were never as successful as the unions in East Texas, however, because of the lack of support from blacks and