Takaki Chapter 7

Takaki chapter seven shows how Americans colonized and stole land from Mexico to form both California and Texas. America saw the need to move westward and in doing so felt that they needed to take control of Mexican land. Mexicans believed, and rightly so, that Americans thought Mexican land was theirs for the taking, “The idea these gentlemen have formed for themselves is, that God made the world and them also, therefore what there is in the world belongs to them as sons of God”(171-172).
According to Takaki, in 1840 American’s began to seize land from the Mexicans to form the “Great Bear” and the “Lone Star” states. American’s felt that Mexico’s land was for the taking because the “idle” mindset of the Mexican citizens. Richard Henry Dana once said Mexicans are “an idle, thriftless people,” and suffered from “California fever,” also known as laziness. Dana also felt that Americans differed from Mexicans in the sense that the Americans were people of industry, frugality, sobriety, and enterprise (171). Once again America found itself discriminating against those of different ethnicities. While in Mexico, Dana divided the class of Mexican citizens by the skin tone of their skin, “‘even as fair’ as the English: of ‘pure Spanish blood,’ they formed the upper class. Racially the laborers ‘[went] down by regular shades’”(Takaki 169). Dana used his stereotypical ideas to try to categorize the Mexican citizens.
It is disturbing to me to see that America not only discriminated against the African Americans, but also Mexicans. It appears as though Americans wanted Mexico’s land so America took the land on the basis of skin color. Americans seemed to connect all bad character traits with those with dark skin tones.