On a Sunday in July, fifty men went into Toledo’s immigrant workers’ homes, told them and their families to pack their things, and led them to vehicles that were ready to take them away.
They asserted that the immigrants stole employment from local Oregonians and labored for inadequate pay.
Does that sound familiar? In fact, the scene took place in 1925. The majority of the millworkers were from Oregon, and among them were 27 Japanese, four Filipinos, and one Korean. As they departed, the villagers yelled: String them up!As is the case throughout America, Oregonians have always had a mixed relationship with immigration. Although many immigrants have prospered, regulations and discrimination have occasionally restricted privileges or outright prohibited members of particular ethnic groups.
One of the few states to outright ban African Americans, Oregon’s history demonstrates a particularly difficult battle with the race of immigrants, which manifested itself in pervasive dread and discrimination as their numbers increased.
According to Bob Bussel, a historian and director of the Labor and Education Research Center at the University of Oregon who studied immigration history, there have been two attitudes to immigrants that have mirrored our state and national sentiments: arms length and open arms. When it comes to welcoming certain cultures, Oregon has struggled greatly.
With laws and attitudes that favored northern and central Europeans, the state threw out its arms to white immigrants. According to historian David Peterson del Mar, author of Oregon’s Promise, the groundwork was established by Oregon’s treatment of Black people.
Oregonians believed that excluding all Black residents was the best way to prevent racial issues even after the state was joined to the Union as a non-slave state. They claimed that by doing this, the disparities between the rich and the working class would be eliminated. According to historical records, in 1844, Missouri pioneer Capt. R.W. Morrison declared, “I’m going to Oregon, where there gonna be no slaves, and we’ll all start even.”
Later, immigration of other races were barred on the same grounds: they would create inequality and lower wages.
All three generations of the Robles family are U.S. citizens and lawful residents of Northeast Portland, Oregon. (From left): Ruby, daughter; Cesario, father; Cesar, son; Cesar Jr., grandson; Anthony, grandson; Nancy, daughter; and Irene, mother. More than half of Oregon’s Latinos are born in the United States and many others are naturalized U.S. citizens or legal residents.Nakamura Motoya/The Oregonian
According to Peterson del Mar, white Oregonians have linked persons of color to inequality and hierarchy. You had an unfair edge if you owned slaves. Some thought wealthy people would use blacks and immigrants to get wealthier at the expense of regular white men.
Oregon was the only state admitted to the Union with a black exclusion law in its constitution (Illinois and Indiana had had similar laws, while other states made it difficult for blacks to live there). The state ratified the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which guaranteed citizenship for all U.S.-born people regardless of race, then rescinded its ratification. Oregon did not ratify the 15th Amendment, which gave African Americans the right to vote, until 1959.
Likewise, citizenship and voting were denied to arrivals from China, Japan and other Asian countries. The waves of Asian immigrants, unique to the West Coast, helped define its racial context, says William Toll, historian, author and adjunct professor at the University of Oregon. Far fewer Asians emigrated to the East and South.
These people bring nothing with them to our shores, they add nothing to the permanent wealth of this country, claimed an editorial in Jacksonville s Oregon Sentinel, referring to Chinese arrivals.
Into the early 20th century, segregation ruled in practice and in law. Filipinos, Japanese, Chinese and African Americans sat in the balcony at Portland s Broadway Theater; only whites were allowed on the first floor. Mobs raided and burned Chinese homes in Northwest Portland. Oregon storefronts posted signs such as Filipinos and dogs not allowed or No Japs wanted. Young Jewish and Italian men were accused of heightened criminal activity.
But all immigrants who were poor, unskilled and nonwhite felt the brunt, Toll says. As occurred elsewhere in the U.S., Eastern and Southern Europeans were viewed as a distinct and lower racial group — too culturally different, inferior and taking away jobs.
Some Oregonians bucked the trend. Sherman Burgoyne, a Methodist minister, defended Japanese Americans in the Hood River Valley in the wake of World War II.
And Walter Gresham, a U.S. judge for the 7th Circuit, wrote to Gov. Sylvester Pennoyer in 1893 asking him to protect Chinese immigrants from violence after the Chinese Exclusion Act was extended. The city of Gresham was named after him.
Clearly, there s progress — but the immigration debate today hasn t changed much, except for a modern twist. What s new, says Bussel, the University of Oregon historian, is the preoccupation with legal status, in Oregon as elsewhere. Illegal aliens are blamed for taking Americans’ jobs and using government resources — with most Latinos, especially Mexicans, lumped into the category.
Race, class and cultural strain still bubble near the surface — though today people seldom acknowledge racism. While Oregonians are more sensitive about race and not as critical of immigrants, he says, racial issues come to the forefront when tensions arise.
There seems to be a real sense of threat associated with immigrants from Mexico, Bussel adds, because of their large numbers, and history seems to repeat itself.
When you look at the history of Japanese and Chinese in our state, there are undertones that are similar in the discussion today. The Chinese and Japanese were aliens and it was said that they couldn t assimilate, he says.
The sense of Oregon s special status as a pioneer state, he says, is used to argue for restrictions on immigration population.
So there s the argument that our infrastructure and environment cannot be sustained if there are so many new people coming here, Bussel says.
But Oregon s history of immigration holds lessons. For one thing, there s a double standard when it comes to self-righteousness about undocumented immigrants breaking the law, says Peterson del Mar.
Bear in mind that the Oregon pioneers who we celebrate were people who came here, took land and were also operating outside the law, he says.
And if we harness the energy of our newest immigrants by easing their integration, Bussel says, their contributions can be as great as the generations of immigrants who came before.
Where there have been clear public and private efforts to help immigrants come and integrate, says Bussel, we ve done better than when we were repressive and discriminating.
Most of us are immigrants, after all, even if several generations removed.
Meet the newest wave of Latino immigrants
They are Oregon s new Latinos: legal residents and U.S. citizens, multigeneration Hispanic families, blends of native and foreign-born. Latinos permanently settled, who do not migrate between the U.S. and Mexico. Bilingual and bicultural, loyal workers, homeowners, community volunteers.
Meet one typical family, the Robleses. Irene and Cesario, both in their 40s, hail from the same small village in Mexico. They come from large, poor families. Like thousands of immigrants who arrived before them, the couple say Oregon offered a unique opportunity to thrive and give their children and grandchildren a better future.
We never imagined this would be us, Irene says. To have a home, a title, to interact with so many people. This is what this state gave us.
Latinos have seen the largest growth among Oregon s immigrants in the past 20 years. In total, Latinos now make up 9 percent of Portland, 18 percent of Gresham and 23 percent of Hillsboro, according to the American Community Survey. Their numbers are higher than those of any other immigrants before them — although their share of the population is smaller than that of other groups at the turn of the century.
More than half of Oregon s Latinos are U.S. citizens or legal residents. And experts say new arrivals account for only part of the growth. A second factor is the birth rate among the second generation of Latinos, says Risa Proehl, demographic analyst at Portland State University s Population Research Center.
Like the Robleses, many Portland-area Latinos have sprung multiple generations, well-rooted into Oregon soil. Irene and Cesario live in their own trailer home in Northeast Portland with their two daughters, while their son, daughter-in-law and grandchildren share a nearby trailer. Latino children, such as the three Portland-educated Robles children, represent nearly one of five Oregon students.
Irene will make you instant coffee in her tidy, elegant kitchen and tell you how Oregon changed her family s life. She will point out the luxuries — running water, electricity, nice furniture — that she could only dream of in Mexico, where only rich people have them.
Poverty was the way of life for Irene, one of 11 children. Her father died when she was 1 and her uncles crossed the border to the United States to help the family make ends meet.
Cesario, who had 10 siblings, spent his childhood in the United States. As a teenager, he went back and forth between the two countries, marrying Irene on one of the trips home. Soon, he took his wife with him to Los Angeles. She was only 17.
We had nothing when we got married, Irene says. In Mexico, it would have been impossible for us to make a living, or get a roof over our head, a home. I wanted more for my future children.
They lived as undocumented immigrants until amnesty in 1986 made them legal residents. Their three children were born in California. Then, Cesario s company — where he had worked for 19 years, starting when he was a teenager — was sold to Cardinal Aluminum, a Portland manufacturer of fireplace parts, and the family moved.
In Oregon, the Robleses didn t have the extended family and large Latino community they did in Los Angeles. So Irene ventured into her new community, to explore. She and her husband loved Oregon s mild climate, the calmness, and the nearby ocean, rivers and mountains. The couple took English classes.
Oregon was a rebirth for us, she says, an opportunity to grow.
Irene volunteered in her children s schools. She attended trainings on HIV and community meetings with Portland police. She volunteered with a clinic, a domestic violence group and a neighborhood watch group. Eventually, she worked with Juntos Aprendemos, a Latino Network program that helps children and their parents prepare for kindergarten.
It was in Oregon — and not in California — where she met diverse people: multigeneration Americans, as well as immigrants from Somalia, Russia and Cuba.
Irene now works as a home visitor at HIPPY, a parent involvement and school readiness program for Latinos. Her husband works with the same company. She has started GED classes. New Year s resolution? The couple plan to take their citizenship test this year.
Irene has become a bridge between the Portland school system and immigrant parents, says Catherine Moore, a supervisor at HIPPY. She helps Latino parents to start getting involved in their children s education at a young age.
With their mother s help, the Robles children — 10-year-old Ruby, 22-year-old Cesar, a welder, and 23-year-old Nancy, a medical office assistant — effortlessly linked their Mexican and American identities.
I like both parts of my culture, says Cesar. I ve been living in Oregon most of my life, my kids are from here, my parents live here, and I met my children s mom here. It s home.
But right now, Oregon and the rest of the country are putting a lot of pressure on immigrants, Irene says. She hopes immigration reform will help change attitudes, and Oregonians and immigrants will give one another more opportunities to meet.
Some people think we came to Oregon to take something away, she says, but we came to live together and to help others. Every person at one point had this opportunity, because this is a country of immigrants. Maybe some had more opportunities because of the color of their skin.
a Polish-born immigrant, covers immigration and Latino issues for The [email protected]
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