Mexican Rose

The Mexican-American War ended in February 1848 with the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. It added 525,000 square miles to United States territory, including all or parts of present-day Arizona, California, Colorado, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming. Some of my ancestors came here the summer before that, fleeing religious persecution in the States, only to find the U.S. and the persecution followed them here. The First Amendment that should have protected them didn’t. (If you’re bored or curious, you might look up the Edmunds-Tucker Act of 1887, and then try to picture something like that being applied to Catholics, Muslims or Jews.) Some – including my great-grandfather, his second wife and their young sons  – fled to Mexico. Again. So, when I read the news coming from south of the border, it feels somehow personal. I don’t think building a wall can fix this. I don’t know what can. But I find myself wishing I did.