MEXICO-U.S. RELATIONS

The border between the United States and Mexico represents the greatest division between the standards of living in neighboring countries. Yet, what was once a relationship easily dominated by the United States has developed into a bilateral relationship of increasing importance to both countries.

Early relations between the United States and what was to become Mexico were constantly troubled by border disputes. As a Spanish colony, Mexican territory was fought over and bartered for between the great powers of Europe. France had agreed, by treaty in 1800, to offer Louisiana to Spain if it were for sale, but in 1803 the territory was sold to the United States without consultation with Spain. The borders of that territory were never specified, and the United States interpreted them broadly to include what is now Texas.

Mexico declared its independence from Spain in 1821. Although free, Mexico found itself heavily in debt and the object of great power desires for expansion. The fragile condition of the new state caused the United States concern over possible invasion by a European power. In 1823 President James Monroe announced his famous doctrine, which stated that the United States would not tolerate any European attempts "to extend their system to any portion of this hemisphere." On October 4, 1824, Mexico became a federal republic based on a constitution similar to that of the United States. The republic was divided, however, between pro-British conservatives favoring a loose federation of states, and pro-American liberals seeking a strong central government.

American settlers in Texas agitated for annexation by the United States, and the increasingly murky status of that region led to the single most damaging event in U.S.-Mexican relations: the U.S.-Mexican War. But for sixty years after the war relations were relatively peaceful. To be sure, bitterness over the loss of Texas and fear of further territorial designs remained an important aspect of Mexico's view of the United States. Both countries, however, looked increasingly to domestic concerns and away from conflict with each other. In Mexico, liberals and conservatives struggled for control of government. The conservatives attempted to maintain control by allying with various European powers and instating dictators Antonio Santa Anna (1853) and Emperor Maximilian (1864). The liberal forces, led by Benito Juárez, were periodically successful in gaining control and establishing reforms. But the conservatives never accepted the reforms, and civil war ensued until 1876 when Porfirio Díaz took office.

During the 1850s, the United States had been inclined to deal with the conservatives and was pleased when Santa Anna's financial troubles led him to sell to the United States in the Gadsden Purchase what is now southern Arizona and New Mexico. This territory was valuable in order to secure for America a transportation route to the West Coast. Although American sentiment was largely with the liberals in 1855 when Juárez overthrew Santa Anna, the U.S. government was quick to recognize the conservative regime when it again seized power in 1857. Mexican conservatives, however, proved unwilling to sell off any more territory.

In the thirty-four years spanning the Díaz presidency, the country stabilized and the economy improved. Millions of U.S. investment dollars were attracted to Mexico's modernization plans, as Díaz promised protections and guarantees. American investments went a long way in building an effective railroad system as well as other public works, but caused alarm among Mexicans who believed modernization masked a growing inequality in Mexico's social organization and an increasing dependency on foreign powers, effectively undermining the nation's hard-won independence.

These resentments helped bring on the Mexican Revolution in 1910, which drastically changed the nature of relations between the two countries. Twice the United States sent military forces into Mexico. In 1914 Woodrow Wilson sent U.S. Marines into Veracruz following an incident involving an arrest of U.S. sailors, and in 1916, American troops entered Mexico, when Gen. John J. Pershing chased Pancho Villa back after his raids in New Mexico.

Foreign investment became a target of the revolutionaries who believed that national interests needed to guide modernization efforts. The new Mexican Constitution of 1917 gave the state the right to expropriate property, including that owned by foreign nations, when the property was deemed useful for improving social conditions.

In 1919 President Venustiano Carranza issued his doctrine, which outlined an antiforeign policy, including not permitting foreigners to attain a predominant position in relation to natives, disowning the Monroe Doctrine as constituting interference in the domestic affairs of Latin American countries, establishing solidarity among Latin American countries based on the principle of nonintervention, and gaining control over national resources and promoting industrialization.

The 1920s saw rising tensions as U.S. investors—particularly oil companies—feared expropriation. Mexico owned significant oil resources in which the United States and, to a lesser degree, Britain had invested heavily. Mexico and the United States agreed unofficially on how Mexico would apply oil and agrarian legislation to U.S.-owned property, which eased tensions, but Mexico was asserting its independence in foreign affairs as well as on its own soil.

In 1938 President Lázaro Cárdenas nationalized Mexican oil rights and created the state oil monopoly, pemex. Cárdenas became a national hero who had successfully defended Mexico from the Colossus of the North. Right-wing U.S. interests demanded that President Franklin D. Roosevelt intervene, but the Good Neighbor policy prevailed, and the United States finally accepted compensation, sending nothing more than a few angry notes. In the hope of deterring other Latin American countries from similar acts, the United States enforced a boycott of Mexican oil for thirty years, effectively undermining pemex operations. Nevertheless, the nationalization of oil companies may have established more equal and stable rules for U.S.-Mexican relations.

World War II brought the countries closer. In 1942, Mexico joined the Allies after repeated sinkings of its ships by German U-boats. Mexico provided an air force squadron trained in the United States and fought Japan in the Philippines. Mexico also supplied raw materials at government-controlled prices. Further, under the Bracero Agreement, the war years saw an increase of 300,000 Mexican laborers in the United States who filled job openings created by the draft.

The postwar years were generally stable, emphasizing the "special relationship" enjoyed by the two governments. The concord prevailed despite tensions created by the cold war, which cast suspicion on the Mexican emphasis on protectionism as a stimulus to industrialization. The simultaneous devaluation of the peso, however, made Mexico an attractive outlet for both tourists and foreign investors, and cold war concerns never dominated U.S.-Mexican relations. Although there was much popular outcry by Mexican nationalists against the U.S.-backed overthrow of Jacobo Arbenz Guzmán in Guatemala in 1954, the government kept silent beyond a restatement of the official policy of nonintervention. The Mexican government was more singular in its response to Fidel Castro's Cuba. In spite of U.S. pressure to censure Castro, Mexico was the only Latin American country to maintain relations with Cuba in the aftermath of the revolution. Yet Mexico backed the United States during the Cuban missile crisis and did not ally with other third world revolutionary movements.

The good relations lasted until the late 1960s, but then Mexico began to re-create its nationalist image. Operation Intercept, an antinarcotics program of the Nixon administration, unilaterally closed the border between the two countries and disrupted commercial traffic. Mexico saw this as an example of U.S. untrustworthiness. In 1971 Richard M. Nixon imposed a 10 percent duty on all imports, hurting Mexico, which sold almost 70 percent of its exports to the United States. These acts caused President Alvarez Echeverría to doubt that there was anything beneficially special about Mexico's relationship with the United States. Echeverría tried to orient Mexico away from the United States both economically and politically, but despite significant drops during the mid-seventies, Mexico was again sending 70 percent of its exports to the United States by 1980. In contrast, although trade with Mexico was larger than with any other Latin American country, it accounted for only 5 percent of U.S. foreign trade. Even a severe economic crisis in 1976, however, did not halt Mexico's bid for independence from U.S. influence.

Economic issues were coupled with political differences. In 1979 Mexico broke relations with Nicaragua's Somoza regime, sending a clear message of solidarity with the rebels against the U.S.-backed government. In 1981 Mexico gave similar support to the insurgents in El Salvador. Mexico's expressed support of nationalist movements in Central America and the Caribbean led to increased tensions between the two countries in the 1980s. But the end of the decade saw an increased mutual effort to establish a constructive relationship in the areas of trade agreements, migration, the drug war, and harmonious foreign policies.

Robert A. Pastor and Jorge G. Castañeda, Limits to Friendship: The United States and Mexico (1988); Josefina Zoraida Vázquez and Lorenzo Meyer, The United States and Mexico (1985).

Nicholas B. Maher

See also Alamo; Caribbean-U.S. Relations; Gadsden Purchase; Good Neighbor Policy; Latin America-U.S. Relations; Mexican War; Monroe Doctrine; Texas Revolution and Annexation.