How Have Hispanic Americans Helped Shape the U.S.?

The United States has grown and thrived thanks to the contributions of Hispanic Americans. Learn about a few key moments in American history made possible by its Hispanic citizens in this episode of BrainStuff.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to Brainstuff, a production of I Heart Radio, Hey
brain Stuff, Lauren Boglebaum. Here here in the United States,
it's Hispanic Heritage Month, but which officially began as Hispanic
Heritage Week in ninety eight. Unlike many other campaigns that
observe and honor the contributions of a particular group of Americans,
Hispanic Heritage Month doesn't run throughout September, but rather starts

(00:25):
on September fift and continues through mid October. So why
does it start in the middle of the month. Well
of Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Nicaragua all
celebrate their Independence Day on September. Mexico's is on September,
Chile's September eight, and belize Independence Day is September twenty one,

(00:46):
and by stretching into October, the holiday also includes Dia
de la Razza on October twelve, which is a kind
of rejection of Columbus Day because of Christopher Columbus's many
crimes against humanity and see our episode on Columbus Day
for more about that. Dia de Larrazza instead celebrates the
melding of Hispanic races or raza and cultures. In honor

(01:08):
of Hispanic Heritage Month, Let's talk about three times that
Hispanic Americans have changed the course of U s history.
Some three hundred years after Spanish conquerors became the first
non native Americans to view the Mississippi River and later
the Grand Canyon, when Josef Marian Hernandez helped smooth the
transfer of the territory of Florida into US rule. Florida

(01:31):
was still part of Spain when Hernandez was born in St.
Augustine in seventeen eighty four, but that changed when he
was selected to serve in the House of Representatives and
was sworn into duty in eighteen twenty three, as the
first Hispanic person to serve in Congress. In historical context,
Hernandez being a slave owner is a controversial figure. Still,

(01:51):
he remains the first of a hundred and twenty eight
Hispanic people to serve in the US Congress. Maybe of
more relevance today is the first Hispanic senator elected to
a full terming Congress, New Mexico's Denis Chavez. In but
we spoke with Paul Orretz, a historian at the University
of Florida. He said in addition to being the first

(02:12):
American born Hispanic senator, He's critical for the time we
live in because he fought on behalf of all working
class equally. He fought for higher wages legislation. He fought
for people to have the right to organize a union.
He fought for more progress in US foreign policy for
Latin America. He organized with n double A c P
leaders against Jim Crow's aggregation. Dennis Chavez is one of

(02:34):
those people. We can use Hispanic Heritage Month to talk
about our connection to other people's democratic struggles. Today's Congress,
the U sixt has forty seven members of Hispanic heritage.
Hispanic Americans also helped turn the tide of the Civil War.
Some twenty thousand were involved in the conflict. While some

(02:55):
in the Southeast sided with the Confederacy, especially those who
came from wealthy families with plantations or other businesses. In
Louisiana and Alabama, more supported the Union, or it's said
a lot of Mexican American soldiers fought on the side
of the Union Army in the Southwest and actually helped
defeat the Confederacy in the Southwest. Hispanic people in the

(03:16):
West backed the Mexican government too, and celebrated the country's
defeat of the French at the Battle of Puebla on
May five of eighteen sixty two, single Demio in a
victory that may have helped prevent the French from siding
with the Confederacy and thus ultimately helping the Union win.
A bit more modernly, about eight years before the U. S.

(03:37):
Supreme Court ruled in Brown versus the Board of Education
that segregation in public schools is unconstitutional, a Hispanic school
girl showed the way. Sylvia Mendez, a Puerto Rican and
Mexican heritage, was just eight years old when she and
her brothers were denied enrollment into the white only Westminster
School District in Orange County in ninety three. At the time,

(03:58):
about eight of cow Alifornia school districts were segregated. Her parents,
Gonzalo and Felicita Mendez, enlisted other parents to fight the decision,
and they took the school board to court. After appeals
that were abandoned short of the U. S. Supreme Court,
Mendez versus Westminster became the first successful federal school desegregation
case in the nation. That was in ninety seven. The

(04:23):
case was important in arguing that segregation itself, even if
schools were separate but equal, was harmful and unconstitutional under
the Fourteenth Amendment, specifically the clause that calls for equal
protection of the laws for all citizens in appeals. Sylvia's
case was argued by third Good Marshall, who went on
to argue for the plaintiff in the Brown versus Board
of Education case too, and later would become a Supreme

(04:46):
Court justice. Felicitas died in but Sylvia has continued to
tell her family story. In two thousand seven, a U. S.
Postage stamp marked the sixtieth anniversary of the case, and
on February, then President Barack Obama presented Sylvia with the
Presidential Medal of Freedom. Today's episode was written by John

(05:11):
Donovan and produced by Tyler clang Or. More on this
and lots of other historic topics, visit how Stuff works
dot com. Brain Stuff is production of I Heart Radio
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