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The Bracero Program
Mexico and the United States
1942 - 1946
The Bracero Program1942 - 1946
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What is the Bracero Program?
The official name for the Bracero Program
was the Mexican Farm Labor ProgramAgreement signed by the Mexican and
American governments on August 4,
1942.
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What did the program
agreement say? The agreement said that Mexican
workers could come to the United
States to work as farm laborers for a
fixed amount of time.
The agreement also said that workers
should be paid 30 cents per hour andbe treated humanely
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What does
Bracero
mean in
Spanish?
Why do you think
this was calledthe Bracero
program?Picture of a Bracero named Plutareo, standing in a
field in Salinas, California.
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Why did the Bracero Program
happen?
The United States was just coming out
of The Great Depression and in themiddle ofWorldWar II. There were
very few men to work in farms, and
farmers could not afford to pay high
wages to men who would work in them.
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This is a WorldWar II
Recruitment Poster.
What is the purpose of this
poster?
Who do the two arms inthe poster belong to?
How does this poster
relate to the BracerosProgram?
Discuss your answers with a
partner sitting next to you.
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How did people get chosen for the
Bracero program?Getting chosen was a very difficult process.
Workers traveled from their home towns toreception centers in big cities.
At the centers, they would go through medicalexaminations and paperwork.
Often, they would wait for weeks to find out if theyhad been picked.
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A picture of men being fingerprinted at a Processing Center in
Hidalgo, Texas.
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After being chosen,
men would travelby trucks, cars or
trains to their
farm in the United
States.
This is a truckload of
chosen Braceroswaiting to be
driven to their
farms.
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Eventually, 4.6million Mexican workers
came to as many as 36states through the
Braceros program.
Braceros worked in many different types
of farms: including
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What was life like as a
Bracero?Working as a Bracero was often difficult.
Often, Braceros were ill-treated and notpaid the wages they were promised.
Braceros found it difficult to get medicaltreatment and faced discrimination inmany places in the U.S.
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Bracero living quarters, California
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Why did the Bracero Program
end in 1964? Many labor groups in the United States
saw the Mexican workers as a threat to
their own jobs - they protested theBracero program strongly.
Many Mexican workers stayed past the
terms of their program. They becameillegal immigrants, living in the United
States and raising families here.
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While many Mexican workers remained
in the United States long after theBracero program ended, many workers
and their families were repatriated to
Mexico by the U.S. INS.
What do you think are the implications of
the Bracero program on Americanimmigration and labor laws?