A strike meeting was fired upon by unknown assassins. and the leader of the strike. Jim Price. was injured for life. Anv injunction under the newly enacted TaftHartley Act prohibited other unions from cooperating. and finally the employer succeeded in breaking the strike by bringing in illegal aliens from Mexico to work his huge holdings. I saw the union make a comeback 2 years later and secure recognition when it led a spontaneous movement of farmworkers resisting a wage cut in the cottonfields of Californias rich San Joaquin Valley. Later I saw the union swamped by illegal aliens. or wetbacks from Mexico. in the Imperial Valley down on the border. When I came to Congress I was among those who fought to enact a measure to penalize employers of wetback labor. Although we lost that battle here in Congress. the administration was forced to begin enforcing our immigration laws and the influx of illegal aliens from Mexico. which amounted to over 1 million men in 1953. was brought to an end. Now. nearly half a million legally contracted workers from Mexico are entering the United States each year to work on our larger farms. California imports 100.00O Mexican nationals each year. over onefifth of the total.
Keywords matched
immigration illegal aliens