Milford chronicle., 1939-12-22
BORDER LANDS

Along three thousand miles of the
border one finds very little differ
ence in manners, customs, habits and
characteristics of the people of the
United States and Canada. The peo-
pie maintain friendly relations and
trust one another. The correspond
ent of this paper who has just trav-
erSed a large section of the northern
border records his agreement with
the above universal opinion of our
countrymen and their Canadian cou-
sins.
Swinging eastward later on he left
the California line behind and de-
voted considerable time and atten-
tlOn i'm Obtaining the views and opin-
ions of Texas editors and newsmen,
and other sober-thinking persons,
concerning the conditions along the
border lands of the United States
and Mexico. He included in his
purely vacation-travel a visit across
the Rio Grande into Mexico, where
he found a land as different, and a
people as strange as those he had
once seen and met along the Medi-
terranean, and in European countries
that are now at war.
At FL PasO, Texas. about three
out of every four residents are of
Mexican parentage. Nevertheless it
Is a progressive city in which its
Mexican inhabitants evidence re-
markable progress because they
have long enjoyed the benefits of our
public schools, and become accus-
toned to the higher standards of liv
ing that exist in Texas-a mere frac-
tion of a mile distant from the Mex
ican city of Juarez.
While Mexico has produced skill
ed artisans in the past the common
people have made little progress and
unfortunately they seem oblivious to
the fact that they are being OPP
pressed today the same as they have
been for centuries. Their American
neighbOrs-and their Mexican breth-
rem who nave migrated to the States
have forged ahead, but illiteracy and
lack of intelligent government finds
the masses of Mexico still living in
the fog. What they call a free and
liberal government in Mexico in the
year 1899 is simply another form of
hnlCl AlftO ASaNh
ed the point of operating in a way
that furnishes any promise of dem
ocracy. or qualifications that entities
it to be cla3sed as a good neighbor
among the American Republics.
When a newspaperman encounters
changes in few miles
of travel he instinctively seeks to
find the answers to the perplexing
of life in which he finds
himself surrounded. But the Mexi-
cans don't know what ails them and
their government; so IL is in Texas
that one finds an intimate knowledge
OF the people--who they can see
from their own windows across the
thin border land. Texas newsmen
are inclined to give President Carde-
mas credit for having planned to I'M
prove the conditions among his peO-
Pile They will tell you that the Mex
lean President knows that he has
made serious mistakes. but that the
says that if he has gone
too far and too fast, that is all due
to the fact that he was. trying to do
too much because OF the limited time
allowed his administration under
the new constitution of Mexico. But
the mess OF Mexico, is smeared with |
a dishonest record. aud partieulaFly I
by ill treatment of its benefactOrs, |
The United States. and other Ameri-
can Republics of the Western Hem
sphere. /
In short, Mexico is today the black
sheep among the Good Neighbors.
which is the reason that the honest
Republics of Latin-America are in
;isting that Mexico shall abolish the !,
lifferent forms of thieves markets
hat il has maintained through the
centuries and behind the new barri-
,ades of which they are now hold
ng hundreds of millions of dollars
8Orth of confscated foreign oil prop !
,rties and mines and railroads.