In the book, City of Inmates, the author Hernández aims to explore the issue of incarceration using the example of Los Angeles, a city with the most significant number of inmates in the United States (45). The main issue that the author explores is connected to the treatment of immigrants, their exclusion, and the consequences of such attitudes. These issues have a lengthy historical background, beginning with the Spanish colonial era. Lim also provides valuable input into the understanding of the historical events that lead to an influx of immigration in the United States and the effect that this had on the present (64).
Hobos, a term that Hernandez used in its title, refers to the immigrant workers, usually poor and without a steady income to support themselves (50). The Tram Era is a name given to the industrial age during which a large number of white men became iterant, and the politicians and other society members feared their impact on social life. Francis Wayland, who was a dean of the law faculty at Yale University, warned that these people could be a serious threat to society.
The main fear that prevailed at that time was the inconsistency regarding the politician’s vision of white man – a person with a job, a home, and a wife and the actual state of things (Hernandez 45). In actuality, these people went to the West of the state to find occasional work and often migrate without a family and an aspiration to settle somewhere. This lead to the exclusion of these people by society as they were titled “trams” or “hobos” (Hernandez 46). In general, the issue arises as a contrast between the promoted image of Los Angeles as a paradise for families and the actuality where poor workers rented rooms on a weekly basis, without a steady job. And each winter, the seasonal workers and immigrants from all over the world, including Mexico, came to Los Angeles.
Los Angeles mayor Workman was the first one to use the unpaid work of convicted criminals on a large scale project to pave and construct new roads in Los Angeles, rejecting the bids of independent contractors and using chain gangs. An important aspect is a fact that most people were sentenced for crimes such as begging or being drunk.
Jim Crow laws are the segregation legislation that did not allow African-Americans to participate in some public activities alongside others. A prominent example is an education, as in El Paso, a separate school was established for African-Americans, while Mexican people and other immigrants were allowed to attend regular schools (Lim 65). Later, these schools established only for the African American children were called Douglass Schools. Regardless, the segregation was not as severe as in other parts of the state.
Overall, the Los Angeles police used imprisonment to contain people who were considered socially dangerous by the elites, the majority of whom were seasonal workers. Instead of addressing the actual issues such as low wages and unemployment, the authorities. El Paso had a more welcoming attitude towards the newcomers as no similar policies for seasonal workers, immigrants, or African-Americans were in place. The anti-Chinese attitudes, however, emerged as a response to a large number of immigrants from Asia who were hired at railroads and farms and established many businesses at El Paso.
Works Cited
Hernandez, Kelly. City of Inmates: Conquest, Rebellion, and the Rise of Human Caging in Los Angeles, 1771–1965. The University of North Carolina Press, 2017.
Lim, Julian. Porous Borders: Multiracial Migrations and the Law in the U.S.-Mexico Borderlands. The University of North Carolina Press, 2017.