Geography Reference
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so, and America's classical liberalism emerges from this very fact. Dissent, individualism,
republicanism ultimately all devolve from Protestantism. “While the American Creed is
Protestantism without God, the American civil religion is Christianity without Christ.” But
this Creed, Huntington reasons, might be subtly undone by an advancing Hispanic, Cathol-
ic, pre-Enlightenment society. 24
Huntington writes:
Mexican immigration is leading toward the demographic reconquista of areas
Americans took from Mexico by force in the 1830s and 1840s, Mexicanizing
them in a manner comparable to, although different from, the Cubanization that
has occurred in southern Florida. It is also blurring the border between Mexico
and America, introducing a very different culture. 25
Boston College professor Peter Skerry writes that one of Huntington's “more startlingly
original and controversial insights” is that while Americans champion diversity, “today's
immigrant wave is actually the least diverse in our history. To be sure,” Skerry continues,
paraphrasing Huntington, “non-Hispanic immigrants are more diverse than ever. But over-
all, the 50 percent of immigrants who are Hispanic make for a much less diverse cohort
than ever. For Huntington, this diminished diversity makes assimilation less likely.” 26 And
as David Kennedy observes, “the variety and dispersal of the immigrant stream” smoothed
the progress of assimilation. “Today, however, one large immigrant stream is flowing into
a defined region from a single cultural, linguistic, religious, and national source: Mex-
ico … the sobering fact is that the United States has had no experience comparable to what
is now taking place in the Southwest.” 27 By 2050, one-third the population of the United
States could be Spanish-speaking. 28
Geography is at the forefront of all these arguments. Here is Huntington: “No other im-
migrant group in American history has asserted or has been able to assert a historical claim
to American territory. Mexicans and Mexican-Americans can and do make that claim.”
Most of Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, California, Nevada, and Utah were part of Mexico
until the 1835-1836 Texan War of Independence and the 1846-1848 Mexican-American
War. Mexico is the only country that the United States has invaded, occupied its capital, and
annexed a good deal of its territory. Consequently, as Skerry points out, Mexicans arrive in
the United States, settle in areas of the country that were once part of their homeland, and
so “enjoy a sense of being on their own turf” that other immigrants do not share. Mexican
Americans into the third generation and beyond maintain their competence in their native
language to a far greater degree than do other immigrants, largely because of the geograph-
ical concentration of Hispanic communities that manifests the demographic negation of the
Texan and Mexican-American wars. What's more, Mexican naturalization rates are among
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