Posted on 05/05/2012 8:45:52 AM PDT by mandaladon
Los Angeles (CNN) -- Cinco de Mayo -- the unofficial U.S. holiday long believed to have been imported, with celebratory beer, from Mexico -- isn't a Mexican holiday at all but rather an American one created by Latinos in the West during the Civil War, according to new research by a California professor.
Conventional thinking has held that the holiday -- now a commercial juggernaut -- may have grown out of the mass migrations from the bloody Mexican Revolution of the 1910s or even during Chicano Power activism of the 1960s, University of California at Los Angeles Professor David Hayes-Bautista said.
But on the 150th anniversary of the holiday, Hayes-Bautista is announcing that he happened upon the true origins of Cinco de Mayo -- the 5th of May -- after poring over Spanish-language newspapers in California from the mid-1800s while working on another research project.
Cinco de Mayo does indeed mark a Mexican military victory over the invading French army on May 5, 1862, but it's celebrated more in the United States because in 1862, U.S. Latinos of Mexican heritage parlayed the victory as a rallying cry that the Union could also win the Civil War.
That's because the French sympathized with the Confederacy, and Hispanics sided with the Union in its fight against slavery and elitism, Hayes-Bautista said. France sought to impose a monarchy over democratic Mexico while U.S. foreign power weakened during the War Between the States.
Hayes-Bautista, a UCLA professor of medicine whose family lore holds his great-great grandfather fought in the famous Cinco de Mayo battle, has just published a new book on the discovery, "El Cinco de Mayo: An American Tradition," which one historian also at UCLA describes as "of great significance."
(Excerpt) Read more at edition.cnn.com ...
Do they celebrate the 4th of July in Mexico?
Cinco de Mayo, Reconquista, latin purity, blah blah blah....for all the blathering about retaking what was theirs, maintaining identity, etc., it is ironic that the proponents no longer speak the language of their ancient forefathers, but speak Spanish, highly mutated by Spanglish influences....from their less-ancient ‘forefathers’ that conquered them. George Lopez can suck it.
How nice! Giving illegals that are sucking the life out of this country a day to celebrate. S/
Let’s just rename it Progressive Vote Pandering de Mayo and be done with it.
Because of the war in 1861, the United States was not in a position to enforce the Monroe Doctrine against French imperial designs.
Annoying to say the least. Sure are a lot of lies in the history books nowadays.
Cinco de Mayo was created in the US by Marxists. The fifth of May is Karl Marx's Birthday !!!
bttt
Or, as our astute President said, Cinco de Cuatro...my preference is for Siete de Nueve, though.
(post photo here if I could)
Hey, the guy who led Mexican Forces against the French was a TEXAN, born right there in Goliad, Texas...The only American Born Citizen to have his picture on a 500 dollar peso bill. It’s all about Texas! They are proud of Ignacio Zaragoza. NOW can we celebrate?
In fact, May 5th is a celebration marking the ongoing Mexican conquest of the American Southwest.
Same here at 68. Hey, any excuse for a party!
Cinco de Mayo is like Obama’s girlfriend in his faux-autobiographies: Fabricated.
That professor is a typical leftist idiot. Mexico’s Independence Day is September 16th, their independence from Spain. Every Mexican I know here or have met down there, knows that. Cinco de Mayo is a minor holiday, not even considered important. But leave it up to the Gringo’s marketing genius to find another reason to get stupid Americans into an ethic restaurant American owned most likely) and drink Mexican beer and tequila. Duh.
Not only did Benito Juarez conquer the FRENCH, he withstood the Power of the Papacy... Mexican’s don’t like to remember this. GOD HIMSELF HELPED BENITO JUAREZ THAT DAY, dear ole Porfirio Diaz got delayed in Atlixtco, and God sent RAIN in torrential ways to cause the French much havoc in their ability to array the battle. GOD SAVED MEXICO ON CINCO DE MAYO from the FRENCH and from THE PAPACY.. Their Constutitional Gov’t surviced thanks to an Indian Zapotec and a Texan born near Seguin. Let’s Celebrate.
Cinco de Mayo ass.
Exactly. Cinco de Mayo is nothing more than one more reason to go out and get drunk here in the US.
I'll start celebrating Cinco de Mayo here when they start celebrating Quatro de Julio there.
“Or, as our astute President said, Cinco de Cuatro...my preference is for Siete de Nueve, though.”
Or what do you call four Mexicans in a rowboat that’s going down?
Quatro Cinco!
Cinco de Mayo, proudly sponsored by the Tequila Marketing Association.
But when they achieved independence they failed to do the one thing that would have saved them; throw out all the white Spaniards who are now the "elite" and keeping the natives in their place. < /sarc >
LOL...best response so far.
Is Cinco de Mayo anything like a Latino Kwaanza?
The French lost the battle but they conquered Mexico and only left because of the end of the US Civil War. They made Maximilian the emperor of Mexico.
Cinco de Marxo
You are right. Gonna eat with the father-in-law later today. Where.....wait for it....Mexican Villa.
I don’t think I ever met David Hayes-Bautista, but I have met his ex-wife (now a professor at a different university) many years ago (as I recall they were already estranged so I assume they have long been divorced). He’s at the “Cesar Chavez Department of Chicana/o Studies”—political correctness trumps Spanish grammar. (The form “Chicano” should include both male and female.)
If some want to celebrate it, I don’t give a big damn. I won’t be. I’d say 80% of the people that observe it just use it for a reason to get half drunk.
The holiday will never truly catch on, because it can’t be easily ‘financialized’, unless you are a brewer or bar owner.
Every holiday is fabricated by someone.
press one for ENGLISH or then press one until you learn ENGLISH!
According to the left these days should not be American days of remembrance:
1) Veterans Day—Celebrates American Imperialism
2) Presidents Day— Washington was a racist slave holder
3) Columbus Day—more Western Imperialism
4) Christmas—Pagan Holiday that offends Islam
5) Easter—same
6) St Patricks Day—too White Catholic
7) Thanksgiving—offensive to native Americans
8) Memorial Day—too military
9) Flag Day—shows a worldwide symbol of hate and oppression
10) Pulaski Day—too Euro-centric
Is Debbie Wasserman-Schultz the poster queen for
Cinco de Mayonaise?
Just like Kwanzaa is right
Might wish to make a little wardrobe adjustment. . .your anti-Catholic bigotry is showing.
“Pulaski Day”?
Catholic hierarchy picked the leaders for Mexico. First was the Tratado de Cordova when the Virey Donaju gave Iturbide the Divine Right to be emperor. It was nice that Benito Juarez inclinced towards a more lay gov’t. Does this make me anti Catholic...okay. Tri Garantia of 1828 Iguala, All Mexicans by law had to be Catholic. Dec. 4th, 1860, by Presidential Degree of Benito Juarez Freedom to chose your religion. Sorry if the facts get in the way of your world view.
I’m waiting for November 7th so I can celebrate Obama’s unemployment.
You can also go to a Chinese, Japanese, Italian, or barbecue restaurant these days. No matter who owns the bidness or runs the counter, the kitchen staff is likely to be largely hispanic with tejano sounds on the radio coming from the kitchen.
It’s a day of remembrance in Illinois (I think it’s just Illinois, not sure) for Casimir Pulaski, a Polish cavalry officer who became a general (on our side) in the Revolutionary War.
I’m buying the first round in celebration on that day, FRiend!
I think Cinco de mayo is mexican for drink a beer and eat a taco..?
Otherwise, as long as I do not have to submit or pray five times a day.
Its a big...whatever.
I’m waiting for November 7th so I can celebrate Obama’s unemployment.
That will be a historic moment. The first half black non-
citizen,and worst President in America, gets the boot.
Drinks all around!
and the first white hispanic momon is elected President..?
Someone else can by that round of drinks.
Not that i know of. But i do know that Cinco De Mayo is not as widely recognized or celebrated in Mexico as it is in the US. I also Know that it started out here and did not move into mexico until much later where it was imported from us.
Cinco De Mayo is indeed a U.S. Export not Inport. Much like Nachos. While this may be news to the professor its not news to me. I’ve known this to be the case for many years now.
What I can’t be sure of is the exact cause of the celebration whether it was out of sympathy for the north or simply a matter of a victory against foreign reconquest in the Americas.
I know there was extensive trade between Texas and Mexico during the war between the States. That Mexico in this way provided a backdoor for the confederacy to access the rest of the world. At least until Lincoln’s imperial navy took control of the Mississippi.
I don’t think either Government of Mexico were too particular about whom they traded with. The French like the British were however sympathetic to the confederacy owing to the hypocritical position of Linclin’s Government (betraying the very foundation of self-determination of the once free republic he claim to be defending). Under Lincoln’s imperial threat of war for mere reconciliation nether took sides. The British almost sided with the Confederacy thou.
Trade with mexico largely consisted of “smuggling”, the french & British invasion(Which was initially just to recover debt mexico owed them) rendered mexico in as much need of their arms & resources as the Confederacy.
In Cleveland there is a statue to Tadeusz Kościuszko, a Polish patriot and volunteer with the American patriots.
It may be the only date in history where someone being fired actually LOWERS the unemployment rate.
Anti-Catholic bias (anger) still showing.
Please post links to the documents that prove what you allege happened—from the Catholic Church, mind you.
That would be helpful.
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