"Just so you know the whole story, many many Indians were slaves also to white men and Mexican families. I have documentation to this but of course all of you already know it but just don't mention it."
Bondage was legal and largely accepted, in most of the world, prior to the early 1800's. We fought a lethal, bloody war, that left half the country at that time in shreds, with the ultimate end result being the end of legal human bondage in this country, regardless of the precise whys and hows at the start of the war. However, it's still legal and practiced in fairly large areas of the planet to this day. In North America, whites enslaved blacks and Indians, Indians enslaved blacks and whites, blacks enslaved blacks and Indians. I can't speak to Mexicans, because I am not as familiar with the history of the southwest, but they are human, too, so I'm sure they practiced slavery, just as everybody else did. It happened. Sanitizing history doesn't do anybody any good, in the long run.
The Brazilians had black and Indian slaves, too. In Sao Paolo there's a statue commemorating the settlers who opened the Brazilian "West." Some of the figures are clearly Black or Indian. I was surprised that they were so open about the history of their country.
No they didn't...they held them captive not as slaves.
Europeans (English and Spanish) owned slaves...not the natives. Mexico is basically controlled by the same 20 or so european families that have always controlled Mexico.