The Squatter and the Don / A Novel Descriptive of Contemporary Occurrences in California

by María Amparo Ruiz de Burton

“I heard them talk about an appeal that was pending, and I thought it was your appeal, not theirs.”

“The position then was this: In the first place, I was willing to give them a chance of getting good homes for their families, for I shall always consider that the law has deluded and misled them, and helped them to develop their natural inclination to appropriate what belonged to some one else; so they should bear only half the blame for being squatters—Congress must bear the other half. Then, in the second place, about the time I had that meeting, I had just received a letter from George, written at Washington, telling me how the Solicitor General had disobeyed the order of the Attorney General, instructing him to dismiss the appeal against the confirmation of my title. As I did not know that the Solicitor General was acting thus out of pique or personal animosity against the Attorney General, I naturally feared that he was going to make me suffer other worse outrages, judging by his arbitrary, irresponsible conduct. I thought that there might be many more years of delay while waiting for the dismissal of the appeal, and while thus waiting all my cattle would be killed. Reasoning thus, I concluded that it would be less ruinous to me to make the concessions I offered than to wait for tardy justice to restore my land to me—restore it when all my cattle shall have been destroyed.”

“I think your reasoning was correct—it did seem as if the Solicitor meant mischief. It was fortunate that he dropped the matter.”

“Yes, for which I am devoutly thankful. I hope the mischief he has done may soon be corrected by the Attorney General. Of course, the additional eighteen months of depredations on my cattle which I have had to endure, must go unredressed together with all else I have had to suffer at the hands of those vandals.”

“At the hands of our law-givers.”

“Exactly. I shall always lay it at the door of our legislators—that they have not only caused me to suffer many outrages, but, with those same laws, they are sapping the very life essence of public morality. They are teaching the people to lose all respect for the rights of others—to lose all respect for their national honor. Because we, the natives of California, the Spano-Americans, were, at the close of the war with Mexico, left in the lap of the American nation, or, rather, huddled at her feet like motherless, helpless children, Congress thought we might as well be kicked and cuffed as treated kindly. There was no one to be our champion, no one to take our part and object to our being robbed. It ought to have been sufficient that by the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo the national faith, the nation's honor was pledged to respect our property. They never thought of that. With very unbecoming haste, Congress hurried to pass laws to legalize their despoliation of the conquered Californians, forgetting the nation's pledge to protect us. Of course, for opening our land to squatters and then establishing a land commission to sanction and corroborate that outrage, our California delegation then in Washington, must bear the bulk of the blame. They should have opposed the passage of such laws instead of favoring their enactment.”

“Why did they favor such legislation?”

“Because California was expected to be filled with a population of farmers, of industrious settlers who would have votes and would want their one hundred and sixty acres each of the best land to be had. As our legislators thought that we, the Spano-American natives, had the best lands, and but few votes, there was nothing else to be done but to despoil us, to take our lands and give them to the coming population.”

“But that was outrageous. Their motive was a political object.”

“Certainly. The motive was that our politicians wanted votes. The squatters were in increasing majority; the Spanish natives, in diminishing minority. Then the cry was raised that our land grants were too large; that a few lazy, thriftless, ignorant natives, holding such large tracts of land, would be a hindrance to the prosperity of the State, because such lazy people would never cultivate their lands, and were even too sluggish to sell them. The cry was taken up and became popular. It was so easy to upbraid, to deride, to despise the conquered race! Then to despoil them, to make them beggars, seemed to be, if not absolutely righteous, certainly highly justifiable. Any one not acquainted with the real facts might have supposed that there was no more land to be had in California but that which belonged to the natives. Everybody seemed to have forgotten that for each acre that was owned by them, there were thousands vacant, belonging to the Government, and which any one can have at one dollar and twenty-five cents per acre. No, they didn't want Government land. The settlers want the lands of the lazy, the thriftless Spaniards. Such good-for-nothing, helpless wretches are not fit to own such lordly tracts of land. It was wicked to tolerate the waste, the extravagance of the Mexican Government, in giving such large tracts of land to a few individuals. The American Government never could have been, or ever could be, guilty of such thing. No, never! But, behold! Hardly a dozen years had passed, when this same economical, far-seeing Congress, which was so ready to snatch away from the Spanish people their lands (which rightfully belonged to them) on the plea that such large tracts of land ought not to belong to a few individuals, this same Congress, mind you, goes to work and gives to railroad companies millions upon millions of acres of land. It is true that such gifts were for the purpose of aiding enterprises for the good of the people. Yes, but that was exactly the same motive which guided the Spanish and the Mexican governments—to give large tracts of land as an inducement to those citizens who would utilize the wilderness of the government domain—utilize it by starting ranchos which afterwards would originate ‘pueblos’ or villages, and so on. The fact that these land-owners who established large ranchos were very efficient and faithful collaborators in the foundation of missions, was also taken into consideration by the Spanish Government or the viceroys of Mexico. The land-owners were useful in many ways, though to a limited extent they attracted population by employing white labor. They also employed Indians, who thus began to be less wild. Then in times of Indian outbreaks, the land-owners with their servants would turn out as in feudal times in Europe, to assist in the defense of the missions and the sparsely settled country threatened by the savages. Thus, you see, that it was not a foolish extravagance, but a judicious policy which induced the viceroys and Spanish governors to begin the system of giving large land grants.”