Cockroach People

Ever since I went on a Student Government trip to Boston back in the early 1990s, I have had a fascination with New England.  Growing up in California where everything, save the Catholic Missions, seems brand new, I loved the fact that one can still find three to four hundred year old churches.  In addition, having spent half of my life in Chicago where anything older than 100 years was lost in the Great Chicago Fire, I appreciate the antique charm of places like Boston.

Of course, that was the Boston of two decades ago.  On a recent trip, I was dismayed to see the extreme development of Boston, complete with condos on the Harbor.  I traveled with a friend from Mexico who loves to point out how America doesn’t have anything comparable to the colonial jewels of Taxco or Morelia.  This was my chance to prove him wrong and I failed.  The old places were still there, but they were just dots on a very modern landscape.  I had remembered a very colonial, ancient town.  What I found was modern city with a handful of museums and a beautiful church at its center, Trinity,  still locked in a battle with John Hancock Tower for its life.

Because Boston was the first trip I had taken outside of the Southwestern United States, I guess I must have created some imaginary land that really only existed in the plane of my extreme nostalgia.  Yes, I still love Boston, but like most American cities, it is constantly being reborn.  The old is replaced by the new.  The people are changing color.  The blue-bloods that I once had revered as being sensible liberals with old-money class, were probably closer to snobs than I had first surmised. I didn’t notice the divisions by class and color.  I was much to busy visiting the home of Paul Revere.

Such is the myopia of the youthful traveler.  We see what is on the tourist map and usually not much more.

Over the years, I have kept up a bit with the changing Boston area.  My good friend ended up organizing Brazilian immigrants in Framingham.  He shared many stories with me.  Brazilians, it turns out, are the Mexicans of New England (though there are also many actual Mexicans these days).  They are the objects of scorn, fear, and hatred there.  Many of them are undocumented. Another friend of mine did some undercover reporting for the Southern Poverty Law Center.  He shared details about an organized anti-immigrant movement in New England, one that I truly would previously have never believed existed.

All these thoughts came to mind this week as news articles like this one about William Lantigua’s resignation as State Representative, began flooding my news feed.   I initially ignored the story.  The gist that I got from it was that he had promised that if he ran for Mayor of Lawrence, MA and won, he would resign as State Representative.  He decided not to resign.  While of course this presents a conflict of interest, I did not seem like big news to me.  I mean, seriously, you call that corruption Massachusetts?  I’ll see your “Lantigua” and raise you a “Rod Blagojevich.”  But until now, I didn’t pick up on the other issue that was causing a lot of the ruckus: race.  Mr. Lantigua is the  first elected Latino (Dominican) Mayor in the history of Lawrence (history of Massachusetts?).  A glance at some of the comments at the Boston news sites sheds some light:

I think it was a dumb idea to try hold on to both positions.  With the anti-immigrant–perhaps, anti-Latino–sentiment permeating the country, Lantigua and other Latino officials need to be above reproach.  I have said this many times with regard to corrupt Latino politicos in Chicago as well as adultery scandal seekers such as Loretta Sanchez in California.  Lantigua, so far, seems to be on the tame end of corruption and/or conflicts of interest.  But anti-immigrant and anti-Latino forces have already smelled blood in Massachusetts.  Lantigua  must move forward with squeaky clean steps.  He owes it to himself and to the people of Massachusetts–especially Latinos– who look to him for leadership.