Significant Spanish-speaking population in the U.S. and its ramifications

How do we get a demographically, culturally, and politically significant Spanish-speaking population in the United States, significant in the same sense as the French-speaking population is in Canada? (For example in this alternate U.S., I would envision Albuquerque as an entirely Spanish-speaking metropolis in the same vein as French-speaking Quebec City, while Los Angeles would be half Spanish and half English, more in the mold of Montreal) This would probably involve a POD around the time of the Mexican War but what would that POD be exactly? A larger Mexican cession? Less American settlement? Later POD's could be a successful annexation of the Dominican Republic by the Grant Administration and U.S. annexation of Cuba.

And what would be the cultural and political ramifications of a large Spanish segment of the American population, in terms of the development of an American national identity and in terms of the place of the Spanish population within that national identity? Where would this larger Hispanic community fit in the context of the larger racial dynamics of American history? Would English-speaking Protestant America view them with prejudice and animosity? Would they as a community be more inclined to side with African-Americans in TTL's Civil Rights movement? Or would the Spanish-speaking states in a bid for more autonomy, find common cause with the Southern states in seeking greater States Rights? Would the US eventually adopt a policy of Bilingualism like Canada did?

Could this TL see strong nationalist or even separatist tendencies in the Spanish-speaking areas, along the lines of OTL Quebecois nationalism? How would having Mexico as a neighbor affect the situation? And this being America, would these fissures of language and culture manifest themselves through armed conflicts and civil wars rather than referendums and constitutional accords (like in Canada)? What would such a United States look like by today?
 
How do we get a demographically, culturally, and politically significant Spanish-speaking population in the United States, significant in the same sense as the French-speaking population is in Canada? (For example in this alternate U.S., I would envision Albuquerque as an entirely Spanish-speaking metropolis in the same vein as French-speaking Quebec City, while Los Angeles would be half Spanish and half English, more in the mold of Montreal) This would probably involve a POD around the time of the Mexican War but what would that POD be exactly? A larger Mexican cession? Less American settlement? Later POD's could be a successful annexation of the Dominican Republic by the Grant Administration and U.S. annexation of Cuba.

And what would be the cultural and political ramifications of a large Spanish segment of the American population, in terms of the development of an American national identity and in terms of the place of the Spanish population within that national identity? Where would this larger Hispanic community fit in the context of the larger racial dynamics of American history? Would English-speaking Protestant America view them with prejudice and animosity? Would they as a community be more inclined to side with African-Americans in TTL's Civil Rights movement? Or would the Spanish-speaking states in a bid for more autonomy, find common cause with the Southern states in seeking greater States Rights? Would the US eventually adopt a policy of Bilingualism like Canada did?

Could this TL see strong nationalist or even separatist tendencies in the Spanish-speaking areas, along the lines of OTL Quebecois nationalism? How would having Mexico as a neighbor affect the situation? And this being America, would these fissures of language and culture manifest themselves through armed conflicts and civil wars rather than referendums and constitutional accords (like in Canada)? What would such a United States look like by today?

Los Angeles is half Hispanic *now.* http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/states/06/0644000.html And the current US Hispanic population is certainly "demographically, culturally, and politically significant." It is 16.9 percent of the US population http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hispanic_and_Latino_Americans; French Canadians are about 22 percent of the population of Canada. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_Canadian So the difference is not that great and in a few years the percentages will be even more similar.

Which is why I am puzzled by your post--*parts* of it seem to be a DBWI, whole other parts do not.

In any event, even if the Hispanic percentages in the US were higher, I do not see any substantial separatist movement. People come from Mexico to the US to get away from Mexico, not to make the US part of it.
 
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Los Angeles is half Hispanic *now.* http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/states/06/0644000.html And the current US Hispanic population is certainly "demographically, culturally, and politically significant." It is 16.9 percent of the US population http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hispanic_and_Latino_Americans; French Canadians are about 22 percent of the population of Canada. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/French_Canadian So the difference is not that great and in a few years the percentages will be even more similar.

Which is why I am puzzled by your post--*parts* of it seem to be a DBWI, whole other parts do not.

In any event, even if the Hispanic percentages in the US were higher, I do not see any substantial separatist movement. People come from Mexico to the US to get away from Mexico, not to make the US part of it.

What you're describing is the state of the Hispanic population in the U.S. today building up to the near future, what I'm trying to explore is a scenario in which the significance of Hispanic Americans comes about much earlier in the early to mid 19th Century (which is why I put it in Before 1900). While Hispanic Americans have always been present in American history, for much of the first two and a half centuries since the the United States absorbed the territories of the Mexican Cession (in addition to Spanish Florida and Louisiana), Hispanic Americans were relegated to the margins of American society by vast and overwhelming Anglo-American demographic domination. What if for some reason or another, that hadn't happened and a distinct Hispanic-American polity comparable to that of the French-Canadian one, had earlier evolved in the United States?

If I could use Wikipedia articles as well to illustrate my point with regards to my comparison with the French and their place Canada. There is an article listing the number of Hispanic Congressmen and Senators in U.S. History (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Hispanic_and_Latino_Americans_in_the_United_States_Congress), most of these Hispanic representatives come from within the last few decades, while a similar list of French-Canadian members of Parliament would probably be hundreds of times longer and would reach back into the earliest days of responsible government. Consider how much of Canadian history has been defined by the French-English divide; in America the historical divide is a racial one, between black and white and also a sectional one between North and South, but for TTL, imagine a Spanish component that could be considered distinct from these axes ("brown" as distinct from black and white, "Southwest" as distinct from North & South and of course "Spanish" as distinct from English-speaking whites and blacks).
 
The prequisite would be that the hispanic areas have an elite that is strong and determined enough to survive the transition. And they have to be learning quickly how the game is played. But the deck is stacked against them. They need to get local and regional political influence quickly, because anyone sent out from Washington will have a comet tail of crooks, speculators and strongmen out to steal their lands and possessions. They will still be considered second-class citizens, but if they are wealthy and powerful enough, the powers that be will hold their noses and deal with them.
 
How do we get a demographically, culturally, and politically significant Spanish-speaking population in the United States, significant in the same sense as the French-speaking population is in Canada? (For example in this alternate U.S., I would envision Albuquerque as an entirely Spanish-speaking metropolis in the same vein as French-speaking Quebec City, while Los Angeles would be half Spanish and half English, more in the mold of Montreal) This would probably involve a POD around the time of the Mexican War but what would that POD be exactly? A larger Mexican cession? Less American settlement? Later POD's could be a successful annexation of the Dominican Republic by the Grant Administration and U.S. annexation of Cuba.

And what would be the cultural and political ramifications of a large Spanish segment of the American population, in terms of the development of an American national identity and in terms of the place of the Spanish population within that national identity? Where would this larger Hispanic community fit in the context of the larger racial dynamics of American history? Would English-speaking Protestant America view them with prejudice and animosity? Would they as a community be more inclined to side with African-Americans in TTL's Civil Rights movement? Or would the Spanish-speaking states in a bid for more autonomy, find common cause with the Southern states in seeking greater States Rights? Would the US eventually adopt a policy of Bilingualism like Canada did?

Could this TL see strong nationalist or even separatist tendencies in the Spanish-speaking areas, along the lines of OTL Quebecois nationalism? How would having Mexico as a neighbor affect the situation? And this being America, would these fissures of language and culture manifest themselves through armed conflicts and civil wars rather than referendums and constitutional accords (like in Canada)? What would such a United States look like by today?

Number of native Spanish speakers in the US: 38 million (12%)

Number of native French speakers in Canada: 7 million (21%)

When you count non-native Spanish speakers, that number jumps up to around 50-60 million. There is a very significant Spanish-speaking population in the US. Miami, one of the largest cities in America, is completely dominated by Spanish speakers. A similar situation is going on in El Paso, Los Angeles, and San Diego.

And just like every other immigrant group to the US, they are being assimilated. There's no desire to ever break away and rejoin Mexico (and this ignores the fact that roughly half of all Latinos in the US are not even of Mexican descent).

Was this supposed to be a DBWI?
 
I'm really not sure that this is doable, given trends in history and geography. THe U.S. annexed what it did from Mexico precisely due to sparse population in those areas. If you want a substanrially Hispanophone U.S., and you don't feel that this could come be in the future, then I'd suggest a POD in which the U.S. eats up more of Mexico in 1848.
 
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