Posted on 06/13/2025 2:14:49 PM PDT by CardCarryingMember.VastRightWC
They got their freedom from Spain. Then they just went nowhere. Should have split long ago.
A major reason was the motivation of the original immigrants. The English places - US, Canada - were settled mostly by middle & lower class farmers & their families who wanted to build a better life by working very hard on the land.
But the Spanish countries were mostly settled by soldiers who hoped to get fabulously wealthy without having to lift a finger. The Conquistadors initially came hoping to acquire gold & silver by the ton & take it home to Spain to live happily ever after.
But there wasn't enough of that for all of them to get wealthy, so the next best thing, which large numbers of them did, was to stake out claims to land farmed by local Indians (who were not much different than slaves), build a huge Hacienda, marry the prettiest Indian girl they could find, and if not being hugely wealthy, then at least living an indolent life of leisure on the backs of others.
My understanding is that their descendants 500 years later are still to be found in several hundred families who control the vast majority of wealth in Mexico. And similarly in other nations of the region.
The problem with having a tiny class of elites who control most of the wealth, while the vast majority of the population lives in poverty, such that there is no prosperous middle class of significant size in between the uber rich & uber poor classes, is that this has historically been the benchmark of all non-wealthy, non-free societies.
Ok
Michener was OK. ‘Goodbye to a River’ by John Graves was spectacular.
Nobody will ever beat ‘ Grapes of Wrath’ though.
“Adios”
The items from the book “Caribbean” may be right on the reasons why Spanish conquered lands had different outcomes from English conquered lands. But if I was to have to put money on it, I’d say it was more because of religious differences that happened later that resulted in better outcomes for the U.S. For whatever reason, the First Great Awakening and Second Great Awakening impacted the English speaking Protestant world more than the Catholic world, perhaps for the reasons you posted. Until that point, both European descendant groups were pretty harsh on the non-whites around them and on the lower class whites.
From the future to the past;
Hamas can kiss my a$s!!
I call them DemoNrats.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.