Referencing New York Times beseller, “Forget the Alamo: The Rise and Fall of an American Myth,” Seminole Democrat (at Daily Kos) offers a revision to the revisionist history Texans sell themselves. It is worth a read. But here, in brief, is the blurb from Penguin Press:
Every nation needs its creation myth, and since Texas was a nation before it was a state, it’s no surprise that its myths bite deep. There’s no piece of history more important to Texans than the Battle of the Alamo, when Davy Crockett and a band of rebels went down in a blaze of glory fighting for independence from Mexico, losing the battle but setting Texas up to win the war. However, that version of events, as Forget the Alamo definitively shows, owes more to fantasy than reality. Just as the site of the Alamo was left in ruins for decades, its story was forgotten and twisted over time, with the contributions of Tejanos–Texans of Mexican origin, who fought alongside the Anglo rebels–scrubbed from the record, and the origin of the conflict over Mexico’s push to abolish slavery papered over. Forget the Alamo provocatively explains the true story of the battle against the backdrop of Texas’s struggle for independence, then shows how the sausage of myth got made in the Jim Crow South of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. As uncomfortable as it may be to hear for some, celebrating the Alamo has long had an echo of celebrating whiteness.
As Seminole Democrat tells it:
In the early 1820s, a newly-independent Mexico was attempting to colonize the vast lands of Texas (called Tejas at the time) as an economic strategy, and invited settlers to come and live there, as long as they paid import duties. Mexico abolished slavery in 1829, but the nation allowed an exemption in the Tejas region because of the outcry from the white settlers, whose entire economy was based on cotton and thus very dependent on slavery.
That is, until 1833, when Gen. Antonio López de Santa Anna was elected Mexico’s president. One of the first things Santa Anna did was abolish slavery in the Tejas region. For white settlers, this was a bridge too far. Stephen F. Austin, the so-called “Father of Texas,” wrote many letters to Mexican authorities about the importance of slavery for the Anglo settlers. William Travis’ letters about fighting for freedom get a lot of attention by Texan historians, but Austin’s letters speak about the settlers’ true concern:
“Nothing is wanted but money,” [Austin] wrote in a pair of 1832 letters, “and Negros are necessary to make it.”
American settlers in Tejas tried to circumvent the new law by converting enslaved people to lifetime indentured servants, but Mexico responded by passing a law saying such contracts could not last longer than 10 years. Mexico was a post-colonial nation founded on egalitarian principles, and Santa Anna was determined to enforce the end of slavery throughout Mexico, including in Tejas.
Myths are bigger in Texas too.
Seminole Democrat reminds readers that the current Republican governor is determined to preserve ahistory in Texas:
Instead of allowing critical thinking and a serious examination of the historical record, Gov. Abbott and his allies decided to go the despotic route and unilaterally declare the false mythology is now fact. In a move that critics decry as a pure expression of fascism, the Texas governor requires his “patriotic education” to be provided at state parks, landmarks, monuments and museums. Additionally, a pamphlet about Texas history, devoid of any negativity, is distributed to anyone who receives a Texas driver’s license.
As part of Republicans’ war against critical race theory, another new Texas law severely limits how teachers can address slavery, the Holocaust, or other “controversial” topics. The Texas law requires “multiple perspectives when discussing widely debated and currently controversial” issues.
Gina Peddy, executive director of curriculum and instruction for the Carroll Independent School District, recentlyaddressed teachers in a training session on what books they are allowed to have in classroom libraries. She conceded that teachers are “terrified” of the law, and offered advice, using an awful example with the Holocaust.
“And make sure that if you have a book on the Holocaust, that you have one that has an opposing, that has other perspectives.”
The only books that offer a “differing perspective” that the Holocaust was a good thing or didn’t happen are white supremacist, Nazi garbage. Yet the new Texas law demands that those viewpoints get represented.
American democracy is now a “widely debated and currently controversial” issue too, and thanks largely to Donald J. Trump, among Republicans from sea to shining sea. So it is hardly a surprise that Republicans are eagerly entertaining opposing perspectives on that.