Operation Wetback

            "The attitude of Mexican Americans toward the institutions responsible for the administration of justice - the police, the courts, and related agencies - is distrustful, fearful, and hostile. Police departments, courts, and the law itself are viewed as Anglo institutions in which Mexican Americans have no stake and from which they do not expect fair treatment. The Commission found that the attitudes of Mexican Americans are based, at least in part, on the actual experience of injustice."" So stated the United States Commission on Civil Rights in its 1970 report, Mexican Americans and the Administration of Justice in the Southwest. Why do many Mexican Americans feel such distrust, fear, and hostility toward institutions of justice? Why do many Mexican Americans expect unfair treatment under the law? What have been the experiences of injustice which have created such attitudes on the part of Mexican Americans?.
             Operation Wetback was a repatriation project of the United States Immigration and Naturalization Service to eradicate illegal Mexican immigrants from the Southwest. What was most alarming about Operation Wetback was the initial deception by the INS. One year before the implementation of Operation Wetback, the INS had launched a "friendly- public-relations effort in the Spanish-speaking communities. Immigration officials contacted community organizations such as CSO, ANMA, and LULAC, among others, and tried to present themselves as having a new policy toward undocumented Mexicans that involved helping them to achieve legal status. The officials claimed that these undocumented Mexicans could begin the process of legalizing their status if they could show that they would not be a public charge - for example, by presenting letters from employers or potential employers. As a result, thousands of mexicanos went and registered with the INS and given a permiso, to stay and work in the US.