Mr. GARCIA. Well, in New Mexico it is quite different. Although tourism usually provides for a better general economy in other parts of the country, I would say that a look at the New Mexico situation shows that the poor normally do not get anything out of tourism. It seems that the business people receive the income. Mr. RESNICK. They do get the jobs eventually. Somebody has to work in these resorts and hotels. Mr. GARCIA. In New Mexico there is usually very little provided in terms of jobs for the poor. Our kind of tourism would be slightly different from other parts of the country. For instance, tourists coming into New Mexico, they usually buy things like jewelry and rugs and all of this and, of course, this is going to do some good for the rug weavers and the jewelrymakers, but we do not have such things as huge lakes and fancy resorts. The tourist that comes through New Mexico spends his money on the, shall I say, few tourist facilities that are available, and this goes into the pockets of the businessmen. Mr. RESNICK. I would like to point out that although there may, I would say, not be huge lakes in Scottsdale, Ariz., it is a big resort area. There are many people working there and sooner or later that tourist dollar trickles down to the guy running the little gas station on the corner. This builds up the economy. However, it would be a little while. Mr. GOODLING. You just made what I consider a very, very unusual statement on page 8. You say "education, therefore, seems to be defeating its own purpose by causing unnecessary and damaging tension." Now, who is responsible for the educational system? And if it is doing that, is it not time somebody changes the system? Mr. GARCIA. Many think it is high time, yes. Mr. GOODLING. Who is responsible for changing it? Mr. GARCIA. The department of education. Our State department of education. Mr. RESNICK. I would say to my distinguished colleague that we debated that on the floor of Congress not too long ago when we gave title III back to the States. This is the reason that I voted to keep it here in Washington, so that we could change situations like that. As you know, the minority and some of our other Members decided to give it back to the States and this is why you get statements like that. Mr. ZWACH. Mr. Chairman, of course, if it is not understood at the State level where the people know these things, it is certainly less understood here in Washington. That would be the way I size it up after a lifetime in education. Mr. RESNICK. And, I would say to my distinguished colleague that I disagree. Very often the best thing that could happen is for someone to come in from the outside and inject some new ideas. Mr. ZWACH. I think it is good for us to take a look at it and suggest something. Mr. RESNICK. Title III was designed to inject new life, to breathe new life into these moribund State education departments and what we did was to take title III and give it right back to the States. But continue. Mr. GARCIA. Roads in the forests which practically lead nowhere, coupled with failure to improve roads to the schools, does nothing for the improvement of their lives. A welfare system which prevents job seeking, stifles their initiative to add income to their families likewise oes them no good. It is the people and the villages themselves who ust gain the experience of planning for their own needs. Gov. David F. Cargo plans to come to testify before this subcomittee tomorrow, and will probably present the outline of a program rawn up by the people concerned aimed at the very roots of their social roblems. The U.S. Congress is urged most strongly to give serious onsideration and to take quick and far-reaching actions in the light of he present danger. In a most serious tone do we hereby make this ppeal. The possibility and even probability of extended guerrilla warare and overall social resentment on the part of these poor people is ot a melodramatic fantasy. This view comes from interviews, observaions, and a long study of the situation. Mr. RESNICK. I want to thank you for your statement. Without bjection, the appendixes will be entered into the record. (The appendixes referred to follow :) APPENDIX A [From the Santa Fe (N. Mex.) New Mexican, Oct. 27, 1966] NOT A LAUGHING MATTER It's unfortunate that we can't seem to laugh at the utterly futile and predoomed efforts of the Federal Alliance of Land Grants to establish a right to the old Canyon de Chama Land Grant. We can't laugh because our conscience is pricked. Under the law, the right these people claim does not seem to exist. Similar battles have been fought through the courts before-all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court-and the claimants have lost. But morally, the case is far less clear. When the United States took over the territory which includes what is now the State of New Mexico it agreed, under the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, to respect and protect the rights of the citizens which the Republic of Mexico was surrendering with the land. This treaty specifically guaranteed the status of old Spanish and Mexican land grants-some made to individuals and some to communities of Mexicans or Indians. A good many volumes could be written about what happened to those land grants. New Mexico came under Anglo-American law, and Anglo-American custom. These included property taxes, payable in cash. In New Mexico's barter economy of the 19th Century there was very little cash in circulation, and what there was was not generally available to the small farmers and wood cutters who owned the grants. Some of this ancestral property went on the auction block at tax sales. Some of it fell under the control of individual grantees who sold it (whether they had the right to or not) to buyers who put up the purchase price in good faith. Anglo-American immigrants, with hard dollars and a savvy of the law, built great empires from what had been land grant property. Some land grants ceased to exist except on the old maps. Others, like those set aside "forever" for villages shrank drastically. For example, the expanse of more than 50,000 acres guaranteed to Las Trampas became about 800 acres. Spanish and Indians alike quickly lost most of their land to the settlers from the East. Fortunately for the Indians, the injustices done to them were of national Scope-ranging from Florida to the Pacific Northwest-and thus produced national sympathy. But while the Indians at Picuris Pueblo benefited from pangs of remorse and prevailed in their claims, the settlers next door at Las Trampasvictimized equally by laws they neither made nor understood-got nothing at all. As we understand the complexities of the many legal decisions rendered in Spanish land grant cases, the heirs and descendants of the grant holders are out of luck. Technically, our treaty obligations seem not to have been violated in some cases, and in others were violated too long ago to permit legal relief. But behind the legal technicalities we are confronted with the shameful fact that the United States of America made a solemn promise and failed in many instances to honor the obligation of that promise. People who were guaranteed the pereptual (and often tax-free) right to the use of ancestral lands have lost that right and the United States, which assumed an obligation to protect them, did nothing to honor its pledge. Land Grant heirs are asking that a federal commission investigate this situ tion and right this old injustice. Whatever the technicalities of the law, we think the national conscience would rest easier if this were done. APPENDIX B BUREAU OF BUSINESS RESEARCH STATISTICS FOR NORTHERN NEW MEXICO COUNTIE (Taos, San Miguel, Rio Arriba, and Mora Counties) Number of such females who are unemployed (7.8%). 3,95 Welfare: From 14 to 26 weeks (17.2%) 13 weeks or less (18.9%)‒‒‒‒ Persons under 21. Number of cases receiving AFDC payments (August 1960) – 67 7 8,2 4 1,2 Persons aged 65 and over__. 1.3 Number of persons receiving old-age assistance (August 1960). Number of such persons with less than 8 years education (45.5%) -- 3,2 Selective Service: Persons aged 18 to 25 who were examined by Selective Service___. 1 1 Health: Births per year-- 5 Deaths per year of infants under 12 months (3.8%) --- Housing: All housing units__. 4,8 Number of housing units which are substandard (37.2%) Number of cases receiving AFDC payments (August 1960). Persons aged 65 and over_. Number of persons receiving old-age assistance (August 1960) –– Education: Total number of persons ages 14 and 15. Number of such persons enrolled in school (97.6%). Total number of persons ages 16 and 17---- Number of such persons enrolled in school (79.7%). 4, 253 638 1,990 266 6, 900 704 1,279 1, 356 506 1, 390 2,065 847 978 947 968 855 10, 749 Number of such persons with less than 8 years education (48.3%) --- 5, 194 Selective Service: Persons aged 18 to 25 who were examined by Selective Service*. Number of housing units which are substandard (27.9%) ---. Number of cases receiving AFDC payments (August 1960) Persons aged 65 and over_. Number of persons receiving old-age assistance (August 1960). 'See Mora County. 82-388-67-10 24, 193 24, 193 5, 057 2,539 988 899 652 3, 889 672 1,255 103 5, 394 628 712 12, 885 570 1,569 1,584 868 Education: Total number of persons ages 14 and 15. Number of such persons enrolled in school (77.3%). Number of such persons enrolled in school (69.2%). Number of such persons with less than 8 years education (48.9%). Persons aged 18 to 25 who were examined by Selective Service____. Health: Births per year. Deaths per year of infants under 12 months (3.6%) --. Housing: All housing units__. Number of housing units which are substandard (55.8%). 1,088 876 950 695 10, 216 Population: Total population-- Population living in rural areas (100%). Family income: Total number of families. Total number of families with income: Less than $3,000 (68.9%). Less than $1,000. From $1,000 to $1,999 From $2,000 to $2,999 Unemployment: 6, 028 6, 028 1.249 861 316 284 261 Number of cases receiving AFDC payments (August 1960). 201 563 Persons aged 65 and over__ 584 Number of persons receiving old-age assistance (August 1960). Number of such persons with less than 8 years education (57.2%) --- 1,487 Selective Service: Persons aged 18 to 25 who were examined by Selective Service__ Number of housing units which are substandard (52.4%) --- *Statistics given for selective service are Mora-San Miguel Board totals. |
