Borders of Violence and Justice
Mexicans, Mexican Americans, and Law Enforcement in the Southwest, 1835-1935
By Brian D. Behnken
334 pp., 6.125 x 9.25, 14 halftones, notes, bibl., index
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Paperback ISBN: 978-1-4696-7012-6
Published: November 2022 -
Hardcover ISBN: 978-1-4696-7011-9
Published: November 2022 -
E-book EPUB ISBN: 978-1-4696-7013-3
Published: October 2022 -
E-book PDF ISBN: 979-8-8908-6322-5
Published: October 2022
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Awards & distinctions
Honorable Mention, 2023 Theodore Saloutos Book Prize, Immigration and Ethnic History Society
The long history of the border region between the United States and Mexico has been one marked by periodic violence, but Behnken shows us in unsparing detail how Mexicans and Mexican Americans refused to stand idly by in the face of relentless assault.
About the Author
Brian Behnken is professor of history at Iowa State University. He also holds affiliate faculty positions in the U.S. Latino/a Studies and African and African American Studies Programs. He is the author of Fighting Their Own Battles: Mexican Americans, African Americans, and the Struggle for Civil Rights in Texas and the editor of Civil Rights and Beyond: African American and Latino/a Activism in the Twentieth-Century United States.
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Reviews
“Compellingly argue[d]. . . . Challenging popular myths that vigilantism emerged in the absence of functioning legal institutions, Behnken demonstrates that extralegal violence in fact operated with and through law enforcement across the decades of his study.”—The Western Historical Quarterly
“Behnken has delivered a book that operates at the intersection of policing, extralegal violence, civil rights, and empire—adding a much-needed corpus of knowledge about law enforcement in the Southwest.”—Journal of Arizona History
“The foundations of the Southwest are tainted with blood that Brian D. Behnken painstakingly makes visible, recognizing and substantiating the generational trauma experienced by Mexican Americans to this day.”—H-Migration
"Offers a well written and much needed examination of the ways the Mexican-origin community contended with law enforcement in the US . . . . impressive in its scope and succeeds in demonstrating how racism became institutionalized in police forces in the borderlands . . . . timely."—Pacific Historical Review
"As our nation continues to witness increased police violence, it is imperative that we turn to sound scholarship to understand its long history in order to find ways to combat it. Behnken examines historical patterns of violence that too often involved the false idea of a lawless frontier to justify the elimination of so-called bandits, almost always of Mexican origin. Borders of Violence and Justice reminds us of this painful past as well as the various ways in which communities sought to address both nonstate- and state-endorsed violence. This historical synthesis will be of great value to the general public and policy makers alike—it has the potential to effect real change, if only those lessons from the past are taken seriously."—Sonia Hernández, Texas A&M University
"Brian Behnken gives us a rare look into the convoluted history between ethnic Mexicans and the U.S. criminal justice system. Behnken writes of power, colonization, and control, which invites the reader to recognize the origins of systemic racism and inequality aimed at Mexicans, Mexican Americans, and other minoritized groups. This study fills a major gap in both Mexican American historiography and public knowledge of how ethnic Mexicans engaged in a tug-of-war with our criminal justice system."—Miguel A. Levario, author of Militarizing the Border: When Mexicans Became the Enemy